Pizza and Parenting, a Metaphor!

Tonight I made pizza for dinner. I've done this many, many times before. I'm pretty good at it. I made the pizza dough, preheated the oven, rolled out the dough, put on the toppings and baked. It turned out terribly.
I had problem on top of problem today. I decided to make two smaller pizzas with different toppings instead of my usual one large one. My pizza stone was out in the garage, and the pizzas wouldn't work on one air bake pan, so I just planned to make them on a baking sheet. I put the sheet in the oven to preheat.

At this point, I thought I
still might salvage something

I rolled out the dough, topped with everything but the cheese, and got ready to put in the oven. But I had a problem. How was I going to get the rolled out, already topped dough onto the heating baking sheet? I don't have a pizza peel. (How this is even possible?) The dough was thin and when I attempted to lift it, it just fell apart.
Meanwhile, Moe was whining and crying and fussing about being hungry. Frazzled and rushed, I decided I'd just make the pizzas separately, got out air bake pans, and managed to get the first very messy dough transferred. I moved the second pizza to its pan a little more easily, but both crusts were stretched very thin.
I baked the first crust for a bit, then topped with cheese. Otherwise, the cheese burns before the crust is baked through. As I put the cheese on the pizza I realized I had somehow bought fat free mozzarella. If you've ever used fat free cheese, you'll know that it is nothing more than flavorless rubber strings that do not melt well and belong on no pizza ever. But it was all I had.

Second pizza was equally screwed up

With the first pizza out of the oven, I still had hope. I sliced it, and tried to lift a piece. It stuck to the pan. Completely. In my haste, I had forgotten to oil the pan.
What can I say? It wasn't my day. It happens to the best of us. I know I can make really great pizza but today, as Jeff said, "my head wasn't in it" and I mucked it up.
Jelly has been into metaphors lately, and wow, what a metaphor this provided. How many times have we all made mistakes either because our heads weren't in it, or because factors just seemed to be conspiring against us?
As a mother, especially of a child with limited communication skills, I rely on formulas—recipes of communication that usually give me a positive outcome. But sometimes I don't have the right ingredients, or I try something new, or I don't plan ahead correctly and I screw it up.
But this kind of mistake is harder to let go. The stakes are so much higher and I want to get my interactions with Moe and Jelly right every time. But I don't. Sometimes I yell, or choose to give iPad time instead of engaging in a game, or cave when Jelly only wants crackers for dinner. I lose my patience with Moe. A lot.
I will never get it right every time. And every time I read blog post I read by a parent who never tells their kids to hurry up, who are always patient and positive, who never allow screen time and whose children make their own spinach avocado smoothies for breakfast every morning, I know I am going to screw up. Because parenting is hard. And parenting a tough kid is even harder. Much harder than making pizza.
All I can do is remind myself of past successes and know that I'll probably get it right the next time. Or the time after that.

Better luck next time

Here are a couple of posts about times I've successfully made pizza!
Using Pioneer Woman's pizza dough recipe
Quick and Easy Pizza