6:30am: Timothy wakes me up by either hitting me in the face or jumping on me. So I drag myself out of bed and we watch ‘Baby Einstein’ together while I try to start my brain.
7am: I start making breakfast of some sort and coffee. Gotta have coffee. Timothy is now jumping on Samantha and Sean to get them out of bed.
Somewhere between 8 and 9 I get a shower. Now I’m awake.
9am: Sean goes out to conquer the world.

On this day, we decided to paint. Samantha was teaching Timothy how to paint and draw between the lines (a skill she hasn’t mastered herself). It’s so much fun to watch her ‘play mum’ with her brother, parroting things I’ve said to her. She’s so protective of him and helpful with him… when she’s not trying to kill him.
While I painted Timothy started to dump his uneaten breakfast onto my picture. He then over turned the rest of the egg onto the floor and took the bowl and put it in the craft box. As I cleaned up egg, I asked him, “Timothy, please bring the bowl back to Mummy”. So he stood up, walked straight past me and rolled my exercise ball to me. I thought that was too cute, so I gave him a big hug and said, “Thank you for bringing Mummy the ball!” Samantha indignantly stated, “But Mummy, he didn’t bring you the bowl”.  So I explained to Timothy the difference between ‘ball’ and ‘bowl’. We speak 3 languages in our house – Thai, American and Australian – and sometimes our accents get a little messed up.

Then it’s time to make lunch. “Mummy, I want mac’n’cheese! And I want to help you make it.” So, Mummy’s little help puts water, salt and oil in the pot, and I put it on to heat up. Then we put the noodles in and go outside to play. Mummy’s very happy to get outside, because Timothy has been whining all morning and I need some fresh air. The next thing I know we’re 4WD’ing (on the tricycles) through the thick jungle of Dragon Land, and we’ve got to find our dragon friends. “Come on Mummy!! Come on Timmy!! Cassie is over there. Let’s go play with her.” The terrain in this part of Dragon Land is very rough, and while Samantha has a 4WD trike, Timothy’s in more of a street bike, so he takes a few tumbles. By the time we navigate back to the front gate, Samantha announces is time to go to the ‘play port’ at the end of the street (the playground at the kindergarten). So, Samantha & Timothy are now on their motorbikes, and we all head off to find the Dinosaur Train so we can play with Tiny, Shiny and Don.

By the time we get to the playground, Timothy is exhausted, and just wants to sleep on the swinging bench, but Samantha is determined to ride the Dinosaur Train. We park the bikes and board the train, where we meet our friends the Teranedon Family,  plus the Troodons, T-Rex, Alasaurus, Brontosaurus, and Triceratops. She knows them all by name and happily introduces Timothy and I to them. I asked if she was a big ‘Samantha-saurus Rex’, to which she replied, “No Mummy, I’m the conductor. I’m a Troodon.”

Then suddenly an alarm goes off in my head.

THE MACARONI!!!!

“Samantha, we forgot about our noodles. They’re still on the stove cooking.” She gives me a ‘so what’ kind of look. “Sweetie, we have to go home, because the noodles might burn and then we can’t eat them.”

She practically jumped off the train and started to run down the street. Um, no. First. We don’t run down the street alone. Second, you have to get your trike. Third. You don’t run down the street alone. So, I carried sleepy Timothy, his trike, and the bucket that Samantha had declared we needed to take with us to pick flowers, while Samantha rode that Trike home… very slowly. I was practically running down the street, and she was so slow. It took her about 30 seconds to get to the park, but about 5 minutes to get back. Thankfully we’re on a quiet street, so I ran home, put Timothy and toys inside the gate and ran back to Samantha to get her moving. Then I ran into the house, which was full of smoke and found stinking black noodles in a stinky black pot. I’ll deal with that later. “Let’s get some new noodles going so we can have lunch.”

Next on the agenda. Feed kids. Put Timothy to bed. Wait a minute, I’m starving myself, which is probably why I forgot about the noodles. Then I hear, crash!… “Waaaaaaa!” Samantha was climbing in her doll house, and somehow fell flat on her face. Did I mention she’s already not feeling well? So, she’s screaming more than usual, and she starts acting like she’s gonna throw up. I pick her up to comfort her, patting her back a few times and suddenly…. ‘blech’ – all down my back. Oh, the joys of motherhood. But I think she felt a little better. By this time Timothy is wailing, too, cause he’s overtired and just wants to go to bed. Put Samantha in the bath and put Timothy to bed. Phew. Peace for a few minutes. Now I can eat.

At 2pm,  miracle occurred. Samantha put herself down for a nap. But Timothy woke up earlier than anticipated, at 2:30. Bummer. I decided to put on ‘Happy Feet’ so that I could get some work done. But Timothy’s response to the movie was so cute, that I was mesmerized watching him for about 20 minutes. Timothy is a singer and dancer. Music is in his heart. So, he was trying to dance with the penguins. Finally I managed to pull myself away to do dishes and make dinner. But I got sucked back in when Samantha woke up and the two of them started dancing together.

Finally, Daddy comes home and Mummy begs for some down time. Daddy time is sand pit time. Time to get messy and dirty. After about 20 mins, I remember there’s more cooking to be done, so it’s back to the kitchen. Kids are really dirty, so they have a bath before dinner, then we all each a gourmet meal together. Well, kind of. We feed the kids as fast as we can, then send them off to play while we eat together. Then Daddy gets some down time.

Around 8pm, Timothy brings me his blanket and pulls on my shirt, indicating he’s ready for bed. But Samantha battles bed time fiercely, so she sometime between 8 and 10, she’ll finally fall asleep. Some nights Mummy and Daddy get time together… sometimes blow kisses as we pass each other in the night, tending to the needs of the kids.