Well Traveled Babysitters

(***Note of apology: I used Eric's borrowed camera while ours is on vacation and apparently took all of the pictures with the nigh shot feature on! Too many gadgets, buttons, switches and lights for this dummy but I'm posting the gray-green pictures anyhow!)

Lucky for us, another weekend just happened to pop up when we needed it most. Even luckier yet was that my parents came to town to visit. Wahooey!

Since Eric is on the volunteer fire department and since they have a work day once each fall and since he's missed it for the past 3 years, Eric felt obligated to spend most of his day Saturday lending a hand to the maintenance of the fire department and the trucks. Since my mom and dad were visiting, we had no problem leaving him to his work while we went chasing through the town bargain shopping. No treasures were found, but it was a nice way to spend a gorgeous, crisp September Saturday. No complaints.

As we settled in at home for a late lunch from Subway, my mom held Lincoln on her lap while she ate her sub. My dad was the first to notice that with each bite that led my mom's sandwich to her mouth, Lincoln was following the path of the sub and opening his mouth like a little bird awaiting his supper. Since my mom was oblivious to his intent glare, Lincoln tried another approach. He began to reach his hand out in the direction of her sandwich. My dad began rolling in his seat from laughing so hard while my mom and I began to watch his noble attempt at getting his hands on some grub. Hysterical!

What a better indication that he just might be ready for some rice cereal. Some "real" food! I couldn't stand to see my baby starve and whipped up Lincoln's first taste of rice cereal which he loved! There was no question if he knew what to do with it once it was in his mouth, he pushed it back with his tongue, swallowed and opened up for more. He appeared as though he's been eating cereal for all of his four months. He ate most of a tablespoon of cereal before his belly told him he wanted more. NOW! Bottle time came before he even had a chance to scream. I think I'm getting good at this appeasing-my-kid thing.

Later in the evening, some friends of the firemen hosted an appreciation dinner / bonfire for all of the volunteers who had spent their day working and their dates. As for lame-O Eric and myself, we considered this a date! My mom and dad were watching the kids and we went to a grown up dinner where nobody threw their steaks on the floor, no one whined about not wanting to eat what was served and everyone ate with a fork. I didn't even have to cut up any one's food! It was a good date, indeed!

So, when our long distance babysitters come to watch the kids, let me just tell you the order of things. Pop-pop walked Elaina down to the local restaurant for ice cream sundaes after dinner (I hope), Grandma read Elaina approximately 17 bedtime stories and tucked her into bed about 3 times, and this happened to my kitchen table:

My mom had spent the intermissions of her evening folding all of Elaina and Lincoln's bigger sized fall clothes that I had pulled out and sent through the laundry. Now that's something to come home to! Thanks Mom!

Sunday brought us another gorgeous almost-fall day with lots of sunshine. We went out to a nice restaurant for lunch and stuffed ourselves until we had to be rolled out to the car. Why don't I know better? When the promotion is "endless shrimp" why don't I know that it's going to have to end after only one plate? What am I thinking? Talk about misery. ugh.

Although our meal was good, our 2 year old was not. She wasn't the worst I have ever seen, but by no means good. During dinner, we kept reminding Elaina that she needed to use her quiet voice because we were indoors. The child had a cry fest while whimpering, "I wanna be loud. I wanna be loud Mommy." We all made it through dinner without anyone getting too loud or too whiny or having to leave the table, but the drive home was a whole different story. We witnessed the meltdown power of a strapped in toddler for 30 minutes. As I recall, the demand was "I wanna get outta my seat. I wanna get outta my seat. I wanna get outta my seat. I wanna get outta my seat." Over and over and over.... Crying and crying. The child was a lunatic! For 30 minutes. This is the evidence of a too-late-of- night and a too-early- morning and a too- little-nap. Recipe for disaster. As I was pulling her "outta her seat" when we got home, I told her how much Mommy disliked her behavior and her whining and that Mommy wasn't happy with her for acting like that. Immediately, the tears shut down and in her very calm-non whine voice, she says, "Okay Mommy."

Oh dear Lord, what am I going to do with this girl?