She's a mean one, Ms. Grinch

And then! Oh, the noise!
Oh, the Noise! Noise! Noise! Noise!
That’s one thing he hated!
The NOISE! NOISE! NOISE! NOISE!

You know, I have a certain sympathy for the Grinch at this point.

It has not been the best of days here at casa Ilona. It all starts with those damned hormones.

I have not been sleeping well the last few nights. There is no good reason for this. I'm all set for the holidays. My daughter's situation is settling down steadily. The husband is as wonderful as ever. When there are no good reason for insomnia, I blame hormones. Probably accurate in this case, given the night-overheating that's waking me up in the first place. Not quite sweats, but too hot for comfort. Peri-menopause sure do drag on, don't it?

So I have to blame fatigue for today. I started out by deciding I would not take my daycare charges outside. I was too tired to contemplate the snowsuits and the boots, the zippers, the velcro, the scarves and the mitts and, and, and... Too tired to imagine lugging them all down the stairs, and far, far, far too tired to imagine doing the whole process in reverse.

So I didn't go outside with them. Didn't give them their fresh air and exercise. Which means I was trapped inside a house with five under-exercised toddlers for hours and hours and hours. Under-exercised toddlers are energetic. They are lively. They are LOUD. Hours and hours of thundering feet and children who can't talk but must SHOUT their every utterance.  And they are toddlers. There are lots and lots and lots of utterances. But I persevere. Because it will end, eventually. I can do this.  The day will end, the children will go home to plague their parents, and I will have peace.

And then, just as the day is grinding slowly, slowly, slooooowly to its close, Adam (19) comes upstairs. He has a few friends coming over, prior to going out to celebrate a birthday.

"A few?"
"Yeah, about six or eight. Maybe eleven."

But it's not for another couple of hours. I'll have a small window of peace.

Just as I'm getting the wee ones ready to go home, Rebekah (15) comes home. With two friends. They are going to bake cookies. And of course, in order to do that, they need to turn the radio to HOTT 89.9 and CRANK IT RIGHT UP.

And then, my husband, my lovely, kind, sensitive husband who has been "working from home" at Starbucks, lovely, blessedly quiet Starbucks, for the past couple hours, walks in the door. I knew he was coming because the dog started racing from front door to living room window to dining window, racing and whining, her tail nearly rotating right off her body, so great was her excitement at the arrival of her Lord and Master. Racing from window to window, nearly knocking the tree over in the process.

Lovely husband takes one look at the mayhem -- thundering toddlers, rampant dog, shrieking teens, gawdawful 'music' -- and says, "I think I'll go watch TV in the attic for a while."

I'm about ready to take out a few Whos, myself.

Comments

[Katy]

I had a glass of wine with my lunch today. It was that or kill the kids. We have 8" of snow at our house in the hinterlands outside of Seattle (this is big news here) and the schools closed up on Wednesday and haven't re-opened so winter break started three days early. They're bouncing off the walls, in and out of the house tracking snow everywhere and just generally making me crazy.

Wine helps, pour yourself a glass when the toddlers go home! ;-)

[Ilona]

You are briliant! I will need it because I didn't mention the almost-16-inches expected this weekend (the papers are calling it "Snowmageddon", if you can say that without snorting your wine out your nose), AND the continuing bus strike.

Good lord. Counting the minutes till I can pour that glass! TGIF!

[Daisy]

We were hoping for a snow day today and didn't get one. Kids were bouncing off the walls, and I used the same quote from the Grinch!!

[Jerri Ann]

You know I owned a daycare last year at this time with almost 40 kids under the age of 5 and 3/4 of them were boys and the noise..omg, the noise was unbearable.

Now, I too am experiencing that wonderful joy of peri-menopause except....I had a hyster 4 years ago. The doc said he left me "1/8 of an ovary" and this week he informs that apparently that "1/8" decided to take a Christmas break...in the meantime, I am running around in below 35 degree temp in short sleeves and soaping wet hair from sweat complaining about the heat everyone seems to want on 90....whatever! Perimenopause can sucks it