A Sunday to forget...

I'm still not writing or exercising as much as I'd like to, but will just have to press forward and try to make progress. Fortunately I have a little more time this week during the week, so maybe that will help. I also want to make sure to plan some fun things for Thomas, keep his little brain stimulated.

I felt very bad today because it didn't end up being a very good day for he and I. Thankfully, these days we have more good days than bad days, when he was a baby it was so hard because he cried so much of the time and after hours of that I just had such a hard time maintaining my patience. It's funny, once you are removed from it, you think, how could I have been so impatient with a helpless infant? But when you are alone with a child all night and they are crying for hours and hours at a time at the top of their lungs and you can't figure out why no matter how hard you try and you feel so helpless, it's so unbelievably hard to keep your cool sometimes. Thank God I had my Mom there sometimes to talk me down. I don't miss those days, I tell you. I am very excited to someday have more children, but I am definitely not so excited about dealing with that first 6 months- 1 year again. I think about mine and Emmett's decision to have not 1, but 2 more children and I wonder if I'll actually go through with that. Two more infants may be more than I can handle. Maybe one more of our own and adopt one that is a bit older? I guess we have plenty of time to decide on that haha

Anyway, Thomas work up on the wrong side of the bed today. He was just completely cranky all day long. The slightest thing would send him into a temper tantrum. We got up about 8:3am, I was surprised that Emmett slept so late, but I think it was just because we stayed up till almost 1am, which is incredibly rare for us. Pretty much immediately, Emmett plunked himself down for a day of sport spectating, BORING!! The Raiders were playing Pittsburgh, after that was channel flipping between the 49ers and the Giants. I made him a nice breakfast, bacon, eggs and toast and then just sort of laid around. As I mentioned, Thomas was in such a terrible mood that we put him down for his nap almost 2 hours early at 11am because he was laying on the floor and rubbing his eyes and generally acting tired. I napped while he napped, then got up and took my shower and started to get ready for the day. Emmett suggested and I concurred that today would be a good day for me to take Thomas and go out for a while. I definitely understand how he might need a break, after all he works all week and then does a lot of watching of the kid on the weekend, so if he asks for a break, I definitely try to give it to him. I had been having a hankering for oysters rockefeller (strange, I know - I got it in my mind because I was thinking of having a dinner party for Emmett's birthday and he likes them so much, so I was looking up recipes and that made me start to get hungry for them), so I decided to take Thomas for a drive up to Point Reyes and buy some oysters at Johnson's Oyster farm up there.

Thomas and I left about 2pm, got gas and headed out of the city. It was an okay drive except that Thomas got into one of his "Mommy...Mommy....MOMMY....MOMMY" modes where he just keeps yelling my name over and over again. Then he was dropping his little toy camel on the floor of the car and then yelling for me to pick it up for him - which consists of him yelling over and over again "camel...camel..CAMEL...CAMEL", well, actually, since he doesn't say the 'c' it's more like, "amel...amel...AMEL...AMEL" lol I reach back and pick it up for him and, of course, 60 seconds later he drops it again and we repeat this process indefinitely, which means until I lose my patience and refuse to get it for him and then he starts crying...arrrgghhh...some days are pretty frustrating. Additionally, my car is running really badly, which didn't help my stress level at all. I really have to take it in and get it fixed. But it's the strangest thing because all day it ran REALLY bad, jerking all over the place and stalling, it was horrible. I told Emmett we would have had a smoother ride if we had gone to Point Reyes on horseback. But then tonight when I drove to work it was perfectly fine ?!? so that makes me a little reluctant to take it in when I know someone is going to charge me an arm and a leg to fix it. I'm also thinking I might take it down to Salinas or somewhere where the cost of doing business is much less in hopes that they might be more reasonable if it ends up being a big thing.

I always digress...anyway, we finally got to Johnson's. It was almost a 2 hour drive, and I took a huge mug of coffee with me for the trip, so I had to pee so bad by the time we got there I thought I was truly going to burst at the seams. I whipped Thomas out of the car and decided first to check the place out a bit and then going and use the port-a-pottys that I saw on our way in. It was a cool place and if we'd left a little earlier in the day, or if the day had been going a little smoother I would have liked to have taken Thomas for a little walk around there. It's very beautiful and very remote and would have been fun to take him for a little walk. But I was just pretty frazzled at that point. And then it turned out that they had sold out of whole oysters for the day and all they had left were the jars. For whatever reason, that didn't upset me as much as it might have, at least we got out of the house and I got to check the place out. Plus, I also knew that all of the little grocery stores around there carry whole oysters that are pretty much just as cheap, so I wasn't that upset. I debated whether to buy a jar, but the need to use the bathroom was so pressing that I retreated with Thomas to the port-a-pottys and decided to decide after we used the bathroom. It was super windy out there and when I started to open the door, the wind grabbed it out of my hand and whipped it open and I was very glad that Thomas wasn't in the way - it would have sent him flying. I HATE having Thomas in port-a-pottys. He's so curious about everything and I am nearly hysterical about him touching ANYTHING in there so I get very tense and start yelling and that never helps the situation one little bit. So I rushed us in and out of there as fast as possible, but Thomas kept trying to go back in and check things out and I kept trying to get him out of there. Finally I grabbed his hand and started walking him away. Well, at that moment the wind caught that door again and whipped it open and it hit him in the back and knocked him over onto his hands and knees in the gravel and he started bawling. I felt terrible for him and held him and picked him up right awy to cuddle and calm him, but I have to admit, there is a sick side of me, that same side that laughs at American's Funniest Home Videos, that was sort of laughing. I know that that sounds really terrible, and I would add the caveat that it would never be funny if there was any chance he'd truly hurt himself, but the thing hit him in his diapered butt and he had on long pants so the gravel wouldn't hurt him either. It was just the suddenness of the whole thing and that shocked look on his face that made it all very America's Funniest Home Video-esque. I don't think this is sounding good, so I'll stop.

I decided to buy one jar of oysters and so we did that and got back in the car for the drive home. I stopped in Inverness and bought some of the whole oysters at the local grocery. I tried to get Thomas and I some lunch, but he was being so fussy that I didn't think we had a prayer of having a sit down lunch. I decided to drive back via highway 1 so that it would be more scenic and that was very nice. Thomas fell asleep and it was nice to be out of the city for a while and enjoy the incredible scenery and sense of peace that I seem to get when I'm out in the wilderness and/or near the water. We got back to the city a little after 6:30 and Emmett asked me to pick up Chinese food from Ton Kiang, which I must say, is the best Chinese restaurant I've ever been to, it's wonderful. I picked up the food and then proceeded to get into a traffic jam on the way home, the car was stalling every other minute and Thomas was yelling in the backseat that his seatbelt hurt. It was like a three-ring circus and all we were doing is driving home. Ahhhh, I guess some days are just like that. :-)

We got home and I was still stressed from what should have been a fun outing but instead just radically increased my stress level, so Emmett took over and got Thomas ready for bed. I went upstairs and read his book and then went back downstairs and took a nap on the couch until it was time to leave for work. Ug, sometimes it is so painful to get up at 11pm and head out for an 8 hour shift. At least tonight was registration, which is infinitely easier than being the unit clerk.

I think I'll put the rest of the weekend recap in a separate entry so as to break it up a bit...

Love,
Melissa