The Art of Distraction

Today was day one without dad. And we always try to fill day one without dad (D1W/OD) with fun things to make it pass quickly. I call it the Art of Distraction. The first day is hard. Then we get into a routine of not having him around. And then we get excited for when he's coming home. So we just need to get through day 1.

Today, after sleeping in a bit because we had a late night last night at a Relief Society activity that I was teaching a jewelry class at, we headed to Chapters to pick up Lucy's fairy books that had come in. It was a lot of fun. The kids got to hang in the kids section for about an hour. Played with trains, coloured, read books, checked out toys and listened to story time.

And while they listened to story-time...I bought Christmas presents. I love the art of distraction.

I haven't been to Chapters on a Saturday. I don't go there very often. I will not go there on a Saturday again. It was fun...but too busy for me. And we had to wait in a 20-person line-up to get the books. Not fun.

After we were done, we headed to the mall for lunch and some shopping...for me. I got a coupon in my email, and had to take advantage of it. Because I'm a coupon lady these days.

Logan is getting so big. I have broken a new barrier. I now have to order 3 whole kid's meals when we eat out. He's no longer satisfied with a few bites of my burger and sharing fries. My boy is big enough to eat his own kid's meal. And he sat at the table in his own chair.

He ate up most of his fries and was done with them, so I threw them out. As we left the mall, I got him out of his stroller and a stray fry fell on the ground. A seagull approached quickly to scoop it up. It was really windy, so he kind of hovered above us for a while, so I let Logan watch him. But when he got the french fry off the ground Logan melted down. I guess he wasn't interested in sharing his stale, mall-parking-lot fry with some bird. He was upset for about 10 minutes, and kept saying, "Bird...Fre-fry!" Until I found a bouncy ball in my purse to distract him with. Again, the art of distraction is beautiful.

We skyped with Dad and watched a movie this afternoon while Logan napped. We made cookies. We skyped with Grandma Bourne. We had tortellini for dinner (one of my kids favourite meals). Then it was showers and bed-time. There were a few melt-downs. I attribute it to missing dad and the late night. I'm sure tomorrow will be better...right?

Point is, we made it through D1W/OD. I am staying up WAY too late because I hate going to bed alone. The Art of Distraction may hit me hard tomorrow...but for now, it works.