Mama Said There'd Be Days Like This...

I do realize that the song referenced in the title of this blog post has NOTHING to do with food, raising children, or anything that I normally do on a daily basis, but that was the chorus that was swimming through my mind almost all last week...

Unfortunately, I don't have much to share in terms of dinner successes this week...that's not to say that we didn't have some delicious meals, but the week started and ended with a bang, and we were just in survival mode over here...you are fairly warned before you start reading :)

My husband left for Phoenix on Monday morning.  THAT was the morning that the mural incident (see last week's blog post...BIG mom fail!) happened.  I was preparing my husband's grandmother's lasagna to freeze and surprise him with when he returned from Phoenix the following Sunday.  George was upstairs trying to cram some last minute studying in before he left, and I was ALL over the place...maybe I was trying to do too much you may say?  Me?  Never!  ;)  Definitely not the send off I wanted George to leave with.  George's eyes were huge as he kissed us all goodbye wondering if we would be okay while he was gone...so, that's how my week began!

Luckily, my mom swooped in to help, and I am SO grateful because all three of my children ended up being sick.  The bad news about sick kids is that they are pitiful, make you sad, and can be SUPER whiny, getting on each others' nerves, and just plain mean.  The good news is that they all went to bed before 7:00 every single night giving me and my mama some great quality time together and a much needed reprieve.  The other bad news is that when you're the only parent home with three sick children, you are up AT LEAST three times at night every.single.night.

Before I realized all were going to end up sick, we had some sweet friends over for a last minute playdate and dinner.  I LOVE spontaneous dinners with friends, and when those happen, I usually have fall backs on hand for kids who may not love what we are having for dinner that night.  Those nights are meant to be filled with fun, laughter, and hopefully some adult conversation, so making sure the kids eat and are happy is key!!  The adults enjoyed some potato soup and some vino while the kids ate quesadillas, and my boys ate a little of the soup.  I highly encourage these spontaneous meals.  Just like wine always tastes better out of crystal (according to my mama,) meals always seem to taste better when we share them with friends!!

Since the kids were kind of a mess,  and we knew they would be in bed early, mom and I made the conscious decision one day to feed the kiddos PB&J and to wait until after they went to bed to start cooking our dinner.  I can't remember the last time that the two of us cooked together, by ourselves.  We had the best time drinking wine, laughing at ourselves, and eating every last morsel of our eggplant gratin.  It was a fun, rare night with my mama that I will not soon forget.

My dad came in on Thursday night, and the kids were seemingly turning a corner.  All the kids were back in school, my mom and I spent the morning in High Point furniture shopping, we prepared our dinner and were very organized well in advance of the start of the witching hour.  We ate Sherry's Aussie Chicken aka copycat Alice Springs Chicken.  I thought that surely this meal would be super yummy and an easy kid pleaser.  Well, evidently they were not feeling as well as I thought that they should be...the baby actually went to bed at 5:15! and slept until 7:30 the next morning, and the boys were a mess at dinner, so I put them to bed, and they were ASLEEP by 6:30.  The upside was that after the kids were out of the picture, my parents and I continued to enjoy a lovely dinner and wine...have I mentioned wine every day of this post so far???

So on Friday, my mom was diagnosed with strep throat...seriously???  And my dad didn't sleep the night before...so here we all were, tired, grumpy, and ready for the week to end.  Luckily, dad brought home Mexican, and we all ate well.  Put the kids to bed at 6:30, my mom to bed at 7:00, and my dad to bed by 7:30.  My parents are awesome, but, with the kids being sick, it was hard for them to even help because really all they wanted was their mama or daddy...well, unfortunately, there's only one of me and three of them, so by Friday, I was BEAT.   As sad as I was to be sitting in my living room by myself at 7:30 with five people in my house, I savored the moments of quiet, trashy television, and texting with my brother and sister...Mama Said They'll Be Days Like This!!!

Despite a little bit of a rocky start, Saturday was a 180 degree difference.  I ran my 10 miles, we watched football, we bought a new chaise lounge, and we enjoyed some delicious comfort food for dinner...poppyseed chicken can usually set the world right!  And Sunday was quiet, and daddy came home late that night in time to enjoy that lasagna I made earlier in the week...and it was worth it...the craziness of it all is always worth it when he walks in with his huge, genuine smile on his face, and I know that everything is going to be alright.  Gah, we missed you, George!!

We are the family of nothing major but always something!  I suppose the moral of all of this is to roll with the punches, find the blessings in the hard moments, and know that no matter how painful things get, we will be okay!

This week is off to a MUCH easier start, and our meals will include the Lasagna, Tortellini Soup, Jambalaya, Pecan Crusted Tilapia, and maybe some of Nana's Meatballs with marinara left over from the lasagna.

Happy Cooking!!!