Daddy's Gone, Day 1

Good evening, fellow humans I'm sure are still out there even though I'm holed up in my house alone with a couple of kids and no one to talk to about the day's news and minutia. Okay, maybe I'm being overly-dramatic. James has left town before, but only for one or two nights. This week, he's gone the entire work week, and while I weathered longer periods of singe-handed toddler care with D, as we've noted ad infinitum, Mal is different. Good different, but, you know.

This weekend was fun and weird. A lot like our family, in general.

First, my parents came over super early Saturday so James and I could go see "The Incredibles 2." Alone. Because neither child was interested. Hmph. Well, we enjoyed it. Then we went to Logan's Roadhouse for James's quarterly meat ingestion (thanks, gout!).

After we got home, almost as soon as my parents left, I got the overwhelming urge to dig up some stuff from our planter outside. Some stuff had sprung up rather quickly earlier this spring, and I had decided to let it grow a bit to see what it was.

We have some Mexican Petunia, which bloom gorgeous purple flowers that last one day and replenish entirely the next. It's amazing. They're self-propagating, and spreading in that bed, but I knew it wasn't that. Then I was doing some research to find out this vine that's taking over our yard was, and learned it is Carolina snailseed. In the process, I realized that the fast-growing plants beside the Mexican Petunias, two inches away from our home's foundation, were TREES.

They needed to come out, and it seemed like a thing to do, so I did. In the process, I got really irritated about how nasty our rose bushes are and took them out, too. As soon as I finished, it poured rain, so I was glad to have gotten it over with.

Then Sunday morning, Mal and I went to the Hill Country Water Gardens and Nursery after church. Love that place.

Found a couple of bushes, one of which I believe I had in Sherman. If so, when they bloom next spring, it will smell AMAZING.

Got home to plant those, and I was just super beat from the day before, and the heat an humidity. Plus, I found more than twelve feet of root all down the bed from a nearby tree. Had to hack that out before I could dig holes for the bushes. Also pulled out all of the tubing for the sprinkler system, which doesn't work, anyway, and it's hard to dig around.

I was just pretty much worn out when Mal came out and wanted to play with the hose. Once he came out and gave me a shower every few minutes, I was able to complete the job! I didn't take any pictures because I didn't weed the bed or anything, so it's not pretty. I just plopped the plants down in there and we'll hope for the best.

We took James to Dos Salsas for dinner for Father's Day, and otherwise just hung out and helped (or watched) James pack for his trip.

Oh! Mal slept from about 9:30 PM until 6:00 AM last night! That;s the record to beat!

This morning, Mal was awake to watch James leave in the Super Shuttle. We played and watched his flight, then went to Target, where I bought Mal a big collection of PJ Masks characters he's wanted, with the understanding that it's all we're buying while Daddy's gone. (We'll see if he's able to keep up his end of the bargain.)

Then we came home, had lunch, played, watched some TV, and Mal was ready to get out again, this time to Jump Street. He played there for about an hour, and I didn't take any pictures, but here's one from Friday.

We actually went twice on Friday. Most kids pay by the hour, but kids 4 and under are a set price for the whole day because they can't do much. We figured, why not make the most of it, and James went with us later in the evening that day.

After Jump Street, Mal wanted to go to Walgreen's, but it and the bank I needed to visit were on the "wrong" side of the road during rush hour, so now we have something to look forward to tomorrow.

We had dinner, and Mal was asking again to go to the store. I talked him into the lake, which we haven't visited in some time. The water level is really low, but it was beautiful out here, nonetheless.

On our way home, we were getting ready to walk up the big hill when I saw a German Shepherd peeking around the curve at the top of the hill. I stopped to see what it was doing, and as it turned to walk back, I could see it was not on leash.

It could have gone back to its owner; I had no idea. So I waited a minute and when nothing else happened, I told Mal we were going to have to walk home a different way. I started to turn around when the dog and a chihuahua friend of his came bounding around the corner toward us. We were still about half a block away, but I never like to encounter off-lead dogs. These both had collars and tags but were very much alone.

I knew I didn't want to approach them, and also knew that there was not time to unstrap Mal from the tricycle stroller thing and try to get anywhere away from them, so I just stood there and left Mal confined so he couldn't do anything to spook the dogs. I also turned both Mal and me sideways so we weren't in an apparent stand-off with the dogs.

When they got closer, I held my hand out and down and looked at the German Shepherd. He clearly wanted nothing to do with me. He and the chihuahua watched us carefully as they pulled up to us and then walked past. Once they were clear of us, they sped up.

I started slowly up the hill, looking back every few feet. I have to tell you: adrenaline really helps that climb not seem so deathly. It was barely an effort.

Anyway, it was a tense few moments and, of course, Mal had no idea what an iffy situation it was. He just came home all chill and with his treasures and construction trucks in tow.

At about 9, Mal announced that he was ready for bed, and he was! I love easy early bedtimes. So we survived Day One! Only four more to go...