Ever since returning from Camp Kesem, Sofie has been demanding...in her own way...time with me. She always has really good arguments for it, but we always have better ones! This past week she didn't have camp or school, so Debra and I took turns taking days off of work so we could be with Sofie. Originally I was going to have her Monday and Friday, but Debra needed to work on Thursday, so I took her Thursday instead of Friday. This kind of messed with my plan of having her with me from Thursday after work until Sunday afternoon. Another contributing factor to the weekend time was a visit from a California friend of Debra and Sofie. So the visit from them bled into Friday night, causing Sofie to arrive at my house Friday night. We went from 3 nights/3 days to 1 1/2 nights/2 days. So far, we've made the best of it.
We had intentions of having friends over for a swim date yesterday, unfortunately it was too hot. Yes, that's right, it was too hot to swim...or be outside at all. I spent early Saturday morning searching for alternatives. Luck was on our side because I quickly discovered the North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences has a daily program called "Meet the Animals." Yesterdays animals to meet, you guessed it, SNAKES!!! I called Sofie into the living room and mentioned it to her and asked if she'd be interested. As she was grinning from ear to ear with a very animated face she said, "Mom, if it has anything to do with snakes, you don't have to ask me! You know I'll want to do it!!" And off she ran into her room to play some more, but excited beyond belief. Gotta love a kid who knows what she loves.
Before we headed out for breakfast, I took her the newly prescribe medicine to take for her "focus and concentration" issues. "Oh MOM. Why do I have to take it on the weekends?!?"...without missing a beat I responded, "So you can focus on the snakes at the museum and not miss anything!" She swallowed the pill without a hitch. We then headed out for our Saturday morning traditional Biscuitville. She had her usual...sausage biscuit with grape jelly. I have never had her finish her breakfast before me but that morning she must have been starving. She downed that biscuit without me having to tell her once to eat her breakfast. Interestingly, one of the side effects from her new medicine is lack of appetite...apparently that hasn't kicked in yet.
After breakfast we headed back to the condo for chilling out time before we headed to the museum. She was going to play, so I turned on my computer to try to blog. She had different ideas about that. She was a little clingy yesterday. Guess she hadn't had enough time with me. She wanted me to take my computer into the living so she could play while I was working on the computer. I tried to explain that the wireless was a bit dodgy, so I needed to say wired to the modem. (Of course that didn't make sense to her!) So, she sat on my lap while I worked...which meant I didn't work. We started watching funny commercials online for laughs. After awhile, it was time to head to the museum, so off we went.
We ended up getting to the museum a little too early, but it all worked out in the end. We looked all over the museum, first heading up to the 3rd floor to view all the snakes on display, then we read all the corresponding information about the snakes. After seeing ALL of the museum, we headed down to the gift shop...of course. Well, we had to do SOMEthing to kill time!! Sofie made a loop three times, trying to pick the perfect souvenir. There were interesting things, that's for sure. I found a new snake shirt for her, so I got that but she picked out a necklace with a snake on it. She was very happy about her choice. After purchasing our haul, we headed back up to the snakes. We still had over an hour before the "Meet the Animals" presentation started!! I tried to get her to eat or see more of the museum, but she wanted to wait by the room to make sure we got a great seat! So we waited...and waited...and waited.
There were several situations that led me to believe her medication is doing what it's supposed to do. First of all, the waiting didn't bother her...at all! She had a goal of getting a great seat and that was enough to keep her focused on the outcome. Interestingly, there was a girl about Sofie's age in the classroom. She kept following the educator around to make sure she got to pet the snake a million times. She reminded me of how Sofie could be. Ironically, Sofie was on my lap the entire time...not wiggly at all. At some point she looked at me and said, "That girl needs to sit down! She's petted the snakes too many times!" I laughed internally because two weeks ago, that girl could have easily been Sofie.
After petting the snakes, she and I headed to her favorite restaurant, which is unfortunately in Raleigh. It's actually a bar that doubles as a chili restaurant. Fortunately when we got there, there were no other clients...smoking or non. Sofie ordered her usual and I had 5 way chili. She ate about 1/2 of hers...appetite suppressant working now...and I finished mine off. We headed back out into the heat to head home to Durham.
On the way to Durham, we called her friends Emma and Kate...well, there moms...to see if we could come over and play awhile. As we were heading over there, Sofie announced, "I haven't seen Kate since the end of school!!" She was right, which is pretty unusual, but it's been a crazy summer for all of our families, so we just didn't do the play dates we normally do. They were happy to see one another and played pretty well for a couple hours. We headed out to go grocery shopping while they were winding down for the evening.
We ended our day with a viewing of, "Night at the Museum" since we'd spent the day there. After the movie, she crashed and I, too went to bed. Today, we're trying plan out what we're doing. Low key morning, swimming in the afternoon. We'll see how the day pans out. I just know that this weekend gave all three of us what we needed. Sofie and I had alone time together and Debra had alone time to recoup some energy. All is well today.
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