Parenting

My Very Chill Morning Routine

Please put your shoes and socks on.
Have you put on your socks and shoes?
Your socks are where they always are,
Your shoes are with the shoes.

The socks don’t match?
They’re inside-out?
The shoes don’t “feel like shoes”?

Who needs to match?
Any side out is fine.
Trust me those shoes are shoes.

SOCKS AND SHOES PLEASE! 
SOCKS AND SHOES!
First socks and then the shoes!

So this is my life now?
I just sit around and beg
For my kids to put on socks and shoes?

I once had goals.
Things I wanted to be.
So many possibilities I could barely choose!

I was gonna change the world!
Now my world…

Is fucking socks

And motherfucking shoes.

I'm a Teacher Now!

I’ve got some pretty cool news:
I’m a teacher now!
I know what you’re wondering, 
and NO, I don’t know how.

Is my first grader thrilled?
Nope, not a bit. 
She’s very strong-willed
and thinks my teaching skills are shit.

We’ve been practicing our lower-case. 
She says I do a’s wrong.
(I told you this one
was really headstrong.)

We tried to do some math.
It’s not how I remember.
She rolls her eyes and laughs at me.
I think I should suspend her!

She doodles when I’m talking.
She laughs when I instruct.
But she’s already learned a few new words.
Namely: shit, goddamn, and fuck.

A second language, just like that!
And it was only our second day. 
Now school is done and I’m back to mom.
A mom who needs to go practice her a’s.

Wine in My Bathroom

Merlot at a winery in the south of France
A cup of spiked punch at a high school dance

On the back of a boat sipping a margarita
In the Taco Bell parking lot with beer to wash down my Gordita

A vodka Red Bull at a club in 2005
A shot of Jameson at the local dive

Of all the fun places I’ve had a drink
I would simply never think

THAT THE ONLY THING I WANT IN THE WORLD TODAY:

Is wine in my bathroom

And for my kids to go away

Least Favorite Things (a sing-a-long!)

Stepping on a lego.
Forgetting my password.
Losing my car keys.
Forgetting the new password.
Why can’t my 3-year-old learn how to swing?
These are a few of my least favorite things.

The self-checkout line.
Forgetting the password I just changed it to.
My kid pooped in the bathtub.
I’ll just reset it and get another new password.
Legs out, legs in, it’s not that hard to swing.
These are a few of my least favorite things.

When the dog bites,
When the bee stings,
When I’m feeling sad,
I simply remember there’s weed gummies in my pocket,
And then I don’t feeeeeel so bad.
(Although I am totally locked out of my account now.)

A Two-Year-Old's Birthday

“Happy birthday, kiddo!
We got you this drum!”
Were the last words heard in my home.

Now it’s:
Bang bang bang.
Boom boom boom.
Bang boom. Bang boom.
Boom bang. Boom bang.
How fun.

What a fun fun fun toy.
So much darn fun.
He bangs the drum.
We hear the drum.
The neighbors hear the drum.
Strangers walking past our house hear the drum.
People who live down the street, around the corner, across the highway, right next to the construction zone hear the drum.

You can’t not hear this drum.
It’s. So. Fun.
So so so much darn
          -- BOOM BANG BOOM BANG BOOM --
                    Fun.

“Happy day-after-your-birthday, kiddo!
We got you this very soft and incredibly silent stuffed hippo!”

Let us never speak of the drum again.
 

Kid #2

Kid Number One got all the attention.
Classes and playgroups and that’s not to mention,

The toys!
Oh the toys, oh the hundreds of toys.
Kid Number One simply had TOO MANY TOYS!

A kitchen, a dollhouse, crayons galore.
Enough princess dresses to fill up ten drawers!

An easel, a ball pit, a bear that gives hugs.
Everything sold by Melissa & Doug!

So for Kid Number Two, what do we do?
“Hey buddy, mom’s tired. Go play with this shoe.”

Goodnight, House

Ahhhhh.
  Falling asleep to the dulcet tones of
    My screaming baby,
      My snoring husband,
        And the Roomba sucking up what sounds like an entire box of Cheerios.