You say tomato I say hillbilly.

Ever have one of those days. You know...the kind that make you want to look around innocently and ask, "Whose kids are those?? They are unfit to be in public!"

It all started when we went to Costco. We walked in the door and Ivy started sca-reaming. I mean, I am the first to admit that Ivy is an angel baby. Nary a peep from the girl. She is so good in fact that I can count the number of times on two fingers that she has even spit up. She's that good. So the Costco screamfest of 09 was kinda freaking me out. I don't mind if my kids scream and act crazy, what I do mind are the eye rolls and scoffs of passersby. Jerks. Ever try walking through Costco with one kid clinging to your pant leg, crying because you bypassed the 5000 pack of fruitsnacks, one kid in the cart throwing out all of your groceries as you walk, and one very very very screaming newborn who lacks the neck support to hold up her own head, so you can't really bend over and pick up your milk because her head will snap off if you don't use one hand to hold her and the other to hold her bobble head. And it just so happens to be the one time in your career of being a mother of three that you didn't bring your snugli because you were kind of sick of feeling like you are pregnant ALL of the time.

And then you find out that they don't sell your favorite kind of chicken at Costco.

And then you nearly die of heart failure on the way home when your four year old informs you that your newborn is turning purple in the backseat of the car.

Then you manage to get home and get all the groceries in (Ivy still screaming in the background, what the?). But since Costco doesn't sell good chicken you have nothing to make for dinner even though you just spent about a million dollars at the store (I hate that about going to Costco, you still have to go to a regular store afterwards). Then your husband comes home and opens the cool little yellow tomatoes you bought and incidentally dumps half of them on the floor...

and one of them rolls under the stove, which leads to an hour long cleansing of under the stove and you feel a little bit like you should have been wearing a spacesuit or something to keep out the noxious fumes of all the disgusting yuckies that were found back there. (but hey the good news is we found the illusive missing "P" from our fridge magnetic letters!)

And just then you think, hey, I should make spaghetti for dinner but your thoughts are interrupted by...

*CRASH*

* SCREAM*

And you walk in the pantry to find Bentley covered in blood from head to toe, but then you notice the blood smells a lot like spaghetti sauce, and you're kind of glad it's not blood, but kind of sad that it was your last jar of spaghetti sauce.

But then there was a little blood because you stepped on some glass on the way in there (alright, that part didn't really happen, but easily could have)

And you think, it's okay, I'll just look in my favorite cookbook where none of the recipes take more than thirty minutes, I will feed this family, I am superwoman! But then you realize that somewhere in the hullaballooo the cookbook got plastered with spaghetti sauce.

Then you turn around to see that Bentley has learned how to climb up on his high chair and is balancing precariously and is likely to come crashing down on your hard tile floor.

So you decide to go to dinner. You deserve it.

And HOORAY you have a coupon plus half priced appetizers if you get there before seven! This day is starting to turn around! Woohoo!

You run, you scold, you drive like mad.

Hooray, it doesn't look crowded at all, we're going to make it! Wait...there's no one here, is this place any good? WAIT there are like not even employees here. It's closed? Closed! Egh....dang economy.

Okay, on to the next restaurant. Your quick jaunt to dinner is really turning into something now.

Your exhausted toddler and preschooler join the chorus of screams and whines STILL coming from your newborn.

You battle with the preschooler to stop acting insane when you realize that she is not wearing shoes, or socks. And you distinctly recall seeing a sign on the door that read something like "no shoes no shirt no dignity" or something.

When more than half of your dinner party isn't wearing shoes and the other half have glazed over eyes and earplugs in...I don't know, you just kind of feel a bit like ....hillbillies I guess.

Then as you collapse, exhausted and ready to quit your job (being a mom) and watch "Marley and Me" you realize that these are the days that you are going to remember. The days you are going to miss. As hard as it is to believe now, you will miss this and long for the days of spaghetti sauce kisses and working so hard to just survive the day. I have no doubt that one day, in the very far future ( : ) ) I will miss the chaos and the craziness and being supermom.

Anyway, it wasn't a bad day, just remarkably chaotic and really memorable and it all started with a tomato.

Tomatoes and I have a history. Speaking of...2/3 of my tomato plants are dead.

Gotta run. Here's hoping for no catastrophes today of the human or vegetable variety!