A Morning in the Life of a Dad with 4 Girls:
Today is not going as planned, not for my newfound hope of blogging, but for a different reason. I still plan on posting about the topic I assigned myself today, but I will have way more time to write than I originally thought. Today was supposed to be the first of six straight weekends of cheerleading competitions. Still is weekend one of six straight, but I will not be attending. My other star cheerleader, who somewhat thankfully was not scheduled to compete today, is sick. I was also outvoted by the cheerleader performing today to not attend. Mom easily won that vote, receiving the lone ballet.
This will also give me more time to try and figure out this website. I honestly have no idea what I am doing, and I am kind of embarrassed by my struggles with it. I promise that one day, it will look nice and welcoming and like I have some clue what I am doing. But until then, please bear with me.
On with today’s topic: A Morning in the Life with a Dad of 4 Girls. A typical weekday starts with me getting up well before anyone else. That still holds true today with me working from home and starting work nearly three and a half hours later than when I went to the office. Working from home has been a blessing. Well, most of the time. Being home and around the girls more could not be a better feeling.
After getting up and getting myself ready, I take care of the two dogs and three cats (I was talked into these, but I love them the same as the dogs) because my oldest, who is supposed to take care of them in the morning, always “forgets.” You will, before too long, realize that she is always saying “I forgot” unless it is something for her and only her. Truly, it isn’t hard for her. All I ask is that she feeds them and gives them fresh water. To her, that is the equivalent of solving world hunger. She is the second one up every day, but only just in time for me to give her a ride to school. She is currently in eighth grade but is in an advanced Spanish class at the high school. I cannot figure out why, though. Just early this school year, she made a PowerPoint for Spanish, and each slide was to be an answer to some problem, only her responses needed to be in Spanish, and she put “idk” on a slide. Not even the full words in English. She just put “idk.” And when asked why she did that, I got an “I forgot” in response. Other than getting her to “solve world hunger,” she is the easiest to get ready. She is old enough, so it should be ingrained in her now, but she often does not brush her teeth either. Another, “I forgot.”
Once I have her to school, I come back home and work for another thirty minutes, give or take. Then I will look for clothes for the youngest two and get the second oldest up. After finding clothes, I wake the “littles” up. Then comes the real morning before school chaos. More often than not, I wake them all up obnoxiously, and they are annoyed but love it. I go back to work for about ten minutes and obnoxiously wake them up and, this time, make sure they are awake. I will fight with them about what clothes I picked out, or secretly, to avoid a fight, I will pick out a certain shirt for two of them, knowing full well that they will go find something they want to wear. My favorite part, and theirs, is next. YouTube shorts to find out how the bald man is going to be a hair specialist and attempt braiding or some other hairdo they know full well I have no skill for completing. But it is fun. Straightening hair, I guess you could say, is my specialty. I have gone through enough straighteners to know a thing or two about them even though I ask my wife every time what to get.
While they are getting dressed, I will jump back into work mode or attempt to. The next battle begins shortly thereafter. Making sure they all brushed their teeth. This is and will always be the biggest battle I face every day. They all know the dentist recommended two minutes, but unless I am helicoptering over them, the three combined won’t brush a total of two minutes in a week’s time. And every day, it is, “I can’t find my toothbrush,” “I don’t like this toothpaste (that they picked out just the day before),” “I call going last,” and any other excuse your mind could come up with. Then the question, “Do you have everything for school and your backpacks packed?” To all of which annoyingly say they are. But if you are a parent, I think you know there is no way for that to be true. Someone, at least one, but normally multiple, is not ready to go when you say, “Go jump in the car.” And with the weather being colder here, there has not been one day where each one of them has their hat, gloves, boots, coats, or whatever else they need when it is time to get into the car. It has never happened. If it has to you, please tell me your success story.
Once we are in the car, the final battle of the morning among them begins. They will argue if I will drop them off in the drop-off line or park and walk them to the door. The drop-off line nearly always wins, but that is more my choice than one of them winning an argument. I do not want to get out, especially when it is cold or raining.