The Sick Child Checklist

(as written by a hands-off-Mom)

Some days a kid will come down with the perfect illness. Like a pretty bad headcold. No barfing. Just a gnarly cough, terrible congestion, and a general feeling of malaise. These kids just want to sit on the couch watching movies all day and need minimal parenting. Some drink runs, offering of various snacks, and temperature takings. Other than that, it's parental freedom... within the confines of the house. No one is leaving the house. You have errands to run that day? TOO BAD. They are all shelved for another day. You're only function is to bring sippie cups of apple juice and hitting the restart button on Frozen. So what is a gal to do with all this time? I'll tell you.

- Prepare to do All The Laundry. Every stitch of cloth will be washed, dried, and folded today.

- Since you're still in your pajamas, go ahead and clean the bathrooms, all three, top to bottom. Because WHY NOT.

- Mop the floors!

- Remember that laundry we talked about earlier? Some of it is ready to be folded, (let's be honest, some of it has been sitting, clean, in your room for days now) whip out some podcasts and get on it.

- You're sweaty, so time to think about taking a shower in your freshly scrubbed bathroom. But you really want to finish up the podcast you're in the middle of. Re-juice the kid and make sure you've got a good Frozen time-buffer, then sit in your room trimming your split ends finishing up that podcast for say 45 mins.

- Take the longest shower known to man. Wash your hair. Shave your legs, even! You're going to look AMAZING... sitting at home... where no one will see you. Consider taking a selfie for Twitter just to document the occasion.

- Check in with the sickster, he demands lunch and needs to get out of those infernal boots. (BOOTS ON THE COUCH!) Slap together a lunch that he probably won't touch because he feels like dirt, then go dry/style your hair. Throw on makeup because WHY THE HECK NOT? Get a little fancy with the eyeliner and use red lipstick. Top the look off with a fresh set of uber comfy pajamas.

- Blog about the nonsense you've been up to, and it's only 11:39.

- Wish the kid wasn't hogging the good TV.

- Remember there is always "quiet time"at 1:00 and pray that maybe medicated, the boy will take a real nap, and let you catch up on sleazy television.

- Suddenly start scrolling through a list of all the household maintenance you could be doing the rest of the afternoon, but you already took a shower... a possibly wasted-shower.

- CRAP.