Just a Hard Day

Today was a very long, hard day. I do not want to go into serious details, but it all went awry about 9:30 this morning when I asked the kids to help get ready for our 10:45 house showing. Then it just seemed to get worse from there. I tried to make things feel better by getting some junk food. (That didn't help, but since I have forgotten that tomorrow is Easter, I am really glad to have cake and ice cream in the house. The Easter egg hunt will have to be next week. But that is okay, because we often do it a week late so we can buy more stuff for half the price. ) Well the kids being very difficult this morning just set off some negative pregnancy hormones in me because everything bothered me from that point on. Little things that I usually take casually really bothered me. I nearly cried when John stepped on and broke a sprinkler head. (They are actually not that much money.)

Then the kids fought for about an hour and a half straight in the afternoon and then I just lost it. I put the kids to work and I told them that they were grounded from playing because they couldn't do so without fighting. After we worked for a couple of hours things calmed down for a bit and we had dinner. Then I decided to do another house repair. I filled in a hole in the fire place. I thought that it would be easy, but apparently it meant starting a fire. So then the kids went outside to get sticks and tracked mud all over the living room carpet. Anya and Rachel would not leave the fire place alone and got soot all over their freshly bathed hands and faces. Then Adam, Johnny, and Ruth would not come in for scriptures. So I really did lose it again. Eventually, I got them all into bed. I decided to hang a new blind up in my bedroom. Not too long after I had started I realized that I had not given Anya her antibiotic. I decided to go ahead and give it to her. When I went into her room Rachel said, "I pooped my pants." Indeed she had, and had even begun to play with it. This time, I decided I was absolutely going to behave myself. I very kindly and with a soft voice cleaned her up and put her back to bed. After that I spent about an hour screwing in six screws to get the blind up. Now I am done, and I am so glad that today is over and I do not have to live this day ever again. I think that all of my kids feel the same way. I feel bad because I know that I yelled too much and definitely over punished. But the day is done and we do have tomorrow to try again.