Bad mother confession #437 - How long's a piece of cheese string?

There is no cheese in the house. This isn't usually a problem in itself; no cheese in the house means less chance of a late night cheese and biscuit raid and a greater chance of my diet remaining 'clean' for a few more minutes. But preparing tonight's dinner, I realise it's the third time this week I've served up tuna and pasta. I made a vat of it two nights ago and it's still filling the pot. So I take the chefly decision that I will bake it in the oven rather than re-heat it on the hob, in the vain hope that this will dramatically alter the flavours and textures and no-one will complain too loudly. I also decide to throw over a quick homemade cheese sauce. And therein lies the crux of the problem: there is no cheese in the house. At least, none that isn't the colour it's supposed to be and doesn't smell of fish. So that all goes in the bin. I find my solution, rather predictably, in the lunchbox Cheese Strings that are lurking in the back of the fridge - vacuum-packed to survive goodness knows what and so overly processed that no microbes are likely to set up a colony on its surface. I'm not even sure they melt at high temperatures and I'm more than a little perturbed at the smell of cooking plastic as I stir them into the sauce. It's my imagination. I hope.

Anyway, there's now the sound of three munching mouths in the living room, drowning out The Flintstones that's still raging from the TV in the other room. So far, so good...

Bad Mother Confession #817: Wet trousers and socks for gloves

The title about sums up this morning. Although it's every morning. Every single morning without respite or relief. And it's driving me all kinds of crazy.

So yesterday we had an inset day and I spent the morning in the launderette (seeing how the other half live, as someone said to me - I won't name and shame). It was a generally ok experience. The manager was cheerily sexist in his commentary to me as I loaded the machines - 'You'll be wanting to turn your trousers inside out', 'Have you checked the pockets for tissues', 'Whites.. in with those... oh nevermind' and the rather wonderful 'I thought you ladies were all pre-programmed to know how to do the housework'. He did keep his bollocks... but only just. I came so close... so close...

And then I struggled home with all three kids and a ton of now wet washing to remember that the tumble drier isn't connected and we have nowhere to dry the clothes. So they sat in the basket all day til the other one came home and connected the drier. And then the drier took four hours to gently warm the damp clothes and this morning my son told me he had no trousers for school. 
And then I realised his trousers never made it into the failed first batch of drying in any case. So that's where the wet trousers came in. I usually holler at the kids for running ahead of me on the school journey - this morning I actively encouraged any opportunity to get a breeze flowing through his apparel. I hadn't realised why the daughter was screaming as I ran out the house to get the pushchair from the car at the last minute though until she explained, sobbing, that she hadn't yet got her cardigan on. I wondered why, until I understood she'd been spending precious time fixing socks to her hands instead. I still don't know why she did that.

Life with kids is rarely dull. It's certainly never quiet, either.