Who Do These Obnoxious Children Belong To?

They're certainly not mine. It's 8:30am, we've been up for 2 1/2 hours and I've been ready to leave them outside WalMart with a "Free to a Good Home, Must Be Placed Together" sign for 2 Hours and 29 minutes.

It all started when Zach woke up, chipper and talkie, in his 5 month old baby kinda way, at 5:45. I retrieved him from his crib, brought him to our room, fed him and got him back to sleep. Noisy, moany, groany sleep, but sleep none the less. Then, at 6:07 Dylan decided to make his way into our room, which would have been fine, until he proclaimed "I need my blankie. Mommy get it." I told him no, and that if he wanted his blanket HE could go get it, to which he responded by SCREAMING and CRYING and WHINING and CARRYING ON. To which I responsed by YELLING "Knock it off, you're going to wake your brother up!" which, in hindsight, probably also contributed to waking Zach up, but I'd prefer to place the blame on Dylan. Anyhoo, my yelling only resulted in more SCREAMING, CRYING, WHINING and CARRYING ON on his part, which is shocking, but true. SO, I got up, picked him up, carried him SCREAMING, CRYING, WHINING and CARRYING ON back to his room, and pretty much tossed him, softly, of course, back into his bed. At which point I picked up his beloved blankie, tossed it on to his head and said "There's your damn blanket, now knock it off and go to sleep." I stormed out of his room, closed the door, and headed back to my own bed. Of course, there was more SCREAMING, CRYING, WHINING and CARRYING ON going on back in his room, but at least he was in his room, which kept him separated from us by two closed doors.

By this time, Zach was fully awake and ready to play, which is exactly the OPPOSITE of the mood I was in at that point. I tried, unsuccessfully, for 10 minutes to get him to stop chatting and take his pacifier, but he was much more interested in giving me his baby take on what had just gone down. I think he was on his brother's side. Little bastard.

I finally decided that a cup of coffee was in order, so I got up, put him in his Magic Swing in the hopes that he would fall asleep, as is usually the case, and got myself my much needed coffee (sans Bailey's, it's Wednesday, people. That's only for the weekend, boo hoo). Dylan joined me shortly thereafter in much better spirits, but still full of piss & vinegar. Zach talked and talked and talked and TALKED in his swing for a full half hour before FINALLY falling asleep. Dylan's on video #4 (Caillou (gag), Baby Einstein (yay), Thomas (eh) and Spongebob (bleh), which means he's been coming to me every 12 seconds (I exaggerate) to have a new DVD put in. I'm more than happy to do it, though, cause that means that he's in his own room and is out of my hair. I'm not going to win any parenting awards today, but at least my children will still be members of this family at the end of the day.

I'm going to shower, head to Trader Joe's and medicate my foul mood with some good TJ's shopping. For those of you without Trader Joe's in your immediate vicinity, I offer my condolences. For those of you without my children in your immediate vicinity today, You Are Welcome. For those of you without me in your immediate vicinity today, You Are Welcome.