Meatball subs of doom

My in-laws are coming over tonight, and I had to run to Kroger earlier today to pick up some ingredients for the meatball subs I planned on making for dinner. It was going to be a quick trip to the store just to pick up a few ingredients I was missing...you know ingredients like meatballs and hoagie rolls and sauce (and some mozzarella too).

When Mr. Crackers suggested the idea last night while we were eating dinner, I told him that I didn't have anything on hand to make the subs but they sounded delicious! As we were cleaning up the kitchen he made the comment, "I keep forgetting you've got the kids all day long without a break. How are you getting things done?"

While he may have forgotten this fact, it has remained in the forefront in my mind all week. A late July and an early August free of camps, vacations and activities sounded like bliss to me back in June when we were running from VBS to summer vacations to family visits and back to more camps. I loved the idea of 3 weeks without commitments so the kids and I could just relax and really enjoy summer ...... and start to drive each other a little bit crazy. Now just 4 days into the "bliss" and I am starting to see the error of that decision.

The kids are not sleeping in like I had planned so there are no peaceful morning coffee breaks for dear old Mom. And while they do play together pretty well they are after all siblings, so there is a lot of yelling, screaming and attempted tattling.

As I reflected on Mr. Crackers words, I took a gander at the mess in the family room, and the sitting room, and the dining room, and thought about all of the messes in the rooms upstairs and replied back, "Yea, I'm really not getting anytime to clean the house. I started cleaning the upstairs bathrooms ealier today and only got as far as wiping down the counters before one of the kids caught my attention with something else."

Mr. Crackers looked at me and said, "Oh, that's not what I meant. I was just thinking that you wouldn't have any time to get the ingredients for the subs tomorrow night for dinner since you've got the kids all day."

"Oh that," I scoffed, "going to the store with them will be easy. They're both old enough now that they actually help out quite a bit in the store. We'll make a quick run and get what we need -- no problem."

Seriously, it's like I didn't even know my own children anymore. A quick and easy trip to the grocery store with 2 children? Well, let's just say that's not really something I see in my immediate future.

I attempted the "easy" trip with them this morning and after 1 hour and 15 minutes we finally had what we needed to make the subs. I spent most of the time in the store on 3 activities:

1. Trying to corral my hooligans so that they were out of the way of other shoppers while also trying to prevent them from touching EVERY SINGLE ITEM that their eyes fell upon in the store.

2. Taking them to the bathroom 3 -- yes 3 -- different times.

3. Backtracking down aisles several times because I kept passing items I needed while my attention was focused on item #1.

As with all shopping trips that involve my kids I ended up purchasing items that were not on my list, so my few intended items ballooned up well beyond what was allowable in any of the store's express check-out lanes.

Oh, well. At least I got something out of the deal too. As I was pulling the cart toward the check-out lanes I noticed that 12 packs of assorted Mike's Hard beverages were on sale for $12.99. It's like the angels were sending me a message or something. I mean, while a meatball sub sounded good, a Mike's Hard Lemonade to wash it down with sounded absolutely divine after the hour I just spent in Kroger. So I added the 12 pack to my now full cart and headed over the registers with a smile on my face.

And so goes another day of summer vacation...