A Harried Mother's Daily To-Do's List

1) Change out of my sleep wear into one of my numerous daytime outfits.

2) Brush not just one side of my teeth but all three.

3) Prepare breakfast, lunch, and if I'm feeling industrious, dinner too.

4) Gather up all the crumbs and smashed food after a meal and, while considering how I'm too full to eat them, throw them away.

5) Gather, rinse, and load all the reusable cutlery and dish-ware into the fully automated, grease-erasing, grime-wiping, 3-cycled dishwasher and press the start button.

6) Read, answer, or respond to 1/24th of the new facebook posts, 1/12th of the e-mails in my inbox, 1/8th of the news, 1/3 of the children's squabbles, 3/5ths of my texts, 3/4ths of the children's questions, and 9/10th's of my husband's statements. (Calculations not entirely accurate)

7) Collect paraphernalia all across the great expanse of my property that has been deposited there by the fully-functioning, completely-healthy, spritely 20-month-old boy I am raising.

8) Subdue the wild animals into each of the four corners of the house and compel them to remain there for an hour or so in order to sneak outside, into the bathroom, or into the car for some silence.

9) Count up all the places we haven't gone today—the bathtub, roof, neighbor's fence, into the planters, in the bushes, under the bed, on top of the car, under the kitchen table, on top of the kitchen table and in the crawl space under the house—and think of sending each of the kids to one of them tomorrow.

10) Reflect back on the day's activities and think how they might be considered educational and thus "count" as part of the day's practically non-existent school time.

11) Secretly eat children's candy.

12) Make a mental to-do list of all the things I wish I could've gotten done today—cleaned something, cut the kids nails, art projects with my kids, made cookies, put away laundry—and then imagine that to-do list being ripped into tiny pieces and burned in a bon-fire while I laugh evilly as if this is what I meant to do all along.

13) Use threats and a nerf gun to get all zoo animals back into cages for the night.

14) Change out of grubby daytime outfit and into sleep-ware. Bonus points for taking a shower or just shaving something, anything!

15) Try to fall asleep before husband.