a week in the life

Dangerous to start a blog post halfway through the afternoon nap but I’m feeling lucky!

What a week. My parents left on Sunday after a wonderful two-month stay. It’s so interesting to go back and forth between co-parenting and solo parenting because I see many pros and cons of both sides. Of course when they’re here, they’re so helpful with dinners and laundry and keeping stuff organized and house projects and child care and more. I love bouncing parenting decisions off of them. There’s also more housework to be done with more adults. And I get that hazy feeling about who’s doing what because now I’m no longer doing 100% with a comprehensive birds-eye view.

After such an extended visit, I dreaded their departure and wondered how long it would take me to get back on track. I felt rusty and worried about taking on our new school dropoff without backup and also we of course miss them when they’re not around. I was sad about E asking where they were and feeling sad to wake up to an empty house.

Monday morning, it was go time. I prepped to the nines of Sunday night, would not be defeated by the naysayers (in my head). We got up Monday and the house was quiet. E asked about Mimi and Chacha and I reminded him they went on the airplane. We got dressed and had breakfast and I even took a video of him reading a book out loud on his own while I drank my coffee. A blessed, perfect morning.

Until we got into the car. I was putting E in his car seat when he pointed up and said, “light!” I looked up to see an interior light we had inadvertently left on; weak now two days later. My heart sunk. I knew the battery was dead and the car wouldn’t start.

And it didn’t! Best laid plans. I didn’t flag anyone down, which maybe I should have, but it was 8:30am and I didn’t want to make people late for work, would have to study up on jumper cables (which I do have), and the too-much part would be trying to do all that with a toddler in tow. So I called AAA who took about an hour to show up, and we just went up and down the street on a beautiful morning, checking out the choo choo train in the glasses shop window and singing songs. I got in to work at 10:30am but didn’t miss much.

The next day, I started the day not feeling well, digestion-wise. It wasn’t too bad until I got on the train and then I thought I’d made a mistake. Nothing like fearing that you’re going to have to puke in public. I made it to the office without incident and just couldn’t imagine that commuting home and then back to pick up E later in the day would be that much better than just toughing through the work day, which I did. I laid down in the conference room for a while. Picked E up and went home to a dinner of saltines.

The next day I decided to work from home, which was lovely. I was starting to feel better and eating again and could run the laundry and the dishwasher. My sister B and her girlfriend came over for a burrito dinner and it was one of those errant hot summer days in the city- I was on the upswing again.

Every single night this week, E has fallen asleep on the way home from school. It’s about a 15-20 minute ride home through Golden Gate Park. He stayed awake each time to enjoy the two major highlights of the trip: the buffalo in a big meadow and the tunnel (which is actually just where the road goes under 19th Street). BUFFALO! TUNNEL! and next thing I know, I look in the rearview mirror to his mirror (he’s still rear-facing) and his peepers are closed. Each day, I woke him up to bring him in and he was understandably irritable, nursed him when we got inside, and he went back to sleep. I would say that with the exception of the night that B and J came over for dinner, he went back to sleep and stayed asleep through the entire night. So- he slept roughly 6:30pm-7am four out of five days this week. I was starting to miss him! This schedule only requires an hour and a half of parenting per day!

His teachers say that he’s running around all day, barely napping, eating a ton (good because he’s missing dinner each night and barely nibbling at breakfast). He’s growing and processing language and making friends and learning songs. It must be so tiring!

Every night this week I’ve been staying up late working on a freelance marketing project I took on- I know! As if I have time. But I’m REALLY excited and passionate about this project and learning a lot. Regular work is going well too. Seems like the only place to find more time is giving up sleep.

Today was LOVELY. The cherry on top of a challenging week. We had a pretty lazy morning and then drove over to North Beach to meet dear friends C and her 2yo daughter L, and my sister B. We had coffee and treats at a cafe while the kids colored and played. Then we went to the playground for a bit and there were zero kids there because it was sprinkling. E wanted to try the really long slide and it was totally wet. Why did I think that would slow him down? He raced down the thing at I don’t know how many mph- he went so fast that he was immediately on his back and shot off the end, continuing to slide on the soft astroturf for about 15 feet! I was so taken by surprise but it was over so fast and he was OK (a little stunned!)–my sister and I haven’t laughed so hard in a long time. Note to self: sopping wet slide = MUCH FASTER THAN USUAL.

Then our regular swim class with L and C, half an hour of floating around and jumping off the side and kicking- way more laid back than LPB and E likes it better (so I do too).

Then home- my amazing sister agreed to stay with E while I went for a much-needed wet trail run. I came back, got him down, showered, and here I am with time to blog. See. Still sleeping- the good luck continues.

So, that’s the week. Next week promises to be amazing because I took time off to go to Chicago to visit E’s cousins! (and their parents!) (and my parents for one night!) Yay. When E woke up today, he said, “Chacha,” and smiled. Then, “Mimi,” and smiled. I said, “Yeah. Chacha and Mimi.” and he said, “Airplane.” And I said, “Yep, they went on the airplane. But next week, we’ll get on an airplane and we’ll see them in Chicago!” and he said, “Jacket.” (as in- let’s go!)

More from Chi.

Hope your weekend is ridiculously fabulous xoxoxo