Why I'm not a single parent !

Yes - my nerves are frazzled and we have only been on our own since Sunday afternoon! Thank goodness Mike is headed back Thursday night (and doesn't have to work on Friday since his boss is with him & decided Friday will be their official travel day)!

I knew we might be off to a rough start when John Michael decided that 5am was a good time to start our day. I tried to convince him that we should sleep longer (by ignoring him), but it was a no go this morning. Then he got so fussy a little later, that we had to make an early morning call to "Da!" Though he didn't actually want the phone near his ear to hear "Da" just saying I was going to make the call settled him down. It was a little before 7, but Mike politely said his alarm had just gone off. Here's Clara chatting up a storm this morning.


And for some reason, Gracie decided she was camera shy this morning. So here's what I got:



The upside of the early morning wake-up was that John Michael took a nap from 8:30 until 10:45. Then we headed over to Gracie's school for the annual Mother's Day picnic. Since it's been very rainy here it was an indoor picnic. We ate and I got lots of nice things that she had made at school for Mother's Day.

Then we took a quick trip to Wal-Mart (okay, maybe it wasn't that quick, but I did actually have a list!) and then went home to rest. John Michael was off for another nap and Gracie ended up taking one, too. That was quite a surprise. I can't remember the last time she has taken a nap.

Once everyone woke up and shook off the sleepiness we went out to dinner (I couldn't face more dishes!). And now everyone is happily in bed.

The girls & I have turned into game junkies at bedtime. Tonight the choice was Memory. We play more of a matching game (we don't turn the cards back over once we've seen them) and they really enjoy it. Clara asked if we needed the "constructions" but Gracie told her that we already knew how to play.


One last funny incident. At the restaurant, JM was having a blast eating Rice Chex. I asked him if I could have one and then pretended to eat it from his hand (which he thought was hysterical). He finally popped it in my mouth and thought it was so funny. Gracie piped up with "I guess that's his Mother's Day present for you!" What a thought, but I suppose she was right - who else but a Mother would eat a semi-soggy Rice Chex from the sticky hands of a toddler??? At least he hadn't started on the spaghetti with tomato sauce yet!