Only Two More Days

When I wake in the morning I will have two more days until Grayson is evicted from my uterus.

Brian and I joked tonight that I should send Grayson home with him and stay the full time that insurance will pay for me just to have a rest.

I am thinking about it....

I had wanted the last days of our family of three to be special. But Ruth has been quite a handful today. I think that is mostly my fault because she was great until Brian came home and we ran to the grocery store and let her have the free cookie. I know that some of you mothers probably think I am horrible for letting my daughter at this age have a free cookie. But it keeps her quiet while I shop. But I think tonight has proved to me that Ruth does not do well on refined sugar.

The past few days have been a little stressful for me trying to grade everything that has been turned in (since next Friday I will have a batch of 26 finals to grade - thank you to the two students who turned in finals early), cleaning the house, and doing other last minute chores that I think if I don't get done won't get done until May. And not to mention Thanksgiving was yesterday and I felt that I had to cook - although it was a small meal.

Brian, who has never been a big "let's deocrate for Christmas," wanted to put up the tree but I talked him out of it saying that it would be in the way with family here. This year we will have more traffic in our house and are doing the least amount of decorating. No lights on the porch, no wreaths in the windows, no Nutcracker collection on the mantel, no Christmas towels in the bathroom and only one box of ornaments coming down from the attic. But Brian said that since we had put up the tree last year on Thanksgiving he wanted to keep the "tradition" alive for Ruth. So the two of them unpacked the little 3.5 foot light pink tree I had purchased for her and hooked it up. We put the butterfly ornament Ruth and I bought at the mall on top. Today, I took out some fabric and ribbon from her birthday party and now she has ribbon on the tree and a light pink tree skirt. It looks pretty good just as it is. Brian had purchased some small, multi-colored ornaments for her tree. Although they will not be the monochromatic and silver look I had envisioned, I am sure Ruth will love the colors. And how wonderful that I have a husband who thinks about his daughter's Christmas tree when he is walking stores.

Speaking of walking stores, my sweet husband had to get up at 2:30 am to be at work by 4am for Black Friday. Since he is on the managment team of the district, he had to work today and tomorrow. That has added to the stress in the house since he can't get the things done he needs to get done. In fact, right as I type he is in the basement painting the shelves he has been builing (and he has been up for 19 hours).

I think I am going to turn in. Although Ruth is sweet much of the time, the fit she threw tonight has worn me out and I need to get a little rest before tomorrow. I used to tell my students this story when they had a particularly hard time with an exercise:

When I was young (like 10 or so), one Friday night two of my older sisters and I had to help my dad separate calves from their mamas. It was tough and I was scared of big cows. (For family reading this, we were at the Weldon place) It was a bad night and I got yelled at not only by my dad but by my sisters too (since I caused more work for them). When we got home I remember crying and crying in my room. I guess my mom talked to my dad because he called me in the living room and in a rare moment of parenting for him, he explained how I could improve and said he wasn't mad at me. He also said for me to cheer up because tomorrow morning I would get another chance. I remember thinking "oh no, tomorrow we have to do this again!" It was a death sentence to me but to him, it meant I got another chance. So I say to all my former students, to mothers of toddlers of the world, tomorrow (God willing of course) we get another chance. Another chance to do the adagio and another chance to parent our sweet toddlers (who sometimes seem to be as evil as Stewie Griffin from Family Guy).