Michael: Hey honey. How’s it going?
Me: It’s after 10 PM and the baby is still up.
Michael: Uh-oh.
Me: She’s in my lap nursing right now. I put her down at 8:30 but she woke up screaming a little while ago and wouldn’t go back to sleep. Oh well. I wanted to watch “Lost” anyway.
Michael: Poor sweetie. Sounds like you had a rough day.
Me: I guess. Sam only spent three hours in bed with me last night. I did manage to transfer her to the bassinet in our room around 5 AM so I could get a little sleep. Then we all woke up late. Cassie came running in at 7:30 and I let her climb into bed with us while I nursed Sam again. I got a few more minutes of sleep that way.
Michael: Uh-huh...
Me: Then we got up, had breakfast, and everybody took a bath. Cassie played in our tub while I washed Sam. Then I tried to put Sam down for her morning nap. She wouldn’t sleep though. Just kept screaming. But I left her there, because I needed a bath myself. I figure she did about forty-five minutes of screaming. Aren’t I evil?
Michael: Yep. So what else happened?
Me: Um, let’s see. Cassie insisted on helping me with my bath. She washed my hair and cleaned my ears, and then she tried to convince me she should shave my legs but fortunately I won that argument. Then when I got dressed, I got Sam out of her crib. Since she kept screaming any time I put her down, I ended up strapping her to me in the front pack. I must have carried her around for at least an hour while Cassie and I put up the Halloween decorations in the front yard. Cassie wanted me to put up the Christmas tree too, by the way.
Michael (laughing): Oh man! Is she still going on about the tree?
Me: Quit laughing. It took me half an hour to convince her that we weren’t putting up the tree, and she still keeps bringing it up.
Michael: I’m sorry. She saw a Christmas tree set up in Sears when we went shopping last time.
Me: Greeeaaaat. Anyway, I got Cass to forget about the tree by taking her to the pumpkin patch. Only problem is she wanted two pumpkins. One for her and one for Sam.
Michael: What’s wrong with that?
Me: Well, at first nothing, because I figured you’d be the one carving them at Patty’s pumpkin carving party Friday night. Then I remembered you’re not going to get back in time for the party, so now I’m stuck carving two big-ass pumpkins by myself with a couple of screaming kids hanging on to me.
Michael: (laughing hysterically): Oh no!
Me: I said quit laughing! When you get home, I think I’m going to shoot you.
Michael: I’m sorry, sweetie. So what else did you do today?
Me: After the pumpkin patch we had lunch and then I put both girls down for a nap. Sam kept fussing and rubbing her eyes. Cassie wanted a story, but Sam was so cranky I knew I wouldn’t be able to read and nurse at the same time, so I had to give Cass a rain check. She went off to bed and I finally got Sam down. She still screamed, but eventually she passed out. I got half an hour of sketching done before Cass woke up. Then I read her a story like I promised. And then Sam woke up so I had to nurse her. After that, we made some Halloween cookies.
Michael: Oh? That sounds like fun.
Me: Yeah, you weren’t there. It took us almost three hours to finish two cookies.
Michael: Why so long?
Me: Because I had to supervise a certain precocious little preschooler through the whole process, while wearing Sam in the front pack again. Cassie had to help break the eggs, mix the batter, roll out the dough and cut the cookies out. She insisted on decorating them too, but by the time the cookies were done baking, it was almost bedtime, so we only decorated two of them. One for her and one for me. I think we’ve still got about twenty cookies’ worth of dough left to cut out and bake.
Michael: Well, that’ll give you something to look forward to tomorrow night.
Me: Shut up. Anyway, I let Cassie eat her cookie in the tub while I gave Sam a bath and nursed her down for the night. Sam went down at 8:30 and Cassie was in bed by 9. Cass is still asleep but Sam won’t give up the ghost. She woke up screaming and kept at it until I came to get her, and then she spit up all over me.
Michael: Oh, that’s too bad.
Me: Yeah, well, that’s my day. What did you do today?
Michael: I repaired the Hubble telescope.
Me: ... I hate you.
To clarify, Michael is in Huntsville, Alabama, on a business trip for NASA. Yesterday he attended Space Camp at Marshall Space Flight Center. He didn’t really fix the Hubble telescope. It was just a simulation. A really cool simulation where he got to run around in a mock space suit, fly a fake space shuttle, pretend to go on an EVA, and walk through an exercise on repairing the Hubble telescope in outer space. All I can think of this is, ain’t it amazing what you can accomplish when you don’t have two kids hanging off of you 24/7?
Screw it. I’m going back to bed...
***
Here is my sole, non-child related accomplishment for yesterday. It’s the second draft of the cartoon I’ve been trying to get scanned in and uploaded to this blog. I’m thinking of calling this character Claudia L’Strange, Voo Doo Prom Queen. She really digs her date...
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