The alarm clock buzzes at 6am and it is now time to get up and cook breakfast for a bunch of people that don’t want to eat. If they do want to it, it is rarely something that they can find on the table and many will demand pancakes over French toast and resist cold cereal with milk as though it was the plague. As soon as they get in the car, the breakfast mess still on the table attracting flies- they are hungry and grumpy because their bellies are groaning. One look in the back seat it is easy to notice that two of the pint sized children are slapping one another and wearing miss-matched socks. Should you intercede? No time for that! The lunches so neatly packed that won’t be appreciated or even eaten that day at school are sitting happily in the garage on top of the trash cans where you left them as you loaded the baby! No worries…the dogs will have eaten them by time you return home. Motherhood is amazing!

In the nick of time you fly through the drop off line only to witness a last minute melt down from your oldest child about the math homework they forgot to do! Among pleading requests you huff and puff agreeing to bring it back before 10am. Guess the baby wont get a nap today either! As you pull out the low fuel light dings and illuminates on the dash board and you fumble around for your debit card. Where is it? Where was the last time you used it? Hopefully the 7 year old in the backseat can look trough your purse and find it before your minivan churns to a stop on the side of the road! You flip on the CD player only to hear a distorted version of “Wheels on the Bus’ which evokes complaints from your 7 year old; while the baby slowly comes alive. No way in hell it can be turned off now. “Louder”, “Louder”, she cries and reluctantly you waive yet another perfect opportunity to hear the news for the age old rendition of a child hood songs!

Finally, the last stop of the morning and luckily you made it with just enough gas! The 7 year old, tired because it’s Thursday and she’s had a long week whines. Suddenly she has to go number 2! Now you have to walk her in which means unbuckling the baby who is wearing only a diaper and trying to find some sort of shoes to place on your feet so you can go into the school. As you make your way in wearing your children’s flip flops you realize suddenly that you forgot in the hustle of the morning routine to put on a bra! How embarrassing. This is when using the baby as a shield turns into a good idea! The morning routine is almost over; or has it just begun?

On the way home you stop for gas – thankfully finding the debit card in a remote area of your purse and you make a mental note to always put it back in the same place each time you use it. (Yeah right!) The pay at the pump feature is not working and once again the diaper wearing and braless duo must make their way into public to pay for gas. While in the store, the baby spots sugar babies and begins to throw a fit. It is much easier to buy them- so you do! People stare and you wonder why? Perhaps it is the fact that it looks like a Jerry Springer type mom has just graced their presence. On your way back to the car – of course- you run into your child’s principal. She looks at you sadly; probably making mental notes herself – to check the welfare of your family!

After hearing “wheels on the bus” exactly 11 times in a row – you are home. A short sigh of relief is cut short by the gasp you feel when you open the door to your home. How can so few people make such a mess? Didn’t you just clean and vacuum yesterday! Dishes, laundry, breakfast for baby, phone calls, bills to pay, and hopefully a shower await you. The baby eats while you do dishes and then gets a quick sink bath in order to save your back from leaning over the tub. Laundry is getting washed and the dryer is humming the peaceful tune of mother hood. Cell phone rings and teacher reminds you that you forgot your child’s lunch and they have no lunch money in their account. There goes your shower time! You wonder why all those people told you before you had kids that motherhood is amazing! Amazing what? Amazingly difficult, tiring, stressful, monotonous and depriving?

The baby can sleep in the car – the house is fairly clean and you make your way back in the car to drop off homework and your children’s half eaten lunches. This time you are wearing a bra and have even put on fresh deodorant and mascara to somehow hide the fact that you need a bath! Husband calls on the cell phone reminding you to run a few errands and pick up what he needs at the store! You realize that in your hurry to leave you forgot to take the meat for dinner out of the freezer and may have left the curling on! Now you have to go back home instead of spending the extra time getting that much needed pedicure! With exactly one hour left before pick up you rush home hoping that you won’t return to see your house on fire! Mental note to buy one of those automatic shut off kinds of curling irons is made (again).

The baby is asleep in the car. Hating to wake her you go in and check to see that the house is okay. The curling iron is already off (as you suspected) and for now the house is spotless and relaxing. The phone is ringing as you walk in the door and it’s your child’s teacher explaining that this is the 3rd time this week your son has come in without math homework! Just another one of those things you forgot to do. You try to explain it to the teacher that you were already on your way up there to bring it to him, when she curtly ends the conversation mumbling something about teaching responsibility!

Kids are back in the car! Homework awaits and ball practice at 6am. Snacks and more laundry pile up. The toilet is clogged for the second time this week and one of your kids can’t find both of her cleats. Hmmm, motherhood really is amazing. As you sit on the bleachers at practice next to all the other overworked, overtired and overwhelmed mothers you realize in an instant that there are few men who could take this job and do it as well. The bags under your eyes tell your story all too well and you would share it with your own mother but every time you do she uses it as an opportunity for you to understand what she went through raising you! In order to save the harassment you tell her instead how impeccably wonderful everything is everyday of your mothering life. No complaints here!

Finally, 11pm- kids are in bed and the chores are done. Lunches are packed (hopefully you will remember them) and you and your husband are finally able to sit down together for a little TV time. You pray for the news but remember that Sports Center is about to begin. You decide that you have had enough. You have been awake since the break of dawn and the minute your feet hit the floor you were off and running non-stop. A kiss on the forehead you check the kids one last time. Peaceful, quiet and beautiful. They have their daddy’s eyes and snore like him too. You pull up the covers, fix their pillows and pick up their favorite teddy bear off the floor! As you stand for a moment staring at the fruit of your accomplishment you realize all too seriously that yes, motherhood is amazing! You suddenly consider your self lucky and you are renewed with enough energy and bliss to endure it for yet another day!