The Wife left on Monday and she ain’t comin’ back… ’til Friday. Business travel.
I’m reasonably practiced at flying solo with the kids. The wrinkle nowadays is the schedule- which makes things interesting around lunch. But hey, we adapt and make things work. I’m sure others have worse to deal with. Plus, I figure trading off between mornings and afternoons is good for the kids because they have to figure out how to get along without one another. Definitely a change of pace considering how they bounced off one another all summer. For now, they both seem to be adjusting just fine.
This morning the boy and I made foam airplanes from a kit the Wife had purchased awhile back. After putting together a small fleet of them, he wanted to play. Before long we were dive bombing one another and having dogfights. He always had the bigger weapons and the indestructable plane and managed miraculous escapes from even my craftiest attacks. Tough to compete with that. I intermittently poked around the web to give him time by himself. Then we played on the Wii until it was time to fix him lunch. He finished his sandwich in the car on the way to get the lass. She was excited to see the two of us- we’d been apart for a whole 3 hours!. Then back in the car and home so the boy could jump on the bus.
We got home and had about 15 minutes before the bus would be arriving. I asked the lass to change into some play clothes and asked the boy to get all his stuff together for school. Several minutes later, I noticed he had taken his shoes and socks off. How that aligned with being ready for school I know not. Then, he was leading a session of shadow puppets in the dining room. Obviously, going to school was the last thing on his mind.
So I took the bull by the horns and corralled the lass and started walking up to the bus stop. I didn’t exactly get the response I wanted, but it was effective none the less. The boy came tearing out of the house screaming like a banshee that HE was supposed to be going up and that WE had to wait. The nerve of a 5 year old is rather amazing. I quickly corrected him on the matter, and then he was jumping on the bus a couple minutes later.
The big highlight of the afternoon was the arrival of the firewood. The lass watched as the driver unloaded all the logs with the builtin crane. She was a little nervous about the LARGENESS of the operation, but she came around quickly and was peppering me with questions over the din. He was there about 30 minutes all told. Probably only took him about 15 to unload all the wood.
To me, there’s something enjoyable about watching the whole process. The crane has a claw on the end that has 3 fingers each about 4 feet long, two outer ones opposing a middle one. They hang down and pivot on the end of an arm with an elbow in the middle. The total length of the arm is about 30 feet. Its capable of picking up two or three 20 foot plus logs. The driver can operate the whole thing like it’s his own hand. I’ve tried enough pieces of equipment to know that it only looked easy because he knew how to use it. If it had been me, we’d be looking for a new car right now. Maybe I’m just weird- but I see skill in lot of things and try to appreciate it when I’m a witness.
The boy arrived home a couple of minutes later. No sleeping today. He ran down the driveway and exclaimed excitedly about the wood. Then he told me about how a butterfly had landed on his friend’s nose at school and how everyone had laughed and the teacher had taken a picture. I laughed too. Then he was off with his sister to play in the back. I went in to start something for dinner.
The day wound down quickly from there. Dinner was short and sweet followed by showers for both of them. Shower time provided the only drama of the night as the boy was not happy about having his shower after the lass. He was in tears exclaiming over and over that he “wanted to go FIRST!” Ugh. A short stint in his room sitting on the bed cooled him off. Then we were down stairs for a rousing game of Trouble. The lass won a game, and the boy won a game and I had earned some quiet time.
Well, at least I think so. Besides, tomorrow’s another one.