I am basically the world’s most lazy human being. Given the choice, I will almost always choose sloth. I exercise because people tell me I should (and because I like dessert) not because I get any kind of enjoyment out of it. At all. So on “my” days- birthday, Mother’s Day, whatnot- I pretty much always choose to do nothing at all.
Luckily for me Sergeant Handsome knows this about me and indulges it. He and the boys made me delicious banana pancakes for breakfast. They were sooooo good. He even made the maple syrup glaze I like to add when I really want to make it clear that I’m having dessert for breakfast instead of, you know, actual breakfast. They looked a lot like this:
Except those are from a few weeks ago. The ones my men made I ate before I took a picture of them. Oops!
I followed up my carb-loading breakfast (and some hang out time with Sergeant Handsome and the four lovely boys that me a mother) with some reading and then a nap. Seriously, I wasn’t kidding about the whole “laziest human being ever” thing. After my nap, my happy little self went to the movie theater. To see Iron Man 3. Because in addition to being lazy, I’m also apparently a 13-year old boy.
On the way home from the theater we saw a rather large house fire. Which led to a lot of… interesting… discussion with the boys. First, we talked about how it wasn’t “cool” and that we needed to hope that there were no people in the house and that the firefighters on their way would be safe. Then talk turned to what if our own house was on fire. Where it quickly became clear that I haven’t done enough to talk about fire safety.
Obviously we’ve discussed not to play with the stove, that only grown-ups can use matches/lighters, and about fireplace safety (why we clean it and such)… but we’ve never discussed what to do if there’s actually a fire.
So my Mother’s Day turned into telling the boys to leave their toys and teaching them how to unlock the window in their room. This is also turned into a chat about home owner’s insurance because Mini-Me was really concerned about being unable to replace any toys he lost. The house itself he was less concerned about. We also had to tell them over and over again not to get anyone else but to just help themselves get out.
The level of concern they had for who would get baby Spike out of the house was adorable. You know, you worry that they’ll be annoyed about the fourth brother and not want him in the family. But already, only halfway through the kid’s first year, they were yelling at us that “but someone needs to get Spike!”
So now the older two boys know how to unlock the window in their room. They all know to go across the street and get far from the house and tell a neighbor that they need help. (To which point Fidget objected, “But what if the neighbors are mean?!” Dude, you’ve met them. They’re nice. And also? Your house is on fire in this situation, don’t worry if they aren’t your favorite people) They know to crawl because smoke rises. They know to leave from whatever window or door is closest. They know not to wait for us or worry about their stuff.
It’s not exactly how I thought I’d spend a chunk of time on Mother’s Day, but anything that helps keep these kids safe, right? Hopefully we’ll never need it but looking at the house fire was pretty scary.
And, not to worry, I quickly returned to my day of sloth after our little foray into fire safety. Then Sergeant Handsome made me some filet mignon for dinner. Laziness, carbs, and beef = my happy place.
A good day all around.
