Clarification

I feel as though I need to write a bit of clarification after something I said on here, because I realized I was starting to paint a very glamorized picture of a perfect life..which just isn't true.

I was bold enough to say that this time around (with the new baby) I do not feel overwhelmed like I did last time.

And while I don't feel overwhelmed with the baby herself (I am thankful every day for how sweet and easy she is), some situations are still overwhelming.  What mother doesn't feel overwhelmed at some point?

Some of my daily highlights include:

-Stop Addison from hitting Claire about 45 times. (Hitting, sitting on, jumping on, pulling her hair, etc.)

-Stop her from "loving" Molly a little too enthusiastically at least 100 times. (Her hugs closely resemble the heimlich maneuver or CPR)

-Try to convince Addison that screaming isn't the way to solve anything (Is it hypocritical to yell "STOP SCREAMING!"? Probably.)  

-Feed Molly and change her diaper every couple hours and try to not feel guilty about how much time she spends in the swing while I tackle other things.

-Be completely ignored by Claire when asked to do ANYTHING at all.

-Listen to Claire be overly dramatic at the drop of a hat, crying for things as little as not getting a turn with the bubbles right when she wanted. (we also hear a lot of "everybody is being mean to me today!"  I promise we aren't. My other favorite "I wish my preschool teacher was my mom, she's always nice to me."  That was when I told her to finish cleaning her room before I would let her play a game.  I'm just awful like that.)  

-Brielle trying to boss me around...well, bossing everyone around.

-Kids refusing to play nicely together.  Even with my "Your sisters are the only friends you can guarantee will be there for you forever, so be nice to them now or you'll regret it later" speeches.

And the list goes on and on.

I've decided what has finally occurred, is my will to have a life outside of the house has finally been worn down to nothing.  Logistics is a nightmare, and most of the time errands/outings aren't worth the headache.

There are times I mourn the "old days" when me and the two oldest girls would go do quite a bit.  We went to the library, on field trips, to the park, for walks, shopping and other things and it was not a big deal.  And now we do very little of those things.  We rarely even leave the house for anything other than taking people to school.  It's quite sad. 

I know that there are different seasons in our lives, and at some point we will go and do more.  But for now, I'm just going to embrace the boring, mundane days of sitting around the house and cleaning up constant messes/breaking up fights.  Because I'm not naive enough to believe things will get "easier" as they get older.  Then they will just be busier.

So, I guess it takes four kids to finally wear someone down.  Not in a bad "frazzled" way, but in an "accepting the way things are" kind of way.

At least I think I'm accepting it...that or I've officially lost my mind.