Hi! <Waves>

Funny and honest tales from a made-to-work Dad of three, wobbling, graying, and laughing his way through parenthood. Armed to the teeth with Nerf guns, full of pie, fighting a chocolate addiction, but genuinely honoured to be at least half of Team Parents (yay!).
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6 June 2016

Who Gets the Lie-In?

It's half term. (Was).
There's no school for a whole week.
The morning madness is on hiatus for seven whole days. Yay!
So, as there's no rush. Which of Team Parents (yay!) deserves the lie in?
Me.

I suggest we bare-knuckle street fight to resolve this...
Mrs. Amazing: ‘OK’
Queensbury rules obv. <Starts removing collar>
Mrs. Amazing: ANDGO!' <Sucker punches me in the nose>
BOWWWWW! By BASN'T BEADY! <Nose is bloody> (#NotABloodySwear)
Mrs. Amazing: 'OK... Sure...' <Circles behind me>
<Does scissor kick and trips me>
<Leaps on my back and goes to grab the back of my hair>
<Grasps at thin air>
Mrs. Amazing: 'Ha ha! I just went to grab the back of your hair so I could slam your face into the floor!
<Pauses> Yeah? And?
Mrs. Amazing: 'But what hair! Ha ha'
Literally kicking me when I'm down... <Is outraged>
<Throws Mrs. Amazing off>
Mrs. Amazing: <Does diving elbow strike to regain ground> 'Those lie-in's are mine!!!'
[All kids watching the bloody battle] (#NotABloodySwear)
Miss5: 'Who do you think is going to win?'
Boy8: 'Mummy. Daddy's bigger, stronger, a semi-trained ninja...'
Boy8: '... But Mummy wants it more'
Miss5: <Nods> 'That's true'
No! NO! Not the dishwasher!... ARGHHGGHGGHGHH BLUB BLUB!
[Kids get themselves breakfast whilst we chat]
<Sounds of kicking>

(Come on... top off… it’s definitely my rules not my rules <Whistles>)

Yeah... but no.
We don't fight like that anymore. I'd like to say Team Parent (yay!) sat down together, had a few biscuits, a entire tureen of tea and discussed, as the adults we claim to be are. How half term is going to change things and would anyone like a few minutes extra in bed.
But of course we didn't. Who has time for that crap.
Instead I just claimed the first day due to my incredible ability to not get up, and having crawled to bed the night before due to the bank holiday (I drink play very hard).
So this morning, again, I find myself still in bed, having a lie-in.
But this morning I’ve got the hummus guilt.

I know I have guilt because I am laid in bed trying very hard to justify to myself why I should get more lie-in's at half term.
And not Mrs. Amazing.

I present the case for me to get more lie-in's: <Adjusts Anna wig>

I'm involved in the morning madness.
I work close enough to home to be able share in the morning joys of dressing and cleaning children, leading the dishwasher dance, watching cartoons, quick book-read catch up, and the ever popular delights of breakfast, and its refusals...

You don't want the porridge I made?
BabyBoy1: <Shakes head>
Or the toast I toasted
BabyBoy1: <Shakes head>
Or this bowl of all the cereals mixed together, which you demanded, and pointed and shouted for?
BabyBoy1: <Pushes away plate, again> 'NOOOO'
What do you WANT then? Do you want MY breakfast?
BabyBoy1: 'DES!'
<Passes over fried egg>
BabyBoy1: <Throws food on floor, but is happy>
<Is not happy>

The main reason I get up in the morning is for love because the kids make me.
And by association, and prodding, and very noisy curtain opening, loud tuts, and being shove out of the bed, Mrs. Amazing.
Oh yeah... and work. (If my head wasn't screwed on... Oooo butterfly!)
In fact Mrs. Amazing will sometimes 'suggest' I get up with her.
She likes to 'Share the pain' when we both have hangovers are tired. And it's fair enough.
It's a good reason to get up together.
Also I'm a sucker for a hungover woman in need...

Mrs. Amazing: 'Help Obi-Wan, you're my only hope...'
<Knows is being manipulated> <Kind of likes it>
OK. I'll make the tea, and eat get the chocolate, you get pints of water and put on an awesome, manly, high octane, fighty-fighty, film!
Mrs. Amazing: 'Tangled? 300?'
HELLS YEAH!
Mrs. Amazing: 'Deal!' <Watches me race off...>
<... Goes back to sleep>

So in summary, my main arguments claims to the lie-ins are:
1. I'm still have to go to work.
2. I am a valuable member of the morning team during term.
3. You smeggers lot are all gonna have a lovely day watching movies, eating crisps, making dens, laughing and giggling and doing stuff I like.
4. My side of the duvet is 37% heavier and harder to escape.
5. Mrs. Amazing naturally wakes at that time anyway.

Pretty convincing huh?
Yeah, I know. How could I possibly lose? Those lie-in's are mine.
AH HAAAA HAAAA HAAAAAAAAAAAaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa ha.
Except...

Except on that first day of half term.
As I left Mrs. Amazing for work. She looked unsure. She looked not ready for the day.
She didn't look like a day of fun was waiting to be had.

And that’s because Mrs. Amazing had a problem.
Quite a problem. We discussed it and I had no ideas. Which is rare for me. Sure most are dumb, involve R2-D2 being real, cake and going to bed at any time of day.
But a lack of crap ideas them? That’s not normally a problem.
But I think it shows what a tricky-thorny-smegface-bugger of a problem Mrs. Amazing had as neither of us had any answers for it.
Somehow, incredibly, Mrs. Amazing had to look after three half-term broken children, at home for eight hours. Alone.
And they all had to have live fun.

Boy8 is frazzled. Fried. Burnt out.
Half term was utterly needed. He needs to chill the sandwich out.
Imagine your most stressful day at work ever, with odd socks, then imagine being eight again and you can't drink, can't watch what you want when you get home, can't go cow tipping.
You can't even have caffeine. OMFB! <Runs off screaming>
That's what is going on inside Boy8 at the moment.
Stress and pressures in his daily life building up and up... And few outlets.
Hence the need for half term.
Boy8 is currently like a powder cake of silver birch bark, covered in petrol, sprinkled in fire lighters and match heads. In the sun. Feeling all spontaneously-combustible as well.
Just one spark. Anything. Anything at all.
And he will explode and take half the street with him. He's NITRO!

(Cool hair Boy8… Here catch!)

Dude? Can you ...
Boy8: ‘WHY ME! WHY CAN'T MISS5 DO IT? IT'S NOT FAIR! I DO EVERYTHING! ARGGHHGHGHG’ <Storms off>
Boy8: <Door slams quietly>
Boy8: <Door quietly opens again>
Boy8: <Door is slammed proper hard this time>
... get yourself a plate for this chocolate cake, your favourite?
<Eats his cake>

Miss5 is also exhausted.
This is still her first year at school. Due to the madness of a floating Easter. This term was a special seven week long term! yay. What clever planning.
Miss5's condition is similar to Boy8's, except you can swap stress and anger for just general emotion. Teary, screamy, shouty, obstinate, clawy, heart breaking emotion.
Miss5 just needs to be given a big book of colouring-in, the odd biscuit pushed her way every ten minutes, and chocolate milk on tap. Oh and someone to listen patiently to her mad exhausted babble. And then someone to take over listening to her exhausted babble, when the first person (Mrs. Amazing) goes mad.
Miss5 just needs managing and she will be fine.
She also needs to be kept away from Boy8.
Which is surprisingly tricky in one house.

And BabyBoy1 is very needy.
And that's my fault totally. We didn't do much over the bank holiday weekend. Which means I relaxed and sat more than normal. Doing nothing. Good times.
However that means I am easier to find. Easier for BabyBoy1 to grab my arm, in his little hands, and softly direct me to where he wants to play.
I cannot, and neither want to, resist.
Three days of my attention BabyBoy1 got. Then I went back to work in tears.
Which leaves BabyBoy1 wanting Mrs. Amazing to do what I was doing. Which she cannot.
Mrs. Amazing is already in a pitch breakfast-battle busy with Boy8 and stopping plates and spoons being thrown about helping Miss5 to eat hers.
So BabyBoy1 is needy. Bless him.
#DadsFault.

It's also raining.
So they can’t go outside. Of course it is. It's nearly June in England. Summertime. Of course it's rainy and cloudy. It's cricket season. OF COURSE IT’S RAINING!
<Shakes fist at sky>
<Gets rain in eye>

And we've no money to go do anything.
Really. So Mrs. Amazing is wondering how to fill the next eight hours with Captain Sensitive (Boy8), Miss. Extreme-Emotions (Miss5), and the Baby-Limpet (BabyBoy1).
Yes they could visit family. But it would have to be VERY CLOSE, immediate family. The one's that can see past their current moods and tempers, and still love them, and let them into their homes.
Which is basically... me. I'm the only close family member the children could possibly be around, that will still love them afterwards.
And even I'm not that keen. But I am, alas, at work.

So that, essentially, is Mrs. Amazing's case for the lie-in's.
She needs the lie-ins because her work is trice as hard as normal, and the kids are pretty nuts at the moment. It's pretty good isn't it?
Bugger.

Share the pain. Team Parents (yay!).
<SIGHS> <Stomps about a bit> <SIGHS> FINE!
Stupid, damn guilt, damny making me damn well make the stupid-right damny choices and stuff.
Damn it!

[Later that second day]
So I thought... that... as I've had two line-in's already this week...
Mrs. Amazing: 'That you just took! And left me to get up with the children, and then spend all day with them? HUH?'
Yes <Maintains constant eye contact like you would a tiger> those ones
<Tries to look cute> <Fails>
<Is frowned at>
Well... I see now... that's not very fair... you lie-in for the rest of the week
Mrs. Amazing: 'Yes' <Gives me a look> 'I will!'

So that's why this morning...
I'm sat in my dressing gown, at ARGHGHGHG O'clock, on the cold floor of the kitchen, watching BabyBoy1 struggling to do two and three piece jigsaws. Wishing I had made my tea before I had sat. As my knees hurt and I don't want to have to get up again.
Plus I'm really regretting the mid-week pub outing that got very slightly out of hand.

(Obv. this isn’t mine! I prefer blue…)

It may sound horrible and un-fun.
But it's not. My head hurts, but that's my fault. It's actually lovely being up with them.
Brainzilla: 'WHAT THE SMEG ARE YOU DOING MAN?'
Huh?.... OH CRAP!!! I meant sometimes it's nice, SOMETIMES!!!
Brainzilla: 'MRS. AMAZING HE MEANT SOMETIMES! SOMETIMES!!!'
Brainzilla: 'Idiot'
<Nods>

I miss-out on this time with them otherwise.
I sat cuddled up with Miss5 watching her cartoons. Which was lovely.
I chatted with Boy8 about his plans for world domination the day.
And whilst watching someone (BabyBoy1) jigsaw badly is like having a spear poked through your nose quite, quite horrible, and brain destroying...
BabyBoy1 is hella cute, and very happy to be with me.
So am I (but with him, you see, not me with me, that would be weird.. I was trying to save some typing...).

BabyBoy1: 'ON NOOOO! NOOOOO! NOOOO' <Tries the same piece, in the exact same way, again, for the ber-millionth time>
Try this? <Turns the piece around a teeny bit>
BabyBoy1: <Bangs piece in easy> 'YAY! TADAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!'
<High fives all round>

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