Single Parenting

Matt flew to Green Bay Saturday morning so first news from the Midwest:

1) Matt is charmed. We bought a 1st class ticket for the flight because it was only $15 more than a regular old chump ticket, and hey, if your going to pay that much money you might as well get some snacks. Well, Matt got a whole lot more than that.

Being the chatty, superstar, sports aficionado that he is, Matt had the good fortune of being seated next to a referee flying out to officiate the Green Bay v Houston game. Over the course of a few hours and a few drinks, they apparently become best friends and he’s offered network seats to the game. Which he of course has to turn down. So business cards are exchanged and now Matt has an in for free awesome tickets to games he wants to go to. PLUS he was served MIXED drinks BEFORE the plane even left the runway.

2) While again, not related to PaPa’s health, his brother Rob, bought a Lotto Scratcher ticket on a whim Friday. Won $10,000. No big deal.

3) PaPa is making improvements. As of this morning, they plan to try and take him off the ventilator. The latest chest X-Rays show the same amount of infection in his lungs, but the respiratory sounds are getting much clearer. The same X-Rays are also indicating that there may be some heart issues, but nothing that they are concerned about right now. The bad news is the doctors are saying that he will be lucky if he’s out in two weeks…. So if you do the math, he might be spending Christmas in the hospital.

On the upside, Matt & Jeanine raided PaPa’s house and cleared out the offending cigars. They were actually able to collect all unopened packages of Swisher’s and return them at the local grocery store. You’ve got to love small towns at times.

Given everything, Gracie and I had a fairly good weekend. Well, except for a few highlights:

1) Gracie is always on the move. I am getting to the point where if I know the baby gate is up on the stairs I just let her run loose and play. We are pretty much baby-proofed. Unless it gets quiet. If more than a minute goes by without noise I know she is into something she’s not supposed to be in.

Case in point, she had stood up and grabbed a glass ornament that I thought was out of reach on the tree. While the glass was still blessedly in tact, she was scraping the glitter swirls off the ornament with her teeth. Although I will admit, the glitter all over her face/mouth/tongue was pretty funny.

2) Saturday night my body decided to kick me one more time. Thankfully, my version of the flu only lasted a few hours, and they were nighttime hours.

I will always remember when I was checked into the hospital to be induced into labor with Grace, my OB asked me what I had eaten for dinner. “Oh I was good. I kept it light. I just had a salad for dinner!”

She looked at me and raised an eyebrow. “Yeah, probably not the best choice. If you have a second kid remember this – Only eat things that you won’t mind seeing come back up. Oatmeal is my favorite. Let’s just hope you keep it all down through your labor.”

I always thought that was a crazy thing to say. As I was revisiting my healthy salad on Saturday night / Sunday morning those words kept echoing in my head.

3) Sunday morning we went to the mall to Christmas shop. The 20 minute nap she took on the way home completely destroyed her sleep schedule for that afternoon. Normally she sleeps from 11:30 – 2:00. Yesterday, it was 1:15 to 1:45. I apparently added insult to the injury of making her nap by having Tim & Jen over to watch the Bears game when she woke up. This lead to very cranky pants for the following 45 minutes.

Given everything though, I think my first weekend of single parenting went smoothly. At least there was no blood to accompany either of our tears.