Slightly Crazy Day of Extra Cleaning – a day in the life of a tired mom

I thought I’d pop on here and write a quick “day in the life” type post. (I love watching day in the life type videos on YouTube. I’m not sure why that is; I just like to see what regular people do on a regular day. It’s very interesting to me.) It’s been kind of an odd day. Not terrible – I’ve managed to make it through everything and end up in a good mood still. Probably because I no longer have to spend the day hopped up on Dayquil, hooray!

September has not started off well for me. On Labor Day, I spent half the day at the emergency vet hospital, only at the end of the day to have one of my cats put down. She had severe liver and kidney problems. (No, I’m not ready to talk about it yet.) Then right after that, school started – and with it, an entire new routine, followed by MOPS starting. (And for some reason I signed up to be in the leadership this year. I don’t know why I thought I had extra free time for it!) Then hurricane Florence, along with typical Virginia panic, came along, and it thankfully missed the area I live. But for a hot minute, when it was predicted to hit us as a Category 3, we were in a panic when we realized that we were not properly prepared. Then, while stuck inside due to bad weather, my entire family came down with a sinus cold my plague spreader child brought home from school.

So yeah, this mom is tired and has not had a break. September has been kicking me in the teeth.

If you follow my Instagram, you probably saw this post:

Yes, that is because I discovered as I was trying to rush out the door to get my daughter to school, that the cat had peed in the baby’s car seat. Of course, I had about two minutes to do a preliminary clean before dropping my kid off and then taking the baby, who had to be strapped into a stinky seat, out for a couple of hours of errands.

But the good news is that I bought a new succulent from Trader Joe’s. Yes, I have a plant-buying problem.

After getting four bags of groceries put away, I made lunch. Mine was a sandwich that the baby decided she wanted instead of her own food and promptly took it apart and tossed all the pieces on the floor. Probably as punishment for making her sit in the smelly car seat. (But then why did you throw my honey ham to the cat that did it, child? WHY??)

After my kid refused to eat both my lunch and her own, I got a pot of marinara started on the stove. (Recipe coming soon.)

I dealt with a metric butt load of dishes, both clean and dirty, and then picked up my kid from school. After that I managed to get stinky cat pee covered baby down for a nap and enjoyed my eiskaffee (German iced coffee drink I make in the afternoons) and watched a rerun of Fixer Upper while scrolling on my phone because single tasking is for the weak. Afterwards I got to spend a while up to my elbows in vinegar cleaner and cat pee covered car seat, scrubbing the nooks and crannies with a toothbrush. Good times. Good times.

The seat cover went through the wash twice and came out smelling great. The seat belts may never be the same. Unfortunately replacement parts aren’t available, so after my cleaning job my husband went at it with his own cleaners. They smell less like pee now.

Dinner was spinach and cheese ravioli with marinara. The rest of the sauce (there’s usually almost two quarts leftover) will be used later this week for flatbread pizzas, meatball subs, and then it will sit in the fridge for awhile until I realize, oh yeah I need to use this before it goes bad, and figure out something else.

Except the four year old suddenly decided she didn’t want ravioli and just wanted to eat a bowl of sauce. Since I was in a good mood, I made her angel hair pasta. (I normally don’t make her a special dinner, but hey, we’re celebrating the lack of Dayquil here.) She finished her own pasta and asked for ravioli anyway. Kids.

After dinner it was time for me to tackle the kitchen. I opened the silverware drawer to put some clean things away and noticed what looked like some crumbs. So I pulled the knives out to wipe out the slot, and there was a giant freaking bug in it. What was it? I dunno, some kind of cross between a silverfish and a centipede. Did I freak out? Maybe. Did I take a picture of it for the blog? Heck no. I dealt with it swiftly, like a boss. Then I complained about it to my husband, because I’m actually a wuss about bugs, and told him I might throw up. (Spoiler: I did not.)

Then I had to take all the silverware out and clean out the liner because a bug had been hanging out in there. (How did it even get in there anyway??) This added a bit of time to my evening clean-up, to say the least.

So if you ever think someone on Facebook or Pinterest or Instagram has what looks like a perfect life, think again. Outside of that pretty picture everything else is chaos I tell you! Chaos! And if my house looks extraordinarily clean, maybe it’s because I like things really clean – or maybe it’s because I spent a day cleaning up after cats and bugs.

I hope this post made you laugh with joy (or cry – I wanted to). Leave me a comment below: did you like this post? Do you want me to do more crazy anecdotes? Was it annoying and should I never write about my day ever again? I’d love to know what you think.