Weekend
It was so nice to get out of the house this weekend! I am sick of this snow, but it has been really warm the past few days so the piles are dwindling. Parts of the sidewalks are even totally clear, which is great for both pedestrians and drivers. Except you know what happens when several feet of snow melts? Garbage suddenly appears. So, so nasty.
We went to a very low-key birthday party yesterday–just five little boys running wild. Four of the moms were part of our co-op preschool, so it was really nice to visit with them. I realized the other day that I have known one of the ladies over four years. That’s some sort of record! We’ve lived in G’Town for almost five years. We’re settled. I love it. Life is so much easier when you have familiar faces that you run into occasionally, or people you can call on when you need help. I’ve known this one particular lady since I joined that first awful moms group. In fact, I only stuck around because I really liked her and didn’t want to lose touch. We usually see each other a couple of times a month these days. Pretty impressive when you consider that she is working full time this school year.
The party was interesting in some ways. The dad of the kid is kind of strange. If I was the betting type, I’d throw down a hundred dollar bill that the man has undiagnosed Asperger’s. The child is a little off as well, but he seemed a lot better yesterday. I think real preschool has been a major benefit to him.
The weirdest thing was the sword fight.
The dad had two foam swords and decided to teach the boys how to fence. Apparently he’d been a fencer (no idea on the terminology) in college. As you can imagine the boys LOVED it, but it didn’t end well. I know I’m a stick in the mud, but foam swords and preschool boys just don’t mix in my world.
Today we went over to our Dr. Saturn’s house. It was nice to get out of here, but boy oh boy do I feel sorry for Dr. S. Her son, Irish Lad, has major eating issues. She has always wanted to just starve him out–give him his food and he can eat it or be hungry. Her husband has always been very against this idea, but after some prodding from the pediatrician and trying a few other methods, he’s finally agreed to food boot camp. I have no idea how it will go, but it certainly can’t make things worse.
Just one little problem: you know what happens when kids don’t eat? They get cranky. I finally had to leave because I couldn’t take it any more. I’m glad my friend gets to send her son to daycare during the day or I don’t think they’d both be standing by next weekend. When Erik drives me crazy, I just have to think about this boy and how I would be driven to an insane asylum if I had to deal with him.
On the good side, my friend showed me a bunch of different types of cloth diapers and has some she can sell me if we decide we want them. This is the paragraph non-cloth diapering people can skip. I just learned all these terms. I definitely don’t want to do prefolds with a cover. That looks really messy. I could see doing a pocket diaper and I may try that out. The big winner, though, seems to be an all-in-two. Instead of sticking the insert in the pocket, you snap it into the diaper. It looks like the simplest, most effective cloth diapering method. Of course, the all-in-one would be even simpler, but I hear they are a bear to get dry. I also hear that I should avoid velcro. Snaps are the way to go. So maybe we have a plan. I can’t believe I am even considering this.
I can certainly see why it is tempting to sew your own. It doesn’t seem that difficult. Dear lord almighty, I do NOT want to get that into it. I don’t know why I have such resistance to that idea, but I do. All these money saving ideas always turn into huge time sucks. I need to give myself permission to spend money on these diapers because we will be saving a load of money even if I don’t sew them myself. Guilt be gone!
Ok, enough of that.
We got a flier about t-ball the other day. Is it really time to start thinking about organized sports? The price is certainly right compared to other sports programs around here, but after some nosing around I don’t think I’m ready to make a t-ball commitment. There would be two games a week plus practices. The practices are totally up to the coach. I don’t have time to be hauling Erik around to four or five t-ball events every week. I know that is the only way to really practice a sport, but yikes! I’m not ready to be mother an over scheduled child.
I am ready to become a minivan mom! I finally started looking around online to see what I could find out. I thought I wanted a Toyota Sienna because they are quite a bit cheaper than the Honda Odyssey, but do I really want a Toyota? I bet we could make a deal, but would we survive the aftermath? Also, Toyota doesn’t make a blue mini-van. They have about a million shades of black, silver and gold, but no blue. What’s so wrong with a pretty blue van?
I’m going to visit Honda while Erik is in school tomorrow and see if I can get a better handle on what I want/need and how much it will cost. I hate car shopping. Oh how I hate it. The Saturn is a piece of shit and I know I am not going to love getting both kids into the back of the car. I don’t know when we’ll have time to actually buy this van. Erik has a make-up swim class next Saturday, then we’re supposed to go down to DC and have dinner with one of Mike’s long lost cousins. Do they even have child friendly restaurants in DC? Not like Chuck E. Cheese or something, but just a place where the people won’t glare at a fairly well behaved four year old?