A taste of single parenthood?
This weekend we planned to visit my mom up north. It funny how one phone call kind of threw that plan into disarray for a bit.
While exwxgirl and I were out having lunch with the kids at school, we got a call from our karate school's owner and chief instructor. ATA Master Mertens was to be in town Saturday to give an all-day seminar on the business side of running a karate school. Our instructor was going to attend, and he could bring a guest. That guest was to be exwxgirl, should she want to.
After much hand- and mind-wringing about what we should do, including when she'd have this opportunity again (if at all), and if she thought me, the kids, or my mom would feel like she was abandoning us to do this thing for herself. I told her we'd support either decision she'd make, and my mom was fine with exwxgirl's desire to stay here this weekend. It was a heck of an opportunity handed to her. I kind of pushed her toward doing this, based on the "we'll miss you but we'll be fine" and the "when will you have a chance like this again?" lines of reasoning.
She decided to stay and go to the seminar. (We already plan to visit my mom again in mid-May.) We didn't tell the kids right away after we got them out of school early. They were sad, of course, but they recovered after a bit and said their good-byes.
The kids' behavior was actually, surprisingly pretty good. The panacea of a DVD player and a Nintendo DS certainly helped. There was only about 5 minutes of trouble that caused me to yell at them. We picked up supper at the Hardee's in Hinckley. After that, the snow on the ground started coming back. The ground was covered by the time we got to my mom's house around 7:00 p.m.
We got outside during Saturday afternoon, after lunch at the new Pizza Ranch in Hibbing, and the kids enjoyed making snowmen with Grandma and being pulled on sleds like a train. We saw my grandmother, who seems to be getting more and more frail every time we see her. But she still can get around and can be quite feisty. All of us, including my mom's boyfriend watched Mamma Mia! after supper. (Quick review: Thin plot; Meryl Streep and Pierce Brosnan can't sing; some of the songs were forced into the plot, Christine Baranski is always a pleasure to see.)
When we stay at my mom's house, all in the same bedroom, Kid[1] usually wakes up about a half-dozen times at night. This time, he slept through the night both times.
There were no problems on the drive back. Again, thanks to the DVD player. I was even in a good enough mood to stop for at Dairy Queen. After we got home, exwxgirl took the kids while I unpacked the van and uncompressed for a bit.
So, not so bad of a weekend.
It's back to work tomorrow. :-/
While exwxgirl and I were out having lunch with the kids at school, we got a call from our karate school's owner and chief instructor. ATA Master Mertens was to be in town Saturday to give an all-day seminar on the business side of running a karate school. Our instructor was going to attend, and he could bring a guest. That guest was to be exwxgirl, should she want to.
After much hand- and mind-wringing about what we should do, including when she'd have this opportunity again (if at all), and if she thought me, the kids, or my mom would feel like she was abandoning us to do this thing for herself. I told her we'd support either decision she'd make, and my mom was fine with exwxgirl's desire to stay here this weekend. It was a heck of an opportunity handed to her. I kind of pushed her toward doing this, based on the "we'll miss you but we'll be fine" and the "when will you have a chance like this again?" lines of reasoning.
She decided to stay and go to the seminar. (We already plan to visit my mom again in mid-May.) We didn't tell the kids right away after we got them out of school early. They were sad, of course, but they recovered after a bit and said their good-byes.
The kids' behavior was actually, surprisingly pretty good. The panacea of a DVD player and a Nintendo DS certainly helped. There was only about 5 minutes of trouble that caused me to yell at them. We picked up supper at the Hardee's in Hinckley. After that, the snow on the ground started coming back. The ground was covered by the time we got to my mom's house around 7:00 p.m.
We got outside during Saturday afternoon, after lunch at the new Pizza Ranch in Hibbing, and the kids enjoyed making snowmen with Grandma and being pulled on sleds like a train. We saw my grandmother, who seems to be getting more and more frail every time we see her. But she still can get around and can be quite feisty. All of us, including my mom's boyfriend watched Mamma Mia! after supper. (Quick review: Thin plot; Meryl Streep and Pierce Brosnan can't sing; some of the songs were forced into the plot, Christine Baranski is always a pleasure to see.)
When we stay at my mom's house, all in the same bedroom, Kid[1] usually wakes up about a half-dozen times at night. This time, he slept through the night both times.
There were no problems on the drive back. Again, thanks to the DVD player. I was even in a good enough mood to stop for at Dairy Queen. After we got home, exwxgirl took the kids while I unpacked the van and uncompressed for a bit.
So, not so bad of a weekend.
It's back to work tomorrow. :-/