What goes up......it pours. And all that jazzy stuff.

I woke this morning to the single beep of my fire alarm announcing to me at 4:30am that it was in need of batteries. Of course it could not wait until noon.  That would make life too boring.  I vaguely registered the announcement and rolled over to try and pretend I didn't hear it. Maybe it would go away if I pulled the blanket over my head and wished really hard. It came again. And again.  I was so tired that I probably could have actually fallen back to sleep through the beeps had it not been for the dog trying to cram her big body under my bed in a panic.

Cherokee does not like the fire alarm and the single beep set her into a run even though it wasn't its normal loud and long shrill.  But it was a warning she could not ignore and came running for help.  Under my bed.  Like it would protect her.  Maybe she was thinking if she hid under the blankets too it would go away.  She spent a good 15 min trying to dig her way under and as I lay there desperately trying to fall back to sleep I felt like I was on a vibrating bed as she shook under it.

I gave up and turned the news on. I sat there for a while watching in mind numbness a news anchor tell the daily report and I realized I never set my alarm clock.  Here I am awake, watching tv and am now a good 10 minutes late because I was waiting for it to go off.

I stumble out of bed and get Megan up and get myself ready.  The fire alarm is still beeping and Cherokee is now hiding in my shower.  I take time that I do not have to unplug the alarm if not for her sanity then for mine.  Silence.  I tell Cherokee she can come out of hiding.......just in time for another one down the hall to go off too.  I am now VERY VERY late.

I do not have time to sweep the snow that fell last night off my car to take Megan to the bus stop and she has to make a run for it.  I am now running myself to get Delaney up and lunch made before my 1st daycare arrival.  I didn't make it.

The arrivals are coming one after another along with a ton of Valentines bags and gifts and I am still elbow deep in peanut butter and chips.  I rush everyone in and out, slap the sandwich in the lunch box, throw the lunch box in the backpack and take a breath.  Only to have Delaney cry that her teachers gifts for Valentines day were not ready to go.

Now I am normally on the ball with things like that.  Gifts bought and packed and wrapped and waiting often weeks ahead of time.  Only the gift she told her teacher she was bringing was end of the school year gifts! Not Valentines Day. She is crying because she cannot go empty handed now so I am running to find anything remotely close to a Valentines gift bag in between door bell rings. I find some Snowman bags with hearts on them and grab those along with tissue paper and throw them in her back pack too just as the bus is pulling up.

Now one would think that was the end but oh no.  Not really.  That would make life too boring remember.

I have someones bottle bag leaking milk all over my kitchen table, chairs and floor.  I unpack another and find one mom switched her childs lunch with hers and the toddler now has cheese enchiladas for lunch and mom has the chicken nuggets. I turn on the tv to it blaring an infomercial and cannot find the remote that Todd lost last night. A daycare child has arrived crying and spilled his cereal all over the floor.  And a baby has arrived with the mother announcing she is cranky. The baby that is.  Not the mother.

I clean up the milk, unpack the diaper bags, put the cheese enchilada in the freezer for a rainy day, lay the babies down for naps, take the left over gift wrap stuff downstairs, clean up the cereal, hide the squealing alarms,  find the remote, turn on Thomas the Train, grab my most healthy breakfast of......

......that someone so thoughtfully brought me for Valentines Day and said a prayer of peace.

"Lord give me strength.  And please make this doughnut make it all better"

It didn't.  But if felt sooooooooooo good going down.

Peace......

For now.

HAPPY VALENTINES DAY!