Just Ordinary Busyness

Most afternoons when I get home, I settle in for a few minutes before making Olivia do her homework during the commercials while watching Cops Reloaded. I know. It’s weird that my seven year old loves that show so much. It’s also probably bad parenting that we let her actually watch it. Judge away if you will.

After homework is finished, I go start making dinner. More nights than now, I can be heard muttering, “Why do they insist on having dinner every. single. day?”

But last night when I got home, Tom informed me that Olivia was out of the mini muffins she eats for lunch every day. Not only were the mini muffins gone, but she’d also eaten her last blueberry pancake for breakfast that morning.

All this meant that instead of doing homework at the decent hour of 5:15, we needed to push it back so I could bake some mini muffins and flip some pancakes so she’d have something to eat for breakfast this morning.

After the muffins and pancakes were done, Olivia came in to hug me. During that hug, I discovered that her hair, which had been washed the night before, was crunchy.

I asked Tom what could have possibly gotten into O’s hair to make it crunchy.

He gave me a sheepish look and replied, “Oh yeah, I forgot to tell you that she coughed so hard this afternoon that she threw up all over the blanket, the floor and, yeah, her hair.”

So a bath was added to the schedule.

Some days, the stars align to make things a little harder than usual.

But after dinner, homework, bath and books, I medicated my poor little darling, rubbed her back and rocked her to sleep by 8:05. I feel so, so lucky that she still wants me to rock her. I know this won’t last forever and so I cherish it even on my most tired nights.