ugh

sadly our playdate cancelled today, oh well. Since the weather has returned to summer we filled the wading pool and Sophia splashed around while Stella napped. (check out the dual slide action!)

Stella dressed in her swimsuit too after her nap, but her heart wasn't in it and she just got her feet and butt wet. So we go in after awhile so I can begin making dinner (which I had started poolside by peeling my potatoes and yam during Stella's nap). The kids ran around the absolute pigsty-house and I multi-tasked by getting the chicken breast and veggies ready for the oven, cleaning up all the books & toys & art supplies a la Jeff (non-stop, relentless, complete) and then Sophia went to the potty for a poop and her MO includes an insistence upon after-poop books while continuing to sit on the potty. Stella had been sitting quietly in her room reading books and came trotting out carrying two and plopping down in my lap to join in the insistence of book reading, which I was about to do when I realized that Stella's swimsuit shouldn't be that wet and I realize that she has the nastiest poop swim diaper and has just left it all over my pants AND her bedroom rug, and somehow I have to get it off of her bottom. Stripped of my own pants, I attempt the rinse-bath, and it doesn't really go well so then I switch gears and decide to do full-on bath before dinner tonight and that goes over fine but now our bathroom sink holds my skanky pants, the potty insert needing a wash holding Stella's scary swim diaper and I have to monitor the roasting chicken breast somehow. And I will have to clean the wool rug in the girls' room. Dinner is kind of going down but then Sophia starts playing with her mashed potatoes and won't eat any of them even though she said earlier that she would. She stops listening to me when I ask her repeatedly to stop playing with her food. I DID try to make it fun, and she just kept raking the potatoes. UGH. Luckily Stella broke us out of our bad-dinner by eating tomatoes and green pepper and crackers (Sophia too) and everyone got happy again. Then I put on reggae and we all danced and played the kids' musical instruments before having one last picnic of the day on the living room floor in pajamas. We read books and 'did tuck' and THEN I went outside to empty the pool/water the plants, empty the compost, move the grill off the deck for tomorrow's NIGHT OUT block party, and back inside for laundry, vacuuming and blogging (which is enjoyable because it's my replacement for adult conversation that I don't get to have enough of).
Now I will drink beer.
I miss my husband, and not just because he helps me do so many of the things mentioned above. I think he will be back on Wednesday. Hurrah!