As a stay-at-home mom, the diciest time of my day is the span between naptime ending and my husband coming home. This usually ranges from about 3-5 p.m. Sometimes, I try to get creative or ambitious and load the kids in the car for a quick outing before dinner. But this can lead to us getting home later than normal and dinner being a throw-together afterthought of whatever we have in our fridge. That, or delivered Domino’s. (In other news, I believe Domino’s is the best delivered pizza. I will fight you on this.)
If naps don’t go well (i.e. George refusing to sleep and continually coming out of his room to see what I’m doing. He always finds me on the couch…), then I’m typically a bit cranky too. This leads to the makings of a pillow pile.
Pillow Pile: /pilo/ /pil/ noun – A pile of near-to-all soft items scattered throughout the home. Including, but not limited to, pillows, blankets, cushions, stuffed animals, etc. Pillow piles usually form as a natural result of a parent’s exhaustion and/or apathy of entertaining his or her offspring.
The pillow pile first began when we noticed baby George rubbing his face on every pillow he came across. We threw a few more soft things down, and a pillow pile was born! Or maybe it was because he tended to tip over backwards and smack his baby head on the floor when he was first learning how to sit…
Pillow piles are handy when Mama needs to just lie on the floor. What? Mature adults don’t typically have this sensation? Well, keep your judge-y thoughts to yourself, por favor. There are moments when I just don’t want to read another book or play with Play-doh or go outside. I just want to not do things. This is where the pillow pile comes in.
For some reason, soft surfaces attract my children’s faces and bodies like fruit flies to the overripe bananas in my dorm room once upon a time. They just can’t help themselves and immediately fling themselves onto the mercy of the pile of plush. The kiddos just crawl all over the the pillows, Mama, each other. They bring me books, which I typically read to them. The pillow pile just has magical entertainment qualities. This gives Mama the wonderful opportunity to simply lie and be. At least until Dada comes home, raises an eyebrow at his lazy-looking wifey, and then launches himself onto the pile.
Got any tricks of the parenting trade to pass along? I’m all ears!
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