School Mornings: My Magnum Opus

I think getting the husband and kids out the door on a school/work day is the largest feat of my day.  At this stage of life, it is the thing that takes the most focused energy, presence of mind, and tenacity than any other part of my day.

I would love to say that a school morning sounds like a symphony of intricate rhythms and delightful harmonies and counter melodies, but generally it sounds more like "Springtime" by Vivaldi as I wake up all optimistic and hopeful and then descends into Bach's "Tocatta in D Minor" as I go up the stairs AGAIN to remind little people they are supposed to be putting their socks on for the 3rd time and then it is angry electrical guitars, frizzy hair and smeared mascara punctuated by the slam of the front door and then I figuratively throw down my baton in a mixture of triumph and relief like a conductor who's left it all on the podium.

(And if you want to know what the morning REALLY sounds like, you can ask our student roommates...they probably could share some choice repeated phrases with you or you can just insert ones from your own experience)

I mean are you guys like this?  I start the day all:

(this girl will continue to sing this song until you're crazy so go ahead and mute your computer)

And then I'm like, wait, I'm not feeling okay even if the sun is out.  I want some more sleep, actually, so then I start doing some complex abstract math equations in my head in a delusional attempt to stretch the morning's timeline (that's the same every day) to try to squeeze in a few more minutes of sleep.

If I hit snooze again and account for the clock being probably 90 seconds fast and I don't put a bra on when I get up then I probably can manage the next snooze bracket and I'll just put those leftover grapes in the lunches instead of cutting apple slices and that will buy me another 3 minutes so therefore I'm good to sleep for one more snooze cycle after that

When I finally accept the reality of my time constraints, I get up, make coffee for me (oxygen tanks on the parents first) and then get started on the lunch assembly.  I'm pretty proud of myself at this point.

Then it's time to get the kids up...for the first time (there my be repeats of this step needed throughout the morning).  I get ready for breakfast.  In my mind, I want to

and

but that equals

so we stick with

Everything is going alright until this happens

 And then things start looking like this

 And I start looking like this

And I coulda sworn I went to bed with things looking like this

but somehow this is usually the scene 3 minutes from go time

So then there's a whole bunch of mom superhero powers (and dad helps, too) that get used: xray vision to find the lost shoe, elasti-girl arms that somehow get lunches into respective backpacks and superman costume changing abilities do their best effort to properly attire and tweak each offspring's wardrobe selections.

They leave...with a path of debris in their wake...but they're off and I feel like a combination of 

And then I need to eat some sugar.  The end.