Diary of an unconscious mother: Where's the party?

Today has been a day of ups and downs. Woken early. Middle of day sleep. Crazy evening. Late relaxing night. Insomniac awakening till wee hours. My body clock is doing a confused mumba.

I was woken at 5am by two girls who thought it was time to get up and seemed most surprised when I told them it was the middle of the night. (It was still dark. It's the middle of the night for me. OK!). They decided to stay up and watched tv downstairs whilst I went back to bed for an hour before feeding Millie back to sleep for another while. When it was obvious through noise and milk needs that I wasn't going to get any more sleep, I got up and made breakfast, cleaned the bombshell kitchen and then swept the bombshell living room into the middle of the room to make a massive pile of contained mess. (It's a very satisfying way of seeing the mess).

I decided to rest for a bit after that except Ellie decided she wanted to make money and chose cleaning the car for a £1. If you think it's a way of getting a bit of peace and quiet whilst they keep themselves busy, think again. I spent more energy filling tubs and sorting hoses and drying children and dealing with leaking hoses that had been fed through the house and were soaking the poppy room and consoling wet children and being unable to not be a perfectionist and leave them to it, that I was beginning to wish...well I was beginning to...try to realise the super extra connection bonus points I was amalgamating!! For sure!

Anyways, we finally relaxed about lunch time then hubby took the girls out for the afternoon and I slept. Well I watched my new funzoneout show Psych (can be hysterically funny) then slept.

The gang came back at 6pm and we got ready for going to Shul for Purim. It was all going so well until we arrived at the place and thought we'd either missed it or it was the wrong night. Turns out it was at a different venue. Signage would have been good. Typical us. Disorganised to the Nth. Anyway we found another Shul which is great considering they are slowly closing one by one. (Dwindling community).

We were barely sat down 5mins when Maia says she needs the toilet. Ellie says she doesn't but comes with us. So we all traipse, by traipse I mean up one flight and down two flights of stairs, to the toilet. Millie is with hubby downstairs ( it's an orthodox Shul so men and women are separated) so it's just me and the girls. After the toilet, Maia says she wants to go the crèche play room so whilst she is in there I take Ellie, who has changed her mind and has therefore unwittingly reduced my patience.

It's a bit of a disaster because Ellie has a sometimes irrational fear of toilets. But only certain toilets. It's hard to know which ones are scary. It's always a gamble. Lately it's been worse. My empathy today was not optimal I have to say. Oftentimes I feel she's hyped it up so much she has manifested it into a bigger fear. I can't understand how she can manage school and home and some toilet, but others not.

Anyway, I thought if I walked into the toilet cubicle first she would follow and feel safer but she didn't follow and then refused to round the corner to the toilets. I squeaked the noisemaker (Purim necessity) to let her hear where I was but she wouldn't move. I probably should have come out sooner and let her see me but I thought she could see me and as I said I wasn't being completely patient with her toilet fear today. After a minute or so shrieking, I got her. She then freaked and wouldn't leave the toilet then tripped and banged her knee running away from the toilet (because of her new trousers). At first I kind of freaked myself and said some not very comforting things, then I checked myself and calmed down and apologised.

She was majorly pissed off with me and rightly so. I wasn't very motherly about it all.

So then they decided they wanted to stay in the crèche and I had a 'we have come to Shul to hear the Megillah and make noise not play here' moralistic imposing moment and marched them back into Shul where Ellie moped and complained on one side of me, that she thought it was a party and she wanted to go home. Maia was complaining on the other side of me that she wanted to go to the playroom. Then down below Millie noticed me and started climbing off hubby to make her way to me. I have no doubt that she could have made it on her own. Somehow!! 5 flights of stairs and 4 sets of doors wouldn't have stopped her. I sent Maia halfway to fetch her. She had only been sat for 5 minutes when she said she needed the toilet. We are on day three of no nappies outside the house so we are honouring EVERY request for toilet. So we ALL traipse back to the toilet and I decide not to turn Shul into a horrible forced affair and tell the girls they can go to the playroom. Unfortunately, I had closed the door and we couldn't open it. So we all go back inside. We've not been sat for 5minutes when Ellie decides she wants to go downstairs to hubby (who has been comfortably sitting, not moving, in one place all this time). So we all traipse downstairs. I meet a mum with a newborn 'uterus ping!!' and we chat for a bit. It always amazes me when I see mothers out with their newborn less than a week after birth. I don't have the energy for that and also I'd much prefer to be at home skin to skin as much as possible that early on. Other kids? That's what Hubby is for!

Anyway, back up the stairs into the Shul again and the other two start wandering about exploring. It's a noisy service anyway (we have to make a lot of noise when the Rabbi, who is reading the story of Purim, mentions the bad mans name, to drown it out) so it's not too disruptive until Millie walks into a book holder on a pew and screams the place down. I'm done. I'm ready for home.

By the time the service is over and we go back downstairs (5 flights, 5 doors) and into the function hall, I am not in the best of moods and hubby notices I am not looking so happy and points it out. Helpfully. It's too much to explain so I just bark back 'NO. I'm not!' and we leave it at that.

Thankfully there is a bunch of soft play stuff in the hall so the kids have a blast and are busy. This gives me enough time to traipse back upstairs to find the missing crown and missing noisemaker.

Back home they fall asleep pretty easily since it's late but I on the other hand am wide awake (damn you afternoon nap) which turns into insomnia. If the girls wake at 5am again tomorrow I am not doing the toilet runs at the next Purim party.

Things I've learned today:-

- be more understanding of Ellie's fear. It's not worth the consequences.

- take ALL kids to the toilet as soon as arrive anywhere

- choose a Shul that has same level segregation (or none) and same level toilets!

- eating at 2am is always going to make you need the toilet at 4am

Here's a funny video from today of Riley playing with his ball and getting it stuck: