Baby you can drive me nuts, but baby I love you

In my deranged state of constant sleep deprivation, I decided to keep DS home today - to save money and foster some mother-son bonding Well, really in the opposite order, but whatever. At 8.30 SubHub leaves with DD and we are on our own.

DS's baby sister refuses to cooperate and keeps on whining asking for attention. So in the absence of his big sister, DS has to find a way to entertain himself. He starts by raiding every kitchen drawer in search of candy and of course finds it. I allow one, he eats two and begs for more. I put my foot down and he agrees. I am surprised.

Two minutes later, still surprised, I find him munching on chocolate, taking bites off an entire bar. I confiscate the chocolate, sigh, mentally compliment DS on his survival skills, and take a bite of chocolate myself when I am out of DS's sight. What? I need some mental and physical reinforcement, and in my book chocolate is better than Prozac. Right?

"Mama, may I watch a cartoon?" "No, we are supposed to bond"

While the baby is still whining, at 9.05 DS finally finds his toy plane. I am grateful for an opportunity to brush teeth when the baby finally falls asleep. By the time I am done with my teeth, the baby is awake (no, I did not take 2 hours or hid in the bathroom from the kids, not today). While she nurses, I mentally note that the apartment smells really nice. Nice. Finally a break. Mmm....

At 9.15 I find my underwear drawer turned upside down. Ugh, I hate organizing the drawers in my drawers. (My lame attempt at joking. Give me a break, I am sleep deprived, OK?) What was he looking for? Lucky for DS, my attention span is very short. I start a load of laundry and in the process realize why the apartment smells so good: DS's plane needed refueling and there's no better fuel than Mommy's perfume. You know, the one they sell only in fancy stores and that costs like $70 a sniff. I take away the perfume.

"Mama, may I watch a cartoon?" "No, we are supposed to be bonding" (A tad louder than the last time.)

At 9.25 I find my underwear drawer messed up yet again. Ughrrrrr! Did I mention I HATE HATE HATE organizing that thing? Especially after doing it only 10 minutes ago? What could he possibly be looking for?! I run looking for DS and find him with another bottle of my perfume. I finally make the connection between messed up underwear drawer and perfume - I hid my perfume from children so well that I forgot it was there. I mentally thank DS for finding my perfume and congratulate on his ingenuity though verbally I chide him for using half of my smelling supplies. I try to confiscate precious liquid, but DS breaks down crying: he needs something that makes pshh pshh to refuel his plane. A real tragedy might happen if he doesn't get where he intends to get on that plane. We settle on my deodorant.

"Mama, may I watch a cartoon?" "Nooooo"

Still hoping for some bonding experience with DS, I try something we can do together only to be derailed by a wailing baby. At least I will be in the same room with him. I enter the living room and immediately start sneezing uncontrollably - whatever makes deodorant go pshh pshh, also makes me sneeze until brains start dripping down my nose.

"Mama, may I watch a cartoon?" "No"

It's only 9.40, and I am ready to depilate my head. Good thing I cover my hair.

At 9.50 he finds my very fragile amber necklace. For a few minutes I pretend that I don't notice he has it. I can no longer do so when DS starts handling it with one of his father's tools. By the way, where is his father?

By 10 am , I am ready to give DS a very different bonding experience: I contemplate tying him to a chair to prevent damage to our apartment. I decide against it, but only after making a long list of pros and cons, all while nursing the poor baby who is still kvetching.

"Mama, may I watch a cartoon?" "No"

The next 45 minutes pass in a blur, I might have passed out from the deodorant gasses for all I know or from sleeping only in hourly increments for the past month. By 10.45 I break down and put a cartoon for DS.

At 11.15 am, SubHub comes home and starts on his woodworking project. He takes DS with him to the porch, much to DS's delight. They bond... (Why are these things easier for men? Or is there something wrong with me?)

It's 11.45 am, and DS and I are making faces through the window at each other while I rock the kvetching baby. Ahhh, finally some bonding experience...