The end of the work day is the busiest time for me. Not just because I support a west coast base and I live in the Midwest (I swear those California people must go surfing all morning and don’t actually start working until after lunch), but it’s also when all my kids’ activities happen.

I work until 5:30pm, partly because I’m not a morning person and can’t drag my butt out of bed before 9am and partly because I support that California base and they are two hours behind me. Before all the kids were in school, working late was never a problem for me. When it was just Keaton and he was in preschool I worked late most nights and even went on weekends. Now I don’t have time for overtime at work.

These days the kids have activities every. single. day. But tonight is our pull-my-hair-out, crazy night. On Wednesday nights Keaton has soccer practice and youth group. Skyler has dance and gymnastics. And Caleb has soccer practice. We put a lot of miles on the cars on Wednesday nights.

Since Keaton’s practice ends at 5pm and Skyler’s dance class ends at 5:15 and the two places are clear across town from each other, Lee usually picks up Keaton and I slide out of work early to pick up Skyler. But it never fails. Just as I’m trying to sneak out at 5pm, my phone rings or somebody pings me on IM with a fire drill. “I absolutely have to have this contract within the next hour because the only person at this huge company that can sign a contract is going out of town for the next month and he’ll be in a submarine [or the middle of the rain forest or in outer space or any place else they can think of to be a big pain in my side] with no cell phone, internet or fax access. He has to sign tonight.” What do I do? Do I stay and review the contract or do I go get my daughter?

Of course it’s all about priorities (like we talked about last week) and my priority is to my daughter. Yes, I did forget her that one day, but generally I try to pick her up on time.

So now I get ready to go long before I actually leave. I don’t answer my phone (unless it’s from home) after 4:30pm. Instead I let it go to voicemail and then listen to the message to see if it really is an emergency or if it’s just sales with their their panties in a bunch. I also log off IM early. I hate IM anyway because it’s so distracting. If it’s an emergency they’ll call. These two things have really helped me get out of the office on time (or early on Wednesday nights).

Remember the days when you would talk about the weather because you had nothing else to talk about. Weather was better than awkward silence. Well now we talk about weather because it’s insane. A week ago we were sweating in tank tops and shorts. It was 80 degrees out. Yesterday it was just a few degrees above freezing and we had snow flurries. Snow flurries, people. The calendar will say May in just two days and we’re back to freezing our butt off.

But, even with freezing temps and snow flurries, I can still tell it’s Spring. There are always some tell tale signs. What are those signs, you ask?

1. I’m running short on band-aids. Last week Spencer took a dive on the pavement and scraped up his leg pretty badly. That finally scabbed over and now the band-aids are moving on to Caleb. Tonight he was running outside and scrapped up his big toe. I have no clue why he was outside with no shoes in 50 degree weather. Clearly I’m not watching him close enough. But at least I bought a new (gigantic) tube of Neosporin last week.
2. Softball has started. Lee has his regular leagues. And he and Justis are also playing for the church team this year. Give it a couple more weeks and we’ll pulling out the band-aids for Lee. At least once a year he gets a huge raspberry on his thigh from sliding in to home. Or a bloody knee. Or a twisted ankle. He’s quite attractive in the summer.
3. I had to break down and shave my legs. I occasionally shave my legs during the winter. But it’s not really a priority. However, now that I’ve dug out the shorts and capri pants I had to dust off the razor and clear off my sweater hair.
4. I had to start wearing a bra again. In the winter I can hide my sagging boobs under a big sweatshirt, but I don’t have that luxury in the warmer weather. In the warmer weather I need a bra to keep those babies up where they are supposed to be. Not down having a conversation with my belly button. You know, if you could find my belly button somewhere within all that “twin skin.” What?!? TMI?

How do you know it’s Spring?

We are giving away a $150 gift certificate to Zappos over at Weary Parent. Do you need some new shoes (and honestly, who doesn’t?) head over and enter the contest.

Lee has a ways to go before his mancave can compete with this man’s mancave, but at least Lee didn’t have to mow anybody’s lawn in a dress.

Melissa is looking for submissions for Rout and Sprout. If you have some ideas for articles the deadline is May 15th. Get your parenting caps on and your articles to Melissa ASAP.

Slacker-moms-r-us asks what is a mother?

Turns out funny runs in the Bossy family. Last week it was her son and this week Bossy’s daughter took over the blog.

Flagrant Disregard over at The Blogfathers tells us what he’s learned about parenting. How can you not love a post that starts out with “On blame and farting: If everyone knows who did it, there’s no point in arguing about it.”

Backpacking Dad discovers that sibling rivalry has hit the internet age since his sister totally copied him and started her own blog.

Mamalogues is having some troubles with her trademark. I think we all know how I feel about trademark. Sometimes it sucks that the little people who may mean no harm are effected, but you have to protect your trademark.

I totally feel Amalah’s pain. I could go on for days listing all the “nice” things I used to have before kids.

White Trash Mom is not only cool mom, but she’s also saving the world. And she did it all with Friendship shoes.

While Mrs. Fussypants is on bedrest her husband confirmed what we all already know. Men have no idea how difficult it is to be a supermom.

Congrats to Lotus on her pregnancy. Yeah!

The You Suck At Photoshopm guys have been revealed. Have you watched this series? They offer a great tutorial that will not only teach you Photoshop tips, but also having you laughing out loud.

Head over to James Roades’ blog and see how the Kentucky Supreme Court has ruled the sanctity of marriage is more important that truth and DNA. Stephanie has a great recap of the disturbing ruling. She says exactly what I’m thinking, only much more eloquently and without all the curse words.

This week’s Friday Flashback theme is movies. Her Bad Mother tells us to write about our first or most memorable early movie memory.

I have a couple of early movie memories.

When I was eight-years-old, I remember standing in a really, really, really, really long line to go see E.T. Did I mention the line was long? That’s about all I remember about that experience. [Aren't I just a fabulous story teller?] I do know I loved the movie and we actually saw it in the theater more than once. I even had a little stuffed E.T. that I loved dearly. I also think this was the start of my girl crush on Drew Barrymore, who I still love to this day.

Oh and when my mom lived in California we went to Universal Studios and they had this E.T. exhibit with a bike and a green screen. They picked somebody out of the crowd to ride the bike and then we could see them flying on the green screen. I was so pissed I wasn’t picked to ride that bike.

In other news you couldn’t care less about, I just discovered E.T. was released on my birthday in 1982. Interesting.

Then when I was nine-years-old, my mom’s friend, Tree (which I believe was short for Theresa), took me to see Staying Alive.

This was memorable because we brought out own food. But not just a little food. We brought a lot of food. We brought our own popcorn in big brown paper bag, some candy, maybe even some grapes and our own cans of sodas. And somehow we snuck it all in to the theater. I remember we had to be quiet when we opened our cans of soda so they didn’t make too much noise when the top popped. That Tree was a crazy one.

About thirteen-years-ago, I went to a party at co-workers house. It was a bunch of us girls (and one guy) and we had a John Travolta night. We watched a bunch of Travolta movies, including Staying Alive (and Saturday Night Fever and Urban Cowboy). Good times.

Then when I was 11, we went to see Follow That Bird, a Big Bird movie. I was way to old and mature to be at a Big Bird movie, but we brought my Aunt Candy’s, friend’s son (wow, that was a mouthful). I can’t remember the boys name, but his mom, Laura, was (and I think still is) one of my aunt’s very good friends.

This movie was memorable because of what happened in the theater. It was this big theater somewhere near Daly City, California. Like many theaters the floor slants up. But in this theater the seats didn’t start until halfway up the floor. In other words, there was a huge gap between the screen and the first row of seats. There were no seats to crimp your neck. We sat in the front row. Some time in the middle of the movie I accidentally kicked my soda. It fell over and spilled all over the floor. I spent the rest of the movie watching my soda slowing roll down the cement floor towards the screen. I was so bummed.

Read about others (more exciting) memorable movie memories:
Assertagirl
Frances
IrishKat
Izzy Mom
Oh The Joys
Mamalogues
Mrs. Flinger
Parenting Toys
Posts From the Playground
Sweetney