First

On the first day of school this year, I was first in car line for pickup. If I don’t blog about how this miracle came to be, you will not believe it. That would be because I was a complete. and. utter. wreck. Oh no, not emotionally. Just physically. Getting the boys rounded up and out the door was a feat in itself. But the rest of the morning? A mess. Here’s what went down.

Tadpole had class from 9-12, and Tigger a shortened day from 9.30-11. Just by stating that you know there was trouble brewing.

Fortunately, we made it to Tadpole’s class on time. We barely got in before the door swung shut behind us, but we made it. Then I had 30 minutes to kill with an eager “why-hasn’t-my-class-started-yet” first-time preschooler, an exploration-happy 22 month old, and a baby who typically feeds at 9.30am.

I decided to sit outside Tigger’s classroom where there just so happens to be a contained area of outdoor toys just large enough to entertain but not so big as to lose kids. (Or so I thought). Tigger and Cubby went at it full force, while I decided to sit on one of those utterly uncomfortable toddler-sized chairs to feed Quatro. Let’s just say that 15 minutes passed with various comedic but not wholly unfortunate events which included a super fussy feeder who was sweating so much in the early morning FL heat that he couldn’t stay put long enough to log two minutes of consecutive nursing time, and a restless eager one year old who managed to sneak out the gate of the play area.

Anyway, at 9.22 I couldn’t take it anymore, and decided to request that Tigger be allowed to enter his new classroom. Luckily the teacher was Tadpole’s from last year. She was familiar with me and my frequently frantic family, and she let us in. Ah, I thought, I will get Tigger settled and take the younger two out to the car as soon as possible.

It was then that I noticed that Quatro had a poo. Not just a nice, teeny, sweet-scented baby poo, but a fully blown out one that had progressed down the sides of his legs.

As luck would have it, the classroom contained a small bathroom with a baby changing station, so I excused myself into it, leaving Tigger and his brother Cubby in the classroom to explore. Error number one. Or one hundred. But who’s counting?

It wasn’t until I started changing Quatro that I discovered he actually had poo everywhere – all over his new onesie (mind you, as a fourth boy he only has about 2 outfits that are all his, not hand-me-downs, and this was one of them) and all over his back even up to his shoulders.

No worries, I am quick at changing a nappy and besides, every good mom knows to carry around extra outfits for her newborn, and I had repacked the nappy bag that morning and confidently remember putting a spare green “up all night” outfit and a turtle/seashell onesie in the bag.

Apparently the changes didn’t make it into the nappy bag though. [Indeed, I came home to discover the outfits sitting unmoved in the exact place on the kitchen counter that I had repacked the nappy bag.]

So I exited the bathroom with a naked baby in a diaper (hello, Raising Arizona), hoping that it wasn’t too obvious, only to find that Cubby had pulled bins and bins of toys out from the cabinets of the freshly organized “welcome-to-your-first-day-of-school” classroom. As I held the baby and corralled Cubby into his cheap, filmsy, “we’ll-use-this-only-for-day-trips-to-Disney” umbrella stroller from Target, the other freshly made-up, showered, and pressed Moms and Dads calmly walked into the classroom with their doll children.

To make matters worse, have you ever tried pulling a strong 22-month old away from a world of fun and games and other children, and buckling him into a stroller, one-handed? Just as I had basically dropped him into the buggy, I heard a large splat and suddenly felt this wet sensation all over my feet. I looked down, and to my horror, the baby had puked – no, this wasn’t just a spit up – but actually vomited his entire that’s-what-happens-when-you-feed-me-in-the-sweltering-heat breakfast all over my feet and the sparkling clean classroom floor. Sweet.

Capturing the next few minutes into words is impossible. You really had to have been there to witness me trying to hold frantic naked baby, clean up vomit, wipe my slippery feet, re-find and re-corral Cubby into said wimpy stroller, buckle in baby, find nappy bag again, mutter words of apology to pristine parents, graciously thank teaching assistant for help with out of control child situation, and excuse myself from the classroom, all while forgetting to actually say goodbye to Tigger, whom I was leaving for the first time in a school setting. Needless to say, retrospect wishes I had all that on video.

I would like to say the craziness ended there – and it almost did – except for the minor mishap of being 20 minutes late to pick up Tigger from his first day of school. (That is a whole different story.) Good thing the kid is relatively secure and calm and oblivious to the fact that every other Mommy had returned to take her child home for lunch and here he was, still hangin’ with the teacher.

Being that he is in a 2-1/2 year old class, I am required to physically walk in and retrieve him, instead of being able to simply pick him up in car line. So when I arrived at school, I went ahead and parked in the car line, woke my sleeping baby, unbuckled the Cubby of Pent Up Energy, left a car full of melting groceries, and quickly ran to Tigger’s class to pick him up. Thankfully he was blissfully unaware of my tardiness and was simply pleased to see me, which I was to see him, as well, and we all happily piled back into the Mommy Bus to wait for Tadpole’s class to be released for the day.

And that is the story of the day that Four Boy Mom managed to beat out all the other anxious moms to be first in car line. By the time Tadpole arrived in the car, I probably seemed calm and completely put together to the teacher who delivered him back to me.

But now you know… I wasn’t.