Three kids is a LOT of kid

Yesterday I helped out a friend who had a work function fall on one of her days off with her kids. So I took them for the morning. They are utterly adorable kids, and I was really looking forward to it.

But I am also not stupid, and I did a fair amount of planning and recruiting help. My friend J came with her baby to help me, and one of the dads in my parents group turned up in the morning too. We did a convoy to get all the kids down to toddler gym for the morning. And it was mostly great - Atti was a bit tired and emotional and was melting down pretty regularly. But with three other adults keeping an eye out for our 5 kids and an infant between us, we did pretty fine.

Atti crashed straight out in my bed when he got home, but my friend's daughter wasn't having a bar of  napping sadly. And her 4 yo son doesn't have naps anymore. So there wasn't really a break, per se, but it was fine, my friend J sat reading with the two loaner kids while Atti slept, so I did get a chance to sit down and take a breath.

It was an interesting experience - and much sweatier than I would have thought. As in, you don't really get to stop with three (four including the baby) underfoot. I had done all the cooking before they had come, so the food was all sorted first thing in the morning. And I seemed to spend a lot more time sort of trailing them tidying up afterwards - which I have always kind of thought was stupid when i saw other parents doing it - I mean teach your kid to tidy up or you will still be doing it in 10 years. But it is insane trying to direct a hurricane, and with a 2, 3 and 4 yo running around your house, a hurricane is kind of what happens. Play with one thing for 10 mins, then onto the next thing. You would definitely need a yard and playroom with three or more. Just to contain mess I and give them somewhere to run amok!

But it was so much fun. Very cool to have other kids who are interested in other things and play in other ways too. The 2 yo girl found lots of Atti's clothes to dress up in, and adorably she was most taken with a scarf and beanie that a friend's mum knitted for Atti that he rips off milliseconds are it is put on. The one photo I got of him in it I had to pin his arms down, something my friend noticed (doh!). So it was fabulous to send her a pix of this heartbreakingly adorable girly in the outfit. And the 4 yo boy is really dramatic and imaginative, and watching his death-metal-style guitar playing (to the wiggles!) still has me LMAO-ing.