Fifty Hours Flying Solo

I’ve just spent 50 hours solo with the kids.  The last adult I spoke to face to face (save for a man at the park who blamed Peppa Pig* for the fact that D&Z were jumping in muddy puddles) was my neighbour at 6pm on Friday.

One of the hardest things about being a lone wolf mama, is that a lot of the time, there’s no-one coming home, no-one to take them off your hands for five minutes, no-one that you can vent to about what little shits the pair of them have been.  Since I’ve had my two, social media has been the place that I vent.  So won’t you sit back and humour me, while I tell you about the lowest point of our weekend?

We did very little yesterday, save for a trip to the supermarket, so today I decided to be a good mum and take them to the park.  Nothing – and I mean nothing – fills me with dread more than getting them ready to leave the house.  It brings out their full scale toddler twatishness.  And they outnumber me.  I cannot possibly win. 

Today, the usual happens: Zachary refuses to try to do a wee.  He does not need a wee.  Oh no.  Absolutely does not need a wee mummy. Daisy refuses to put her snow suit on. I tell her fine, we’ll leave her behind. Daisy puts her snowsuit on and then insists on putting her nighty on over it.   Zachary, at this stage, hasn’t even got pants on, so he gets my attention for now.  After some strategic use of my hostage negotiator voice, Zachary puts pants, trousers, a jumper, a snow suit and his wellies on. 

Then tells me he needs a wee. 

We go to the toilet.  We take off all of the clothes I’ve just put on him and he does a wee.   He tries to run away.  I wrestle him to the ground and get him dressed again.

Daisy is still trying to put the nighty on.  I try to wrestle it out of her grip and fail.  I tell her she can wear it when we get home.  Nope.  I briefly consider letting her wear it, but I’m just too embarrassed.  I wrestle her again, and this time I win. 

I chuck the nighty up out of her reach and commence the wellies battle.  I put Daisy’s on first.  She wants to put them on the wrong feet. I wonder what in God’s name I did wrong in a former life to deserve this.  I don’t even want to go to the fucking park.  I’m doing this for them, the ungrateful bastards.  I tell her she can put them on the wrong feet if that’s what she wants.  She does.

I turn to Zach.  He’s been systematically destroying the living room while I’ve been arguing with Daisy.  He’s pulled the last remaining door off his toy kitchen (it was only a matter of time) and has spread the contents of his money box all over the floor.  He’s also taken his boots off.  On the outside, I sigh.  On the inside, I flick him the finger.  I put the boots back on him. 

I pick up my bag – my shitty, battered, grey and lumo yellow mum rucksack that is functional and nothing else -  open the door and stand on the doorstep.  47 minutes have passed since I first started getting them ready to leave.  We’ve got this far – they think they’ve broken me but they’re wrong.  Their resistance has only strengthened me and, car keys jangling in hand, I tell them we’re going.

They don’t give two hoots.  They both ignore me.  I turn to pick Daisy up.  She smacks me in the face and Zach pings a ball at my head.  I count to ten.  I tuck Daisy under my arm, like a very cute but very angry piglet, and carry her to the car.  I do what every good parent does, and tell her that if she gets in the car like a good girl she can have a bag of Haribo.  She does.  I am winning.

I go back to get Zach.  He picks up the dolly’s highchair to bring with him.  I weep on the inside (and flick him the finger again).  I tell him really calmly that we can’t take the highchair with us because it won’t fit in the car, sweetie**.  He beams at me and walks out of the house, confident as can be, highchair tucked under his arm.  I tell him that if he brings the highchair he will never have Haribo again.   He drops the highchair and it falls into the front yard. I pick it up, lob it quite ferociously back into the house and pick him up.  I put him in the car while he smacks me in the face and roars with laughter.

I get in the car, rest my head on the steering wheel for a second, and then off we go.

We have a lovely time.

*I won’t hear a bad word said about Peppa.  Precocious she may be, but she has every right to be in my opinion, as she is quite literally one of the only things that can make both my children sit down and shut up for more than five minutes.  Peppa is golden in our house. 

**Twatface