monday night

I don't even make sense with my slackerness. Last week, my child spent more or less the entire week with my parents. We went up on Saturday and when we headed home on Sunday, she was so upset about leaving that she ended up spending the night. We made plans to meet on Tuesday to go shopping and for me to collect the kiddo. On Tuesday, when we met, she STILL didn't want to come home, and by then, we had decided to come up on Thursday anyway because Dad wanted to have a yard sale, so I figured that she'd be fine for one more day, especially since I had spent all day with her while shopping. So anyway, I had most of the week at home, sans child, and I still write anything. I am, however, sneaking in a journal entry at eleven on a weeknight, which is when I am supposed to be going to bed.

We had a pretty good yard sale this weekend. I didn't really want to have one because we didn't have that much stuff left over from the last sale. I haven't been shopping much because i have been out of the country and all, and also because I have been a bit burned out on it. Evie is not a very patient shopper anymore, either, so that influences things too. I also had grave concerns about the temperature, since it's been hellishly hot lately. But Dad wanted to have one and they have sales when I want to so I kind of felt like we should, so we did. I spent some of my precious alone time sorting out Evie's toys and clothes, and I took up some of her most obnoxious toys and we got rid of all of the worst ones. (She was pretty upset about the things that we picked out for sale but it's not like she ever played with this junk.) So anyway, considering how little stuff we had, we did great. $625 or so for two days of sitting on my parents porch. haha. Didn't I make it sound effortless? It was a heaping lot of work, actually. M has to work on Fridays, of course, so it was just my dad and me setting everything up... and the biggest reason that he had for having a sale was to try to get rid of all the clothes that were donated to my niece by several different people for her yard sale when she was raising money for Sweden. They were all in his storage building and he wanted to try to clear things out a little more. Soo.. we also had to unload and sort a giant mess of clothes. The second day was much easier because most of the setting up had been done (I put my stockpile stuff away at night, but we just covered the rest of the stuff up with tarps) and because M was there to help.

I took Evie to her first swimming lesson today. It went pretty well but she sorta got in trouble within the first five minutes of class. I really don't think she understood exactly what it was going to be like, or why she was supposed to follow the rules, but she jumped/fell off the pool steps twice in a row. The teacher pulled her up out of the water (it was deep--for her--there and so she did go under) and the second time, she made her sit on the side of the pool instead of the step and explained it was because she had done it twice in a row. (You'll be glad to know that I, while hovering like crazy in that annoying-parent sort of way, did not bristle at this because she deserved it. I did rather think that the teacher did not quite get how completely unprepared Evie was--she has done almost no swimming at all and she has very limited experience with situations where she's supposed to follow directions from someone other than a family member. I mean, no previous classes or daycares or preschool or anything. Also, no previous experience with situations where breaking the rules means possible death. I did feel bad at the beginning of the class, because I was kind of hovering at the side of the pool--not that I had much choice because the walkway around the pool was narrow and there were only two benches, both of which were full, so hovering was pretty much the only choice--but i did reach out to possibly grab her a couple of times and tell her to sit down. I mean, I hate to be THAT parent, but as much as I want her to learn to follow directions, I am not prepared for her to drown in order to learn it. ;) Anyway, after she sat on the wall for the rest of the turn (there were four children and the teacher took turns taking them out in laps around a small section of the pool) she got to get back in for her turn and she was returned to the steps, where, I am happy to report that she remained without a problem the rest of the time. She did great the rest of the time... until the end, when she realized that it was over, and then she started wailing. Man, do indoor pool rooms echo, that's all I'm saying. She sooo did not want to leave. I'm really glad we're camping this week and can get some pool time in.

I guess that's about all I have to say. My eyes are feeling droopy so I should stop procrastinating with bedtime.:)