It is not often that I get to fly the family ship solo but the other day my wife Katy was required to be out for most of the day. I booked the day off work and prepared myself for the what the day would have in-store. The day where I would be in charge was a Monday which meant Charlie had nursery for half the day. Apart from that nothing much else needed to be done, easy relaxing day !
How can a day with one singular task to complete be so non relaxing ?
Let me take you through what one day with a singular task looks like in the hands of a dad ! So we start the usual early 6.30am wake-up and get up to see mommy off on her exciting day. Thankfully Mummy was around for long enough to help with breakfast and get the kids dressed.
Katy left at around 7.30am we waved good bye then thoughts turned to how to keep everyone entertained before we had to leave to drop Charlie to nursery. I thought set the kids up with their toot toot road system that will keep them quiet whilst I get on with the dishes.
I managed to get half the dish water run and had just begun to make my first coffee with my automatic coffee machine before the first crisis-a minor disagreement between the kids. Olivia decide to wreck the road system and then their was a tussle in which Olivia lost (Brothers!). After sorting everyone out I had to rush back to my coffee which was now pouring everywhere! This scene was repeated about three times minus the coffee going everywhere before thinking this can not continue.
The TV had to go on, that calmed everyone down.... thank you Disney junior ! It was almost time to go for the nursery run :-O Hmmm this isn't easy!
Time to get the kids shoes and coats on, I started this task with plenty of time I thought! 15 Minutes to spare before we absolutely had to leave the house no questions asked ! How on earth did it take the full 15 Minutes to get everyone ready, it took so long !
We did get to nursery on time, but with no time to spare ! Finally now with Charlie at nursery there would be a let up in the pressure and finally I could put my feet up and relax! Wrong ! Harry and Olivia were no trouble Harry watched Jake and the never-land pirates and Olivia just played with her tea sets, now the floor needed hoovering !
This day was turning out to be relentless, all I had to do was drop Charlie to nursery. Then it dawned on me this was no especially hard day for me this was what Katy has to contend with on a daily basis. This has given me a deeper respect for what she achieves everyday.
I had a message from Katy before the day was even half way through they had an unexpected early finish and everything went well so she was coming back, phew! I realised just how hard her job was and anyone who mutter the words SAHM is a easy cop out simply does not have enough life experience to understand the concept.
