I just came off of a 4 day “vacation”. I took off Monday to make my 3 day weekend a 4 day weekend. I was so looking forward to this “vacation” to spend time with Claire. I have exhausted all but a few days of my vacation time on sick days or dr. visits for Claire this past year. I haven’t taken one single day as just a vacation day, so I was pumped and so ready to get some serious face time with my baby. Our days were going to go something like this…
sleeping in until 9, chocolate chip pancakes and strawberries on the patio for breakfast, a nice morning walk, naps for both of us, a little pool time in the afternoon, followed by another nap, BBQ chicken and asparagus on the grill for dinner, followed with a glass (or 2) of wine while Claire played in the grass until it was time for bed. The above paragraph was apparently a dream.
Claire woke up Thursday with a fever. Great. I HAD to go to work on Thursday, which means I HAD to bring her to my mom’s. She was a monster at my mom’s house that day. She was up a few times Thursday night crying – which she never does. Friday she was up bright and early – 7:30. Breakfast was a N.utri Grain bar that I chased her around the living room tossing bites into her mouth because she pitched a Royal Fit when I tried to get her in her high chair. We then retired back to my bed to watch D.ora where she fell back asleep for 2 hours. I cleaned and cooked as much as I could because we had a few friends over on Friday for dinner and fireworks. And it’s pretty tough to clean glass doors that are covered in dried drool and (precious) hand prints or bathroom toilets or anything really when you have a 14 month old attached to your left leg. Who is whining, of course.
When she got up and we ran to W.al Mart for some things and she was NOT happy about being there. She didn’t even eat the cookie that I got her from the nice bakery lady…so I ate it. We were out of there in record time.
We got home and I tried to play with her, but she would have none of it. She whined and cried and chewed on her fingers the entire afternoon – she is getting her back molars and she is miserable. I put her down for her afternoon nap, which only lasted about 45 minutes and she was up. My mom and dad came over for the party to hang out with us, but also to keep an eye on Claire. We tried to get Claire to stay up for the 9:15 fireworks, but she was a crabby mess and they had to leave at 8:45. As I watched the fireworks, I only half enjoyed them because I knew that she would have loved them. They were so close we could almost touch them and she would have squealed in delight the whole time.
I love these pictures...some of the only smiles from the day...


Saturday we woke up to rain. We were stuck inside the house the whole. entire. day. The rain did let up for about an hour that evening and we went to watch another firework show and she loved them. She screamed when she seen the first ones, then after about 2 minutes she lost attention and was more interested in the cars around us. Figures.
Sunday we work up to more rain. We were stuck inside the house until about noon. I decided that we needed to do a little shopping, so I called up my mom and sister and we went to lunch, where Claire was an **ANGEL** the whole time. The restaurant was packed and she watched some older kids and actually ate some lunch. We then strolled through H.ome Goods and TJ M.axx and got some cute stuff for the house and a few pair of pants for me (uh um, did I mention that they are a size FOUR!!!!!!). She was pretty good the whole day…it may have been the M.otrin that I was injecting into her every 6 hours on the dot.
Monday my sister and I took Claire to get some new shoes. I have looked high and low for cute, summery sandals for her. I can’t find any that don’t look like crap and they are all so stiff. I gave in and we went to N.ordstrom where I got her a darling pair of sandals. Two things. One, I was squeezing her into a size 3 shoe, they measured her at a size 5. Poor kid. Second, the damn things put me back $50. Yup, the kid’s shoes cost more than most of mine. We went to R.ed Robin for lunch afterwards and she was fairly well behaved although she only ate one fry and nothing else. I can’t complain though. When we left the floor didn’t look like a small tornado had just blown through and knocked everything off the tables in the whole restaurant and dropped it under her high chair.
Her balloon after getting new shoes

Having lunch with the girls

Tuesday morning. I was up at 6:30, showered, dressed and ready to go by 7:30. I was never so glad to drop her off at my mom’s and come back to work. The four days of pure bliss that I had so looked forward to were not like my dream...
I was not cut out to be a stay at home mom.