More Shame on Me

I'm not going to be standing at my mailbox waiting for my Mother of the Year Award to arrive.

Seven has been forgetting things this lately. This week he's left his lunchbox at school, left his reading homework at school, forgot his agenda (which has his homework assignments written in it), etc. That's not like him at all, but we went down this road (and are still driving circles on it) with Ten so I'm a little sensitive about this issue. I started out saying, "Oh baby, that's no big deal. We have an extra lunchbox and cold pack." The next day I tensed a little and said, "Well, you're going to miss recess tomorrow because you don't have your work done, but you can do better tomorrow."

By the third day I morphed into Mean Mommy. I yelled at him and made him cry. I should have my uterus repossessed.

In my defense, there's a bit of stress in the house this week. I'm leaving in a couple of hours to go out of town and any Mommy who's ever left home with Daddy in charge knows that there's a little prep work involved. You don't just grab a pair of jeans and drive off into the sunset, even when Daddy is a good man and the kids are old enough to get their own breakfast. Seven has a big project due today and I've been helping him work on it. He had to research a president (his was Jimmy Carter), make a poster about him, write and memorize a 2-3 minute speech about him (which he is NOT allowed to read) , dress like the president, and come up with some kind of visual aid to go along with all of it. He went to Logan's last night and sweet talked the hostess into a free bag of peanuts. He printed little labels about Carter, stuck them on 22 Ziploc baggies, and filled them with peanuts for his classmates. So, of course, I had to help.

Oh, and Ten is lobbying to bring home more frogs, more crabs, and some millipedes from his class. I'm totally okay with that because they're not much trouble and I can take them to work at my preschool, but the logistics are a problem because I'm leaving today and can't go to school to pick the critters up. SO, all that to say, the tension level was high and I snapped at him. And he cried Big Wet Tears of sorrow.

So I apologized, called another child to get the assignments (which Seven remembered on his own once he calmed down and stopped crying), and checked all of his homework. Then he said, "Mommy, is it okay if I draw a picture of you?" Picturing fangs, warts, and all nature of horrific images, I reluctantly agreed. This is what he drew:
Yes, that is a SUPER HERO cape on me, thanks for noticing. Did you notice how the "O" in "mom" is a heart? Pay no attention to the way my head is sitting on my right shoulder. Don't know what that's about. But do you know what he said to me? Ugh. The guilt. He said, "Mommy there's a box around everybody's heart inside their bodies to hold their heart in place and your heart is so big that it's about to bust out of the box. That's because you're such a good mommy."

I should be flogged.

But hey, did you notice how skinny he made my legs look? What a great artist, to capture my image in such a realistic fashion!