When I returned home yesterday, Mary took one look at me and started screaming. She actually turned purple from yelling and kicking so much, and she would NOT let me hold her. I know she had not forgotten me because Abe leaves for many days at a time and Mary always remembers him. She was clearly upset at me for leaving her (we had been kind of inseparable until then), and she wanted to let me know. Before bedtime, I renewed my efforts to get back in her good graces, but she would have none of it. Instead of responding to my overtures, Mary screamed, raced over to Abe and embraced him tightly while glaring at me.
I said a prayer this morning that Mary would forgive me because Abe is going to be gone for a bit, and I did not want Mary to scream the whole day. We got off to a rocky start. When I tried to hold Mary this morning, she screamed bloody murder, jumped out of my arms and crawled as fast as she could to Lydia, who freaked out because she was trying to go potty and Mary was practically diving into the toilet trying to get away from me.
But breakfast provided two opportunities. 1) Mary was hungry, and only the only way I was going to let her eat was if she let me feed her. A start. 2) I play this game with Mary where I kiss her feet and play peek-a-boo with her while I’m cleaning the floor. When I did that today, her heart softened and we were friends again.
Hallelujah. I have my baby back. (Except that also means I have to do everything one-handed, but listening to her scream all day is the less desirable alternative.)
Aside from scrubbing both toilets, vacuuming, doing/folding (part of) two loads of laundry, playing with the girls and reading to the girls, I finally stepped out of the house at a healthy 5:25pm this evening. I was in the mood for sushi–maybe because Martha Stewart told me she loved Japanese food?–and took the girls with me to the sushi place we went on Saturday. Abe had car issues with the rental car company he’s using for this trip, and so he arrived approximately 40 minutes after I got to the restaurant. His presence was welcome, because before he came I was super busy fishing goodies out of soup, tearing up sushi for the girls, and trying to make sure their clothes stayed clean (big fail there).
But the plus side of all that work is, I have nothing to clean now! No mess in my kitchen or anything, so after I post these two pictures, I can happily tuck myself in bed.
