Sundey McClendon is a writer for the Dallas Observer and mother to three children ages 6, 3 and 2. Sundey lives in the Dallas area with her family.
5AM Late-night Sundey is much more ambitious than early-morning Sundey, so I hide my alarm clock to force myself to get out of bed, and it begins blaring from the far corner of my bedroom, under the dog’s bed. I put a pillow over my head and go back to sleep.
5:45AM My normally sweet husband wraps his arms around me and whispers in my ear, “Find that stupid alarm clock and turn it off or I will have to smother you with this pillow.” And I’m up. A force I can’t fully explain propels me to the coffee pot. I love HEB’s Houston blend coffee. It has a little hint of coconut.
6AM Shower and get dressed. Put on a bright red, puffy vest I bought last week from Old Navy. It reminds me of the ‘80s. I look like I should be in Back to the Future. Fight immediate urge to listen to Huey Lewis and the News.
6:45AM Up and to the email. My inbox sums up my life right now. I have new emails from Mavs owner Mark Cuban, musician Rhett Miller, local sports radio host Ben Rogers and my son’s teacher regarding him having to change his card last week for dancing in line on the way to music class. I’m not really sure I want to curb his spontaneous dancing.
7AM Time to wake up the maniacs. I find the quickest way to get anyone to do anything is for me to sing at him or her until it’s done. Anything by Florence and the Machine is effective.
7:30AM Getting two toddlers and a kindergartener dressed and out the door should be an Olympic sport, plus we carpool, so my car is filled to the brim with kids. If I could bottle the energy in my car right now, I could make a fortune.
8:40AM Grocery store and Pandora time. The Avett Brothers station is doing me right today.
9AM Home and putting away groceries, tackling laundry and the many, many messes in my house. I feel like my house couldn’t get messier quicker if I ran a spider monkey exhibit out of my living room. I have wonderful, friendly neighbors who often stop by and probably expect to see me on Hoarders soon.
11AM I’ve been doing the Team Beachbody Insanity workout for about a month, and each time I sweat, cry, curse and then spend the rest of my afternoon walking around like I just had a C-section. I’m never more grateful for a hot shower than after working out.
12:30PM Get situated at my desk with my lunch to do some writing work. I’ve learned to schedule Skype conferences at this time, after my 3-year-old came in once during a Skype conference and announced that he could see corn in his poop to my entire conference group. Horrifying.
2PM Wait … it’s 2pm? I’m late! Late to pick up the kids! Oh, please don’t judge me, preschool teachers!
2:09PM By the grace of God and green lights, I’m only a few minutes late.
2:30PM Got the preschoolers, now in the pickup line to get my kindergartener. The pickup line is a modern marvel of efficiency to me. I also feel a little bad for the dad in front of me who has no idea what he is doing. These elementary-school pickup moms will cut you.
5PM Dinnertime. Also the time of day I’m most likely to lock myself in the bathroom and cry. My house looks like I never cleaned it, my kids are swinging from the rafters. I’m almost certain that this is my punishment for judging other moms before I had children. Dinnertime is the most wheels-off part of my day.
6PM My husband takes the older kiddo to karate while I bathe the younger two and go through take-home folders in the bathroom, while repeating the phrase “Don’t splash” like some sort of loopy, chanting monk. I see there is still homework to be done for my oldest maniac.
7PM My husband reads to the younger two while the older one and I tackle the homework. I’m new to this whole kindergarten thing, and it’s changed so much since I was in elementary school. What was coloring and naptime is now reading words and journal writing and something called “domino math” which I still don’t fully understand … clearly I don’t play dominoes much.
7:30PM Homework, take-home reader and bedtime reading is done. Teeth are brushed, clothes are laid out, my son’s backpack is ready next to the door, now it’s time to herd these sweet little people we created to bed for goodnight songs and prayers.
8PM Bedtime for bonzos. My husband and I collapse in a pile on the sofa for wine and Homeland. There are still lunches to be packed, more laundry to be done, a kitchen to be cleaned, clothes to be laid out and an alarm clock to be hidden, but I’ll worry about that later.
Diaries are penned by moms (and dads) in the Dallas area. The authors volunteer to share a day of their choosing and are not paid or endorsed by DallasChild. Send your diary to editorial@dallaschild.com. All submissions are subject to editing and may be cut for space.
