The work of motherhood

Polly Geal - 8 Mar 16

My day started with a lego creation slammed into my face. When I took a shower I had a 4 year old sitting on the loo doing a poop in the room with me. And on the way to preschool there were two fairly major meltdowns to tend to. As I left the house later this morning to go and meet a friend for coffee, our little bird had a tantrum to end all tantrums. She was hyperventilating, so much so, I got her out of the car seat and went back inside to calm her down for a bit before trying again. After school pick up I realised we had no food in the fridge to fudge a dinner, so I wrapped two little humans up once more in a million layers and ventured to the shops for supplies, (beans on toast to be more specific). While we were on our way to the shops, the big kid fell off his scooter and took a tumble. There were tears for a good while and an outright refusal to get back on the horse, so I carried the scooter in one hand whilst pushing the pushchair in the other.

At bath time the big kid was distraught that the hook had come off of the little piece of string attached to his playmobil dinghy. For a few minutes there, the world almost ended but by some stroke of luck I retrieved said hook from under a pile of clothes on his bedroom floor and tied it back on in its rightful place. I was hit in the head a number of times while I wrestled two little bodies into their pajamas tonight. And after resettling both kiddos into bed about 5 times, I finally made it downstairs (back to the sanctuary), to find the whole room covered in toast crumbs and beans, and bits of brio train track and tiny cut out shapes of glitter card from a rather camp preschool creation. There were 3 basket full loads of laundry to be dealt with (there are still 3 basket loads of laundry to be dealt with), and a hundred tiny bits of lego to be scooped up off the floor.

I’ve just sat down. I have a bottle of beer sitting next to me and a pizza in the oven. My body aches from lifting a 2 stone, and a 4 stone being up and in and out and up and down and over and over again. My brain is exhausted from the emotional roller coaster that is raising small humans. I can’t remember the last night I slept without being woken. My dungarees are stained with beans on toast. My list of to dos is no shorter tonight than it was this morning. The husband is now on his 4th night away on business and I think our loo is blocked because every time I go into the bathroom the bowl is full of tissue paper.

I’m not sure why I am sharing all this with you here, I guess I just wanted to make a mental note to myself to book a day off from the slog sometime soon and lie in the bath until I turn into a raisin and read a book for an hour in peace and go on a walk without a pram or a tantrum in sight and see a friend for a cocktail, and all that jazz!

On the plus side, I have a beer next to me and a pizza in the oven and two of the sweetest homemade mother’s day cards on the shelf over there that make me feel a little bit better about my day.

Oh hang on a minute… I hear murmuring upstairs. I think I might have spoken too soon….

About the author:

Polly is a professional baby and family photographer from London. You can see her work here: www.littlekin.co.uk

She also blogs at www.amodernmama.co.uk

Instagram: @polly__loves

Polly Geal

Mother to two, wife to one, blogger and photographer. Photography work: www.littlekin.co.uk

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