Month 18....Seperation Anxiety

This has been a strange week for us. My husband did not work, so we have not been car-pooling like usual. Then, the van decided it wanted to have a week off, so it called in with a leaky tire and the boys and I are cruising around in our 2-door Honda Civic to get to and from day care.

New baby has always been the more mellow, easy going one (at least compared with old baby at the same age) and has always been just wonderful being dropped off at day care. Honestly, it wasn't until close to his 1st birthday that I think he really noticed me much at all! But this week, he has not wanted me to let him off at day care, and actually starts throwing a fit before we even round the corner to her place. This morning, he actually tried to physically push me back towards our car. He was screaming bloody murder, and it was all very unsettling. I have been through this before with our older son, so I knew the best thing was to re-assure him I would be back, and that I loved him. The day care lady has been beside herself that he has been acting this way, and she wants to cry when I leave him off! She did call me this morning though about 20 minutes after I left to let me know that as soon as she shut the door, he immediately stopped crying and went about his usual business. She has never had to leave her children at day care, and she said she didn't know how I could deal with it. I told her it's because I know he's going to stop crying as soon as I leave, and that if he were actually sick or something, she would let me know right away. It's the only way I can leave my kids at all. I have to be able to trust her completely with my child, like I would a close family member. I think she was touched by that, but seriously. I would never leave my kid with someone I didn't know for a fact loved him to pieces!

My husband recommended that I try to have a mommy/new baby night tonight, so he is going to try and keep old baby occupied. I think it's a lovely idea. There's nothing more wonderful than having a date with an 18 month old hunk of burning love!

Well, hubby is still feeling under the weather. He has been home sick for three days now. I just wish he were better already! I am suffering major withdrawals over here! I feel like we haven't spoken more than a few sentences together since Saturday. This flu bug is a weird one.



I'm going to try and take off work a little bit early today. I'm not looking forward to the traffic situation on the way home today. We are leaving for Fresno early tomorrow for my annual family reunion at Roeding Park, and I have a lot of grocery shopping and packing to do. The park is great; there is a slightly dilapidated zoo, a carnival, a storybook land and a pond with boats you can rent and ducks you can feed. Plus, lots of great relatives to visit with. My Great Uncle Bill is the last surviving member of his generation. He is celebrating his 80th birthday this year. After my Gran passed away last year, it was just Uncle Bill and Aunt Vivian left. Aunt Viv passed away about 3 months ago. Uncle Bill is the youngest of 13 brothers and sisters. Some of his nieces and nephews were born before he was! It will be so good to see him again. It will probably be 100 degrees outside, but it will be a blast.

Wooo! It's been a long couple of weeks.

First, I want to congratulate our friends Carter and Jene' on the birth if their first child, a daughter, named Lilly Grace. Isn't that a beautiful name? I am waiting anxiously to hear all about the birth (we women are so weird that way!).

Old baby was sick Thursday night with a flu bug, which hopped to new baby on Saturday, and to mommy on Sunday. It involved a lot of puking (on the kids' part) and severe cramping and body aches (on mommy's part). The carpet has some new interesting stains to try and clean out! Luckily, my cousin Pete has a carpet cleaning business. I think I could keep him in golden hubcaps for his van!

Old baby and I felt OK on Saturday though, and I took him to the movie theater to see "Shrek the Third". I was only a tiny bit apprehensive after our first outing 2 years ago to see "March of the Penguins". Did not go well. Even though I swore I wouldn't take him until he was 4, and then not on my own, he enjoyed the first two Shrek movies so much I thought it would be fun to give it another try. He did fantastic. I talked it up to him for a couple of days, then made sure we arrived a couple of minutes early so he could check everything out. We even had time for him to name all of the animals in the "Evan All Mighty" cardboard cutout! He sat right down in the seat, plopped that bag of popcorn on his lap and happily munched away for 2 hours. It was great. We had a small nuclear meltdown as we left and I tossed the trash into the bin. He thought I tossed out his drink, which he had asked me to hold, and was completely inconsolable. Even though I showed him his drink was still right in my hand. It was a bit unnerving. I tried my best to remain calm, and was totally embarrassed. In those situations, you can't win. Passersby will either think you are being too soft if you don't swat them, or too harsh if you don't try and analyze their emotions on the spot. I was trying to keep him from crawling inside the garbage can to retrieve my empty cup, and I actually said "stop acting like a child". Oh my God! I sincerely hope nobody heard me utter that totally absurd sentence!

And people wonder why I have grey hairs.