A little vignette...

Evan is still sleeping upstairs, since I did my cool James Bond stealth roll away and dive under the bed thing and he didn't wake up...

I thought I'd present a little vignette of a day at the pool for the mother of a 2 1/2 year old and an 8 week old. Hey, it made Sarah laugh...

So I'm going to meet friends at the pool. You wouldn't think this would be such a tough thing to do. And it isn't, if you're willing to put up with some slight changes to the usual. On this particular day, this was my third morning waking up to no shower, per Evan's mildly eccentric wake up time. So I pulled my greasy hair into a ponytail and put a ball cap on my nasty head. I loaded up the boys and got them to the pool. I arrived and saw the other moms... most in tankinis with matching skirts, etc. And I looked down and noticed what I was wearing:

- a red bathing suit with breast milk stains on it from the last time I nursed at the pool. I hadn't noticed or remembered that I hadn't washed it. So I decide to keep my t-shirt on, which was...
- the last clean t-shirt in my drawer, a 12-year-old beauty I got at an abstinence rally. Yes, folks, I had "we're going to save sex until marriage" on my back at the kiddie pool.
- And to top it off, there were smudges of mascara still left under my makeupless eyes.

But, hey, I was there!!! With both kids, and Seth was having a great time in the kiddie pool, dumping cupfuls of water on himself.

I successfully nurse the baby by a complicated arrangement where I use a beach towel to cover up, while another mom keeps an eye on Seth, who's occasionally looking up and mouthing a plaintive, "Mommy? Mommy?" But lunch time is creeping up. I dig in my bag, looking for something to give Seth. I come up with a bag of stale cheerios. And realize I can't find a diaper for Evan. And then pray he doesn't decide to poop.

So there Seth sits, on his beach towel, eating cereal out of a bag, while the other moms around me are breaking out tiny plastic containers of fresh watermelon and macaroni and cheese. Did I mention that I've got him out of his swim trunks and diaper, and he's been changed into... a generic Walmart diaper and plastic shoes. Because I didn't bring a change of clothes. Hey, it was hot. Who needs clothes to get back and forth to the car? You're just going in the house to eat lunch and nap anyway, right?

We head home after "snack," and get there a little late. Seth is asking me what he can have for lunch there in the backseat. I get him home, plop him in his high chair, make him a peanut butter sandwich, and race upstairs to take off my wet bathing suit. The baby wakes up in his car seat and starts crying as I start to undress. Of course. I throw on the closest thing to me, a nursing nightgown. Or shall I say, attempt to throw it on. I'm still wearing my baseball cap, so that's not working so well. I eventually knock the cap off, get the gown on, and race downstairs to the red faced, sweaty baby who desperately wants my attention.

I go to get Seth's milk out of the fridge and when I pick up the cup, I still feel the ice rattling around in there. From the water cup I'd carefully created for our trip to the pool. Which meant he must've drunk hot milk at the pool from the wrong sippy cup. Which meant that I then said a prayer that he wouldn't get horribly sick and throw up. Which He didn't, because God is good.

So we're alive and well, and we made it to the pool and back. But I know now why I don't go to the swimming pool by myself much these days... =)