"Mommy, I forgot to tell you..."

Monday mornings in our house are always extra chaotic. We are notorious for cramming our weekends full of events, all the things we couldn’t fit in during the work week. It’s our family time… our “make it up to our kids for having two working parents” time. Our weekends include everything from ice skating, to birthday parties, to road trips to see family. In fact, it’s not unusual for me to be more tired after a weekend than I am after a work week.

Monday mornings we start back to the routine of getting everyone up, out of bed (usually our bed since J and H are now frequent visitors to our bed at night) and off to work and school. So with a 3 month old, a 2 ½ year old, and a 4 year old...you can imagine that our Monday mornings resemble a scene in a movie that is on fast forward.

So there is nothing quite like Miss J’s classic “Mommy I forgot to tell you…” to throw a wrench into an already crazy Monday morning.

One particular Monday, with a half hour to spare before leaving for school and work, I was quickly dressing J. As I was putting her dress over her head, Miss J calmly reported to me… “Mommy I forgot to tell you our ‘brown bags’ are due today”.

It is here that the stop button is hit on our fast forward movie.

Okay, deep breath Mommy…we got this. Step one: find out what the “Brown Bag” is. “Okay honey, tell me about the brown bag.”, I said in a fake-relaxed tone hoping and praying these bags that have now ruined my morning didn’t have to contain a family heirloom or baked good of some sort. Miss J looked at me, of course not sharing my stress, and calmly responded… “I don’t remember”.

Really? My daughter can remember all the lyrics to every Top 40 song out there but cannot remember what her teacher told her about the “brown bag” just two days earlier?

I slip into my panic mode. See, I am always paranoid as a working Mom that my kid will be “that kid” in class. You know, the one whose mother forgot to send her to school with treats to share, or pajamas for Pajama Day. I am often haunted with visions of my children standing in the corner having to miss out all because I forgot to send them with something. In my visions I can even hear the voice of their teacher consoling my child with “It’s okay honey, your Mommy was probably busy and forgot”. It’s one of my biggest fears as a working Mom. I never want to be “that Mom”.

So while we are brushing teeth, going potty, and getting our shoes on I continue to interrogate Miss J on the now-infamous “brown bag”. I obtain scattered short clues….it needs to be something to show the class…it has to fit in the bag. Okay…(light bulb goes off) so show and tell with an item in a small brown bag. Gotcha, I can do that. And as luck would have it my daughter’s entire world can all basically fit in a brown bag. Between Barbies, Polly Pockets, jewelry, Strawberry Shortcakes, play make-up…we got this covered.

Miss J settles on one of her Tinker Bell dolls and puts it in her backpack. I then proceed to lecture my husband that if he gets to school and everyone has brown bags, he must go to the store and buy a brown bag and bring it back to J (in record time of course). Yes, I am that kind of Mom and wife that will send my husband for one brown bag at a busy morning grocery store, just so my child is not the only one without a brown bag.

And of course after all this added stress to our Monday, Todd reported back to me after drop off that NO ONE had “brown bags” and show and tell was not until Friday.

Happy Monday everyone...may your day be un-eventful and free of the "Mommy I forgot to tell you's"!


Mandi