The One Where You Get To Laugh At Me

I sometimes hear talk about how bloggers don't always present themselves honestly, and only share the sunny, polished, high points of their lives. It's true that, in keeping with the title of my blog, I usually post about things that I love, which means they are experiences or products that I've enjoyed and are worth highlighting here - translating into positive stories. But while I know I don't delve into my deep dark secrets here at This Mom Loves (you know, because I have so many), I'd like to think that I'm self-deprecating enough to give you the idea that I in no way am trying to present myself as perfect.
Just in case that's not coming through, I thought I'd share a couple of stories now just to make it clear that I'm willing to let you in on some of my not-so-good days as well. 
Exhibit A: Our school is participating in a magazine fundraising program, and I got my daughters set up online to make their sales. (I've done this for the past two years.) I imported my Yahoo address book, and selected the contacts whom I wanted to receive the promotional emails.
Yeah. Or maybe I selected the contacts whom I did not want to receive the promotional emails. Because at any rate, my entire address book - excluding the ten or so people whose names I checked off, of course - got the email. We're talking magazine editors, celebs I've interviewed, work contacts, friends and acquaintances I've lost touch with and haven't seen for ten years, and multiple friends/parents from our school whose children are - duh - also selling these magazines. Sure, sure, it's a little thing but I was mortified. I immediately went into Yahoo and sent an email of apology to all of these people, just in case they thought I was really bold enough to try to solicit funds from them. Then I was too scared to go back to the site and send the emails to the actual people I wanted to sell to, so it's likely my daughters will sell no magazines at all. (They will live without the prizes - in fact, there's less clutter if they don't earn any, so maybe this was all a subconscious thing on my part?)
Depending on your viewpoint, the funny part of the story may be the emails, or it may be how something minor like that could occupy my mind for pretty much a whole day. Anyway, then I got over it.
The irony is that I woke up this morning with the idea of writing this post, and upon checking my BlackBerry, realized that a "reminder email" had gone out to all the same damn people again! So I phoned the company and I have been told that no future emails will be sent from our fundraising account.
I'm sorry...again...to all of you! (But if any of you are interested in discount magazines, please contact me!)
Exhibit B: Just a couple of days after my email embarrassment, my husband was away at a conference, and I picked the girls up early to have a nice relaxing night at home. We pulled into the garage, brought all our stuff into the kitchen and dropped it. I provided my children with a gourmet feast (deli meat, crackers, grapes, etc.) in front of the TV, and I enjoyed half of a leftover cheese ball with a box of crackers as my meal, in front of the other TV. (Just wanted to add those details in there to show that I am not afraid to be judged by my readers.)
The morning rush the next day was a bit more difficult with my hubby not home (oh, who am I kidding, it actually goes a bit smoother when he's not there to mess with the routine) as well as because it was picture day and all three of us required a bit of extra maintenance. I never let my girls wear their hair down to school during lice season (by which I mean September to June) but I told Frannie I would curl her hair for the picture, as long as she pulled it up after. I hoped that Maggie wouldn't notice that she only got a simple braid, compared to her sister's more labour-intensive style (no way was my five year old with waist length hair wearing it down to school). Oh, but she noticed...and unfortunately didn't understand my logic. Let's just say the tantrum involved burrowing her head into a pillow, which then necessitated the rebraiding of the hair.
And that was just the warmup.
Once we were all photo-ready (except for Frannie's curls, which of course lasted less than 30 minutes), we were heading out the door. I texted my sister-in-law who provides our before and after school care and told her I was taking the kids right to school with me since we were running so late.
The thing is, it appears that a truck does not start if one is not in possession of the keys. (I know, shocker.) The keys that were taken out of the ignition the night before and brought into the house. The keys that weren't where they were supposed to be in the morning. Okay people, my things are always where they are supposed to be, so this was a bit of a stressor. I will spare you the details of how I checked and rechecked the vehicle, garage and house while frantically looking at my watch, but the bottom line is I couldn't find them anywhere.
I got a hold of my friend/coworker, also running late, who generously agreed to come completely out of her way to pick up the three of us (she was much more concerned about the Tiffany key chain than the keys themselves) and we landed at school with precisely two minutes to spare before the bell rang. Not exactly my usual time of arrival. Luckily we both had our days planned and just hit the ground running. My students were much more amused than I at the turn of events, but hey, might as well turn it into a good story for the classroom.
Fast forward through 8 hours of being fixated on where the keys could possibly be (when I went to grab a parcel from the front door, maybe my keys fell on the steps and overnight a wild animal picked them up and took off with them?), and another teacher kindly drove us home to begin our search. Promising a cash (or valuable coin) reward to the finder, the girls and I got to work, and hallelujah, our prayers to St. Anthony were answered, and what was lost was found.
Where, you ask? Well, right on the seat of one of the kitchen chairs, neatly tucked in under the table, where I suppose I should have served my daughters a home cooked meal the night before, and none of this ever would have happened.
Did I learn my lesson and head to the stove? Nope...I handed both girls a toonie for their seeking efforts, just before hubby arrived home early with some fresh and healthy subs from Subway. Okay, fine, and a bag of soft, gooey cookies, but come on, it had been quite a day!

Disclosure: This is a sponsored post, but every word is true. Seriously, why would I make this stuff up?