Freaky Friday... on a Thursday

I'm forgoing a traditional Freaky Friday to tell you all about my hellish morning yesterday. It was true freakiness and resulted in me crying at Downton Abbey reruns for no reason at all, except that I was tired and things weren't going my way,

So, I'm a person who doesn't do well with changes to her schedule. I like things to be verrrrrry predictable, so when something is changed, I'm kind of like: 

And this can mean any minor change. Like, I don't even like it when someone rings my doorbell and it wasn't scheduled in my phone. Picture day at school is one of these minor changes that I fail at. Because it's not part of my regular schedule, I always end up forgetting or sending my kids in weird clothes or last year, missing them completely and then having to do makeup day and the pictures were horrible with a capital H. 

But this year? This year would be different. I would finally prove myself to be the capable adult that I play on TV. So I saved the date in my phone. I set alarms to remind me the day before and then one hour and 30 minutes pre-picture day so there was no freaking way I would ever forget.

The night before, per my reminder, I started getting the kids ready. They both got baths, and not the kind where I make them get in the shower because they're being annoying and I need like, five minutes and I don't care how clean they really get. Like, head-to-toe, scrubbing the toes with loofahs and such to get them clean. And my daughter has roughly 43 pounds of hair, so it takes forever to wash.

But you know what? I had planned for this. I knew what I was doing. I was CONFIDENT. 

I then commenced the process of blowdrying my Muppet daughter's hair, flat ironing and using rollers to give it bounce, which we discussed at length. I also pressed and starched their clothes, which never ever happens ever. 

Thursday morning I let the kids sleep in because no one wants to see a baggy-eyed kindergartner. I got them up, got them dressed, re-flat ironed hair, added gel for perfect spikes: You name it. I even got myself dressed and had cut up muffins to eat in the car on the way and gave myself the exact amount of time needed to get them to school five minutes in advance of the bell. Look at me go. 

.

Aaaaaand that's when all hell broke loose. I sent the kids out to the car. When I went to grab my keys out of my purse, they weren't there. That's fine, that's why key hooks were invented. Except they weren't there. I ran upstairs to check the bedside table, my desk, everywhere, No keys. This is a problem for me. 

I had just grabbed my phone to call Justin when my daughter came back in the house and said the words that no mother who has just taken her children out of school for two weeks wants to hear. 

"I think I'm going to throw up." 

So I'm trying to talk her into feeling better with a bottle of water while frantically typing out text messages to Justin that say things like "KEYS!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!" and "I'm freaking out right now" and "ANSWER YOUR PHONE" liked a crazed girlfriend. He answers and lets me know that my keys are in his pocket, and his pocket is currently in a meeting at work.

Luckily, Justin knows that I lose my everloving mind when stuff like this happens, so as I'm literally barking at him over the phone, he's already in his car to come home and drive my kindergartner (who has been waiting on the porch this entire time) to school. In the meantime, I shriek unintelligibly about Addie being sick at the worst possible time because I had to go to the store to buy goat cheese.

When Justin comes home, I naturally apologize profusely because I'm seriously an animal when I stress out. I hand him Andrew's backpack and give him strict instructions to check in at the school office and let his teacher know I won't be there to help today. Crisis averted. 

Five minutes later, Justin calls, asking where the picture day money. In all of my fastidious picture day planning, I had forgotten that you have to have a way to PAY FOR THEM. And wouldn't you know it? They only take cheques or cash, neither of which he has. 

This caused me to burst into tears. HOW DID THINGS GO SO WRONG? And, because I lack the life skills to remember that I could just pay online, I sent my husband to the gas station to get cash. 

But there was no cash back option.

So he had to go to an ATM. 

And then back to the gas station to break two $20 bills.

And then back to the school to hand the photographer the envelope, which was stuffed with bills and a few quarters because it turns out, the gas station wasn't great at making change.

In the meantime, my mom FaceTimed me to talk about a graphic design project she needed help on. She said, and I quote "I waited a couple days to call you because last time we talked you were grouchy and I wanted you to be in a good mood." 

I tell her to hang on, so I can commence calling Justin frantically every five minutes, because when I get worked up about something, there's a very small part of me saying "Jae, this doesn't matter in the grand scheme of things" and I suppress it and instead act like the money for picture day is now akin to transporting a live organ from the donor to the recipient. IT MUST BE DONE IN TIME.

And guess what? Everything was totally fine. My husband got the (completely unnecessary) cash there on time, my keys are safely in my purse, my daughter never barfed (and was in fact, fine after two episodes of Power Rangers) and I got my goat cheese.

Later, after my son got home from school, I drove to a treat store nearby and ordered 12 sugar cookies from the drive-thru for some stress-eating. The guy taking my order was like "What a world we live in, huh? You can get sugar cookies from the drive-thru. What could be better than that?" and I was like "Thanks for that insight, Cookie Yoda." 

After I have a stress episode like that, I kind of feel like The Hulk after he's like, destroyed a building. I wake up and am like "What happened? Did I do that? OMG I'm so sorry." 

I'm happy to report, however, that today, all of my plans have been executed perfectly, such as:

Showering

Eating a cookie

Looking up funny sloth gifs

Napping 

Moral of the story? Simplify. And next year, skip $@&# picture day.