Hooray, School Tomorrow!!!!

All in all, it was a good vacation week, but I am SOOOO ready for them to go back to school! The second half of the week was somewhat chaotic. Thursday, I took my three kids, and met my friend K and her three kids (they are the family we vacationed with last summer) at the Children's Museum in Boston. Madhouse. Fortunately, we also had another adult with us, K's son's tutor (who also teachers in Sammy's class), so it was a 1:2 ration, which was acceptable. Sofia ran around checking everything out, got totally soaked at the water table, and then slipped and fell. Fortunately, I had a change of clothing ready for her (I've learned my lesson!). K's son had a melt-down when the bigger kids started climbing the 3-story-tall climbing structure, so that was the end of that. And I took a wrong turn going home and ended up going over the Zakim Bridge, north on 93, which then meant taking back roads home, so ride was an hour and a half!

Thursday night, as soon as E showed up to babysit, Sammy I and I took off for my friend R's house, to have dinner and help build her daughter's new desk. I didn't realize it would be some Elfa from Container Store - easy and fun! And Sam got in the spirit and started cleaning up his friend's room!

That mood held over the next morning, and Sam insisted on cleaning his room!!! I could hardly recognize him!
We went through about half the junk, and decided we wanted some better (i.e. Elfa) drawers for the Legos and a short bookshelf.

That's when I tried to take all three kids shopping. Oops. Bad idea. Micah was pretending he was a doggie - IN the store - and Sofia kept trying to climb out of the shopping cart, and eventually got a bloody nose. We picked out some Elfa, but my friend who works there reminded me to go home and get a 20% off coupon first! So we went to the grocery story, where Sofia managed to knock over a whole display case while we were paying.

Got home, built the bookshelf (Christmas Tree Shop), cleaned more, started cooking for dinner. Left Sam home alone, because E was on her way. Dropped Micah at his therapist's office, ran back to Container Store with cranky Sofia. Picked up Micah, came home, built drawer unit, went back to making dinner.

K and her family came for dinner, which was great except that my husband was an hour late, so the kids were getting a little over-tired by the end of the evening. K had given Sammy a haircut when they arrived (she's a former hairdresser), and had intended to give David a cut, but we ran out of time.

Saturday morning, I had to read the Haftorah at shul (last-minute notice, I started learning it Tuesday night!). After services, we went back to K's house so she could do David's hair, and the kids played a bit. Sofia found some baby-doll toys and had a blast.

Sofia and I both fell asleep in the car on the way home, and I climbed straight into bed when we arrived. We both slept for about 3 hours! I was exhausted (Friday really wiped me out). David and the boys played chess (in the hallway right outside my door - I'm not so sure why they chose that particular spot).

Got up, got ready to go out. We ended up going to dinner with L&K at a cute bring-your-own-bottle Italian restaurant near them. Stayed a very long time, didn't get home until nearly 11pm. Nice evening.

Tried to sleep late today, but too many interruptions (like Sofia sitting on my head). Called Grandma (my regular 9am Sunday call), made breakfasts, showered, and got the kids ready to go. David had to pack, he's in Collegeville PA tonight.

Drove the kids out to Northboro, where we were dropping Micah at another birthday party, same place as last Sunday. When we pulled in to the parking lot, Sofia let out a "Yeah! Play! Climb!" and raced with her brothers in to the giant blow-up slides area.

Sofia and Sam and I stayed for the slides, then when they switched to field games, we went over to Target across the street for some errands. Then another mom called me from the party to say that Micah wasn't feeling great, she'd already given him his inhaler, and he wanted me. So quick check-out (I needed the gift for the party twins!) and back to pick him up. The mom had him waiting at the door (whew), and we came back home.

Had a restful afternoon; the boys watched a movie downstairs, Sofia watched upstairs, and I cleaned more. Then they convinced me to order sushi, but I said they all had to come with me to pick it up (they had wanted me to just take Sofia, but with Micah not feeling well, I didn't want to leave them home alone). Restaruant is tiny and I parked right out front, so I let them all stay in the locked car while I ran in to get the food.

Micah loves miso soup, and I order cucumber maki and sweet potato maki for him without sesame (which he is allergic to), so he was happy. Sam and I shared some spicy tuna and a Tornado roll along with the veggies. Sofia was already eating noodles when I dragged her out of the house (she was VERY angry), but she also had some miso, and I already had some edamame in the refrigerator.

Then all three of them took a bath together (yeah, it's a bit messy, but they have fun), and now they are all ASLEEP! I did a ton of laundry today, too, and I'm trying to get my room cleaned up.

I also checked in on my class, and someone raised an interesting question: do we, as parents of children with special needs (or as parents of children who need a Jewish education) have a responsibility to live in an area where such services are readily available? I know many of you live in more rural areas, and I know some of you struggle with medical and educational services for your children. I know there are so many reasons for living somewhere, but if your had the choice to move, would you?

Oh, I also forgot to update y'all about Micah: David and I met with Micah's therapist on Tuesday night, and he thinks Micah has OCD. Micah gets in these argumentative moods, where he is completely unable to "let go" of an idea, and it's REALLY frustrating. He's a tough cookie. So therapist is going to work on giving Micah some "let it go" tools. I have to admit, just having an idea of what is going on in my little boy's brain made it a teeny bit easier to deal with - I needed the words to know how to help him.

EDIT: Have to add this link for "Boheimishe Rhapsody", a very funny take on Queen's classic "Bohemian Rhapsody" (but I guess it helps if you understand most of the words...).