Sometimes We All Like Each Other at the Same Time

By: Mia L. Hazlett

3/19/12

This past weekend was one of those weekends that was just essential in my family’s survival to not kill each other.  We all got along.  It is very rare for all three of us to spend from Friday through Sunday night together without a spell of crying, fighting, biting, kicking, or “go away little people.”  Nope it didn’t happen.  I got home Friday and we went right out to Papa Gino’s and got some pizza.  Then it was off to Home Depot because my youngest wants to do her own Duck Tape thing.  I talk about this business in my Get a Job post.  We walked through the parking lot laughing, pushing, hitting,  and punching.  Hey, that’s just how we get down.  Kidding!  Pushing is for out-of-state license plates (my youngest just hits you and says nothing.) You’re supposed to call the state of the plate, she calls out that she’s hitting you.  We saw Connecticut and Florida, the pushing and hitting began.  Then the Volkswagen bonus drove by, “Punch buggy!”  Then it was time to be mature, said my oldest, not me, because we were in the store still pushing.

We found the tape and I let them do the self-checkout.  For me, any chance I get to use a self-checkout I make them use it.  It calls out the price.  My youngest got a larger roll, but it was a solid color.  My oldest got a smaller roll, but it had a tiger design.  When the price was stated, she stopped and looked at the screen, “Hey, why is mine more expensive?  This thing messed up.”  I explained the difference, gave both of them some money to insert.  Then I made my oldest tell me how much change she was going to get back.  She was off by a cent, my youngest was off by, “almost five thousand dollars.”

We got home and crawled on my bed to watch Puss in Boots, none of us made it through it.  Saturday brought St. Patrick’s Day.  In my youngest’s mind, it was all about her Uncle Pat.  We ate pancakes at about lunch time, followed by sign-ups for softball at the library and errands.  We returned home and they played Barbies and I did laundry.  At some point I crashed on my bed, waiting for the dryer to finish a load.  They didn’t bother me once in that two hours. When I went upstairs my oldest was adding to her line of Duck Tape products, earrings and handbags.  We had stopped at Michael’s craft store and she had picked up the earring things (I don’t know what you call them, but now she can make earrings.)  She opened up her product binder and added it to her list.  My youngest was watching Blues Clues.  There was no fighting and no tattling as I stood in the room a bit shocked.

After dinner we attempted Puss in Boots again, but I was not trying to host a slumber party again, so I kicked them out.  They willingly left and I tucked them in with kisses.  I caught up on my reading and knocked out.  I awoke to a kick in the stomach at about 2am by my youngest, who was in the middle of me and her sister. I didn’t have the energy to kick them out.  The morning was peaceful and brought about a warm day.  Outside they went, and mommy went and got the tools.  I had to fix a problem training wheel.  That’s right, Mommy has skills! They played outside most of the day, while I did laundry.  But not only was I able to wash, dry, and fold the clothes, but I felt nice and put all the clothes away (that’s usually their job.)  This rarely happens all in one day.

The dreaded part of the day came.  I had to unbraid twenty something braids from my youngest’s head.  This is usually a screaming and fighting match, because she hates to get her hair done.  There were a few ouches, but she was busy with Duck tape.  My oldest joined in and we had all the braids out in less than an hour.  After dinner, I attacked the mane.  It’s not a fun

job, but I had to do it.  Amazingly, there were few tears through the washing and the flat- ironing process.  We all shared in some cupcakes and then off to dreamland to start our new week.  Sometimes I just need to have a whole bunch of nothing and a lot of pushing, hitting, and punching in a parking lot, to have a good weekend.