Kudos to the Mothers of Three

I just spent the last 7 days taking care of my two nephews - ages 4 & 6. Patrick was there for a few days of it, but for most of the week it was me, Gabriel and my nephews. I've taken care of the boys before, but not while having to take care of a baby, and never on my own.

I will be honest...the first few days were rough. I'm not one of those people that embraces change. I'm more about routines...and the familiar. Unfortunately, I AM one of those people whose mood is GREATLY affected by "that time of the month," so I'm sure that also contributed to my difficulties. Not to mention that there wasn't a day when someone wasn't puking (including myself).

But, once I got into a routine with them and structured my day so I could get everything done it wasn't so bad. I think the hardest thing was keeping up with Gabriel in my parents huge house and keeping him away from their wider-than-average stairs (so wide that we can't find a gate for them). It was also hard loading Gabriel in and out of my Dad's Tahoe since Gabriel's carseat is rear facing and the latch system was only available in the middle seat. This meant crawling over the other carseats, which was akward for someone short carrying a 19lb baby...it took me literally 5 minutes to get everyone loaded everytime we went somewhere. And there were places to go: Dropping off and picking up Julian every day from school, Karate, Dr. Appts, store, church.

After getting adjusted I found I liked being that busy...I liked the hustle and bustle and having to be so structured, so I definitely think I would still like to have 4 or 5 kids (minus the puking...but I guess you can't really avoid that with kids).

In the end I came away with three conclusions:
1) I don't know how my mom did it for all those years...being a single mom of three AND having to work...and even other moms out there that aren't single, but have three kids...KUDOS to you ALL!
2) I think gradually having more kids will be a lot easier to adust to versus babysitting an extra two for a week
3) I have the BEST husband in the whole world...who helped me clean up puke & cleand the house and took care of Gabriel while I was puking.