A week after my incredibly wonderful break from everyone, I’m solo with the two smaller kiddies. Dear husband took the older pair to Portland, Maine (combo visit to sister, visit with grandparents vacationing there and chance to eat at nice restaurants and see a dear friend) for a few days.
Last week was so last week by now.
I like these moments of being sole parent with these two younger kids. I think I slow down in this very specific way: I know I’m “it” and whatever happens beyond caring for the kids must fit into discrete windows and so I notch all expectations way down.
That said I was hosting a little meeting for a few neighbors to learn about Grow Food Northampton and so I wanted to make something very local. I put together peach bread (found on the Interwebs, with the recipe modified to include a third locally grown whole-wheat flour and some local raspberries that needed a purpose, less sugar and plain yogurt instead of applesauce: and delicious it was, too).
The seven year-old took hot peach bread and went to wake up his one-day-shy-of-starting-seventh-grade pal and never left her side till dark. So, I went with dear friend and dear friend’s three year-old (call her my niece, because that’s basically the relationship we have) to the Eric Carle Museum.
It was one of those excursions that made me glad to already know some stuff about how to enjoy a pleasant morning with a toddler. For example, at the museum, have no expectation of keeping the kids in the galleries (i.e. exhibition space) for more than 120 seconds. Put another way: going to this museum does not have to be about the exhibition for the younger set (or anyone, although—quick aside—if you can go see the Lisbeth Zwerger show, DO; it’s gorgeous, more so than I’d imagined and I’d been very eager to see it).
Also, a successful (by which I mean fun for all) museum visit with a toddler means knowing that a 10:45 arrival and 12:15 departure is plenty (in fact, that was the plan all along).
The girls ran (gleefully) down the long hall to the wooden caterpillar seat and they sat for a while. This trumped the end of the formal Story Time in the library. And why wouldn’t sitting inside a beloved caterpillar with your pal be anything but fun?
We wandered into the gallery for our requisite glimpse and then I took the kids to the studio whilst my pal took some time to really enjoy the exhibition. At the studio, we painted—brush into water, swish, swish, onto sponge, dab, dab, then to paint, wiggle, wiggle—and did the littlest bit of drawing on our watercolors.
I ducked into the gallery for a few minutes and the others went to the library where the girls never made it past a wooden dollhouse and barn. After a few more minutes in the caterpillar seat, we went outside and the girls shared a snack of bunny crackers and almonds. It was a pretty great way to spend a cool, drizzly morning.
Other highlights of my day included a visit to my favorite of farmers’ markets (Tuesday Market). Late summer is all about bounty: that of friends as great as my favorite Zestar apples, plus peaches that bring the word nectar to mind instantly. I had a babysitter so was solo there and left apples and peaches galore for my household and my friends’ household to be picked up (they were in a car on their way back from their adventures at the new middle school and mini-golf). I got into the Pilates/Gyrotonic studio and back in time for the meeting, during which Saskia wasn’t too loud and during which I became that much more inspired by the notion that preserving the last tract of farmland as farms, soccer fields and protected floodplain is so very wonderful I hope that people support this project (if you read, and are interested, leave a comment and I’ll get you information).
Seven year-old returned just before the meeting ended. He and his little sister watched the beginning of Mrs. Doubtfire while we finished up. I kind of forgot how charming that movie is (these days to me Sally Field is Nora Walker and I love her) and felt glad I’d introduced the seven year-old to it.
Bedtime had its glitches in the form of a giant meltdown; the seven year-old sadsadsad about how his dear friend starting a new school and about how school isn’t nearly as pertinent as camp (Remy: “We talk about things like Africa and how hard it is there and about what is love really and all that stuff is so much more important than math; why can’t we talk about important stuff in school?”). With no one else to worry about, I had the luxury of focusing upon my melancholic boy. Tears flowed. Back rubbed. Sleep overtook. Phew.
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On the household recovery project, I’ve weeded through clothes in Saskia’s drawers and one set of shelves and Remy’s drawers, and gotten more than halfway through the piles of papers by my computer. Plus, on another kitchen counter, you can now see… counter.
