I suppose I won’t be nominated for mother of the year after this weekend, but I try.

Sunday was a tough day. I was sick. The kids were still a little sick. I had mountains of laundry and other household tasks to complete.

I was tired in the evening. After preparing something for everyone to eat, bathing and dressing the kids, I was putting the last load of laundry in the dryer. It was after nine p.m., and I had instructed my daughter to go to the bathroom to brush her teeth as it was past her bedtime.

My husband was watching the children.

When I got back from the laundry room I saw our 19-month-old son looking very pleased with himself, standing in the doorway of the bathroom.

"Who left the bathroom door open?" I asked. Of course, we all knew it was the toddler’s big sister, who had just left the room after brushing her teeth.

I looked my son over. His pajamas were very wet. The floor around the toilet was very wet. The toilet seat was covered in water. I began to feel the anger rise in my body. I tried counting to ten, but it was no use.

I began yelling at my poor husband, who defended himself by saying, "I didn’t leave the door open."

"You are supposed to be watching them!" I said, a little too loudly. "Now I have to give him another bath, and find new pajamas for him to wear!"

My husband looked at me like I was a little crazy. "Oh, it’s just toilet water. It’s very clean. Every time you flush, clean water goes in."

I began to undress the toilet water splasher and get him ready for his second bath. At this point I was fuming.

"Now I have even more laundry to do, but it’s okay, because I have nothing else better to do with my time," I said, except I also included a very bad word somewhere in that sentence. It was loud and within earshot of my sponge of a four-year-old daughter.

Upset with myself for losing my temper, I went ahead and gave my son a bath and redressed him in some fresh pajamas.

My husband rightly chastised me for using that kind of language, and so I felt I needed to apologize to my daughter.

I went in to help her pick out a book for her bedtime story.

"Sweetie," I said. "A little earlier Mommy was very angry, and I said a very bad word that I shouldn’t have said. I’m sorry and I will not say it again. I promise."

My daughter looked at me timidly. "Whisper it in my ear," she said.

"Um, no. I’m not going to repeat it," I replied. "We shouldn’t say those words. Mommy shouldn’t. Daddy shouldn’t. And kids shouldn’t too."

"I know what it is," she said matter-of-factly. "It was stupid. You shouldn’t say that Mommy. I don’t know why you say that. It’s not nice."

I drew in a quick breath, extremely relieved that she didn’t realize what the bad word I really said was.

"Yes, you are right. Mommy was very wrong and I won’t say it anymore."

Mommy is thinking though, that if toilet water is so clean, that Daddy won’t mind if I fix his coffee with it next weekend.

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