full of bees

Do you ever feel like you're not very smart, or that you don't have what it takes to really be a good mother?
This is not a sad post - and I'm not crying over it, I just get exasperated -it seems so easily!
First I was trying to find information on the batrachotomus for Trev, and was also (at the same time) looking up evolution, and science experiments. Ran into this page which pretty much let me know that I am not nearly as smart/competent as I imagine myself to be. Granted, I did not try to decipher it - took a quick look at it, and said "Uh, no." and went to the next one.
Fast forward about half an hour..
We had just gotten done with our terrarium, and filling it with various bugs - I'll write later on it on olm (be warned, Secret Agent, five spiders!), and then came in the house and the children wanted to play with the tangrams, so we did that, Maddie starts um... asking for Pooh in a way that sort of set my teeth on edge, can't find it, Trev finishes his robot and wants its picture taken, and wants me to finish my tangram design that looks like a robot (not what I was going for, but that's fine), Maddie wants food NOW! all of a sudden, "When are we going to the store to get the plaster of paris and the skittles and the baking soda and vinegar for volcanoes?" "Uh, food first, Maddie is hungry." "Come on little batrachotomus, Mom, look, the batrachotomus is climbing up the wall again. Can we get skittles for the batrachotomus?" "No, there were not skittles in the times of the dinosaurs of course, it would make him sick." "But, I told you that I saw them when I went back in time. Hey, where are Shaggy and Scooby, anyway, I haven't seen them in a long time." "Well, a time traveler must have left them there. Maybe they're sleeping, after a big lunch." What's super-quick?.. "Bagel, Maddie?" "No."
Eyes darting everywhere, starting to feel closed in.... "Peanut butter sandwich?" "Yeah." Phew. "Chicken noodle soup, Trev?" "So can we get some skittles for batrachotomus, too?" I'n hungry!" "I'm fixing it, Maddie. Trev, really, Bub, I can't play pretend right now. After lunch, okay? I'm starting to freak a little. Let me feed all of us.... I really need to regroup for a few minutes..." He asked me something, I dunno, bzz, bzz, bzz-zap, bzz.... "Here you go, Maddie, can't have grilled cheese with it bub, we need to get some butter at the store..." Okay, I'm going outside for a sec while the soup heats up....
Sigh.
I start (practically running) for the backdoor
"Mom, can we play again in a little while?" following me.
"Yeah Bub, but no more questions right now, okay? I'm feeling sort of stressed out, and my brain is zzzipping and zzzzapping, and I'm sort of freakin' on the inside."
"You mean like bees?" (Which is an interesting question - I took a quiz that Melissia posted about "What does your name mean?" and my answer was "full of bees". Ha! (though evidently it changes every time did it it today to get it exactly right, and was two completely different answers.)
"Actually, more like I'm electrocuting...."

Now we've had lunch and the tot is sleeping out here on the patio sofa, Trev is playing in the sandbox, and I am type-type-typing away.
(deep sigh.)

This sort of thing happens often around here.
Eric asked the other night when we were throat deep in the same "What do people with a lot of kids do? How many does your sister have? Six? Four?"
"Five."
"Do all of them go at once? What do they do? Do people just get used to it?"
A few minutes later (like now) the chaos had subsided, and all was quiet and still.
"I think that when it's just two, eventually you get quiet, like now, and get a chance to regroup. But I don't think you get that if you have loads of them."
(shudder.) The poor souls.

Trev now asks, as I write this, "Mom, did you eat all your chicken noodle soup?"
"Yes."
"So are you out of time out?"
"Just a sec...."