But for some reason--namely that they are kids, they didn't want to hang out serenely in their Easter outfits coloring pictures of Jesus. They wanted to go outside and play or crawl around on the floor or run through the house like mad people. It stressed me out. And I was dressed too. Which--combined with the fact that I felt I had to police my children so that they and their Easter dresses didn't end up in a puddle of mud--didn't really make me feel like I could go at that dirty sink full of dishes or do anything else terribly productive. So I hung out outside with the kids taking lousy pictures and biting my nails about whether or not they were going to "spoil their precious clothes" (name that musical anyone?).
Now we could have gotten into the car and headed for church at 10:15 (if we want to be on time, we need to leave about 10:40). But the idea of sitting there for 20 extra minutes with kids who'd eaten approximated 57,000 grams of sugar before 10am was a little daunting to me. (Daunting is a polite word; truly it sounded as much fun as boxing with a gorilla--well, 4 gorillas). Fun Fact: Before I had kids I used to be early for things. It's true. Now that I have kids, it is logistically harder to be early, but more than that I find that I don't want to be early. I still want to be on time, yes; but not early. Early means sitting in a doctor's waiting room or a church pew or a line for something and shushing my kids for longer than they otherwise would have needed to be shushed. It's bringing extra things to entertain them and stressing once I get somewhere. Being late isn't fun either, but when I am honest with myself, I usually find it preferable to being early with kids. At least it's more cut and dry. I don't have to entertain anyone; I just have to find a place to sit. Still I would like to be on time. I could even hack 3 minutes early. Unfortunately, often in my quest to be just on time, I undershoot things and wind up late. Today, I figured we could drop some cupcakes off at a friend's house.
At 10:25-ish I started herding kids into the car so we could drop off the cupcakes off. I thought this would leave us plenty of time since I'd called earlier (to see if we could stop by for a visit) and knew they weren't home. Of course entering the car is a ten-minute affair. And then their grandmother was there, which required some polite conversation (not that I begrudge that; I just hadn't anticipated it). We dropped off the goodies and the trip to church took us a good 7 minutes longer than I had anticipated. Which meant? Have you guessed? That we still walked into church during the opening song. At least I didn't have to sit there for 20 minutes, but still...I wanted to bash my head against a pew (I refrained).
Moral of the story: If you're going to be late anyway, get dressed at 10:00. (Is this an unrighteous moral; would Aesop be terribly disappointed? Let's not ask him.)
Happy Easter!
I know it's washed out because I can't make our camera function, but still... (Eliz has a baby doll in case you thought we snuck another kid in there without telling anyone.)
She's holding the doll's hands firmly on the chains.
Find the duck.
This weekend Eliz taught Van how to swing. She did it by holding the chain sort of like this and swinging tandem with her for a while, calling out instructions about how to do it. After Savannah got it, Elizabeth would still call out instructions from the ground; it was kind of funny: "Now tuck your legs like you're kneeling; lean back; go forward; etc." It was also apparently helpful as Savannah seems to have the, er, swing of things.
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