Sometimes it's what you DIDN'T do that makes the day memorable...

I pretty much feel that I'm a good mom most of the time.  I try to do a lot of things for my kids to make their life enjoyable.  I feed them food.  I water them.  I talk to them.  They are like little plants that started out needing a bunch of attention and now they are adapting to their environment and figuring out what kind of tree to become.  All right, all right.  I know that little seedlings don't actually get to pick what kind of tree they will become, but I also know that I don't "water" my children.  This is a blog, so just roll with it.

As I was saying...

I have been trying to get back into shape recently and the big boys go to school just a 1/2 mile up the street.  We have been walking to school, and today I decided to walk them home from school as well.  Super-healthy-decision-making mama, right? 

Please tell me how a fifteen minute walk can go so very wrong!

What happened first was I walked through this ginormous spider web that I could not shake off of my body.  Once I did get rid of it, I began pushing the stroller only to find the owner of said web in an eye-to-eye stare down with the baby.  Personally, I think the baby would've won for the mere fact that he will eat anything that resembles candy.  This spider was bright orange and with RJ's recent discovery of Halloween, there is no doubt who would have won.  However, what goes in baby must come out of baby, and I would end up the ultimate loser in this situation. 

Normally I'm okay with putting things off until tomorrow, but spider poop is not one of these things.

I did what any mother would do in the parking lot of their children's preschool.  I threw my arms up in the air, cursed very loudly at the spider, and flicked him with my cell phone.  Then I exploited him by taking approximately fifteen pictures so I could comb through them later and find the most flattering one to post on Facebook.  I am a woman, after all, and I understand the necessity of a picture capturing one's "good" side. 

It's the least I could do after assaulting the thing with an iPhone...  iPhone's are HUGE! 

I have to say that I was super bummed about two things here: 
(1) normally we walk with Leonardo's best buddy from school, whom he chooses to refer to as his "girlfriend" or his future wife, and her mom, Jen.  I was beside myself that they missed all of this excitement...
(2) why, oh why, didn't I take a picture of the stare down when I had the chance???  Do you know how many camping trips I'm going to have to drag my family on just to get another opportunity like this?  Tons. 

At this point I went on and on about how I could not believe the spider thing and how cool and exciting our walk was today... and then IT happened.

IT:  a catch-all term used for anything and everything that has to do with little monkey children when they do something over the top and absolutely UN-freaking-believable that has just made you, and every passerby, say "Wow.  I honestly did not see that coming..." 

In other words:  my house. 
Every.  Single.  Day.

It's just the beginning of rush hour at this time and there is a bit of traffic.  We live in a subdivision so there isn't MUCH traffic, but enough for what happened next to be quite embarASSing.  *NOTE:  pun very much intended*

For some reason *let's not examine this too closely because we would spend the rest of our lives trying to analyse the reasons my children do even a quarter of the things they decide to do on a daily basis* Leonardo thinks this would be a good time to hold the stroller and then make his body go limp.

It actually appears at this point that I am dragging my child down the sidewalk.
Downhill.

This is when many things simultaneously happened:
(1) Leonardo's pants came down around his ankles...
(2) I became very aware of how many cars were driving by...

*inner thought* 

"Hmmmm... Obviously I didn't make sure Leo put on underwear today..."

how very short-lived the spider's infamy was.