Baaaad Mama

First off...I'm sorry that I missed Try it Tuesday this week. I've been really busy/stressed with a YW event plus all the kids things that come at the end of the school year. Which brings me to the purpose of this post. Ugh.

Have you ever felt like a complete and utter failure as a parent? Ever done and said the wrong things to your kids? Of course not you say! It's just meeeeeee.

Here's how it went down:

This morning I woke up after the kids. That was mistake #1. But heck, I was tired and don't I deserve a little sleeping in-age once in awhile? Anyway, I got up and went into the kitchen to get a drink. I saw a huge mess & it hit me the wrong way today. The last straw was seeing a package of hot dogs opened and it seemed like the person that opened them felt like they just didn't have the energy or care to put them away. So Mama was on the war path. I asked each kid (minus Ava of course) if they had left them out. "No". "No." "No" and "No". Enter Monster Mom. I lost it (not completely, but enough to have them all looking at me like I was a Mom from H-E double hockey sticks). This seemed like a re-run of a problem that has happened before. Not with hot dogs, but with something else just as annoying. No one would own up to the fact they they were too "busy" to put the item away. So I put each of them in ground-age mode until the guilty party came forward. It worked. Molly came forward after a bit and confessed. She apologized to everyone and cleaned up her mess. I thought she learned her lesson on that one, but here we were in the same boat again.

Molly insisted that SHE wasn't the culprit of leaving out the spoiling hot dog package. "It's not me this time! Honest!", she exclaimed. After some fit throwing (by all of us), I made them all sit at the dining room table until someone decided to own up to their "forgetfulness". They sat and sat with some more fit throwing and stomping of feet. I just couldn't believe we were back to this again!

Enter Dad. He was still sleeping until he heard all the commotion. He gets the low-down on the problem and sheepishly walks into the kitchen asking if the hot dog package was the one right by the toaster. Mom silently starts to feel the fire moving to the top of her head ready to explode. DAD left the hot dog package out the previous night just before he went to bed. He explained that he was too tired and forgot to put them away. GRRRR.

I really earned the Bad Mom award today. It's just like my kids to eat hot dogs in the morning. It's just like my kids to leave out the package until I remind them to put them away. But Mom is the one who really did the wrong thing by throwing my little fit. Dad left the stinky little things out and did apologize to all of us, but I needed to apologize to the kids now. I had a "quiet" talk with Dad about setting a good example all the while knowing that I was the one who needed to set a better example!

I also learned a lesson about not following through with teaching the kids to clean up after themselves in the first place. I lack in that area. Mostly, I do have them take responsibility, but I still find myself cleaning up after them sometimes instead of making them clean it up themselves. It just seems easier to do it myself at times. Wrong-o. I just made it harder on myself in the long run right?

You would think I would have learned from all those Love & Logic classes that I took this year.

I'm off to repent now.

Have a good weekend!