Day 252: Day 3 Bearings

Today was a fun and crazy day. Not crazy-fun, but fun and crazy.

We're in town (as opposed to the burbs), at my mom's, trying to break Buddy of his waking up all night habit. It's been getting progressively worse and I decided I ought to put a stop to it before I crack. My mom is away and we have her house to ourselves, and because we have a tenant downstairs from us I feel too guilty having my poor Buddy cry at night. I figured that being here would allow me to guiltlessly tough love him.

So far so good.

So, this morning we leisurely lolled around mom's house until noon when we three (four with the dog) and my brother (who lives down from my mom's) hit downtown. It was good in a total disaster sort of way. We had no schedule, no nothing, and other than the stop at Lululemon (where I totally got sucked in to buying way too much stuff-of which I'm going to return some), the children were pretty well behaved.

Side note: Shopping for things that you want to try on sucks when you bring your kids. (Still...I managed.)

Anyways, we ended at my brother's work where we got a huge pile of pancakes covered in sloppy berry sauce and melted whip cream. And, to top that off, Isha (my brother's ex?-girlfriend) got the entire super-packed restaurant to sing Happy Birthday to my slightly shy, totally thrilled daughter. It was one of those moments that brings tears to a mother's eyes. Just a super happy blip of life.

After that we went to the beach. 2 hours of beach actually. Love the beach, that beach with it's seemingly endless shore of teeny tiny pebbles and rolled seaglass. Love the hunt, the trance, finding "a blue one".
"Look, look...I've got one."



I love that.

So, with our pockets full of blue ones, perfectly rounded white ones, and soon to be painted ones we walked, ever so slowly, from end to end. Until, that is, a 6 month boxer puppy jumped on my Little making her fall off a ledge and into a fairly deep tidal pool. And, that's where the crazy comes in. There was screaming, onlookers, apologies, franticness...I actually felt more sorry for the dog owner than for us. We slopped our way back to the van, back over logs and rocks, up stairs, wet and cold. The last day of my 4 year old's 4.

Still, it was nice. We all agreed. Despite the dog the wet and the fall, we had a good day. I think that the break away from our house has been just the thing we've all needed to get our bearings straight. Tomorrow, the first day of her 5th year will be the beginning of something new.