Things Moms do (2007-07-05)

(Originally posted on 5 July 2007.)

Things Moms put on their to-do list for when daughter is visiting grandparents and they have “tons of time” on their hands:

• make summer skirt for self (to replace the summer skirt my mom made when I was 15 and which is starting to look shabby, not to mention has lost all elasticity in the waist…)
• finish Summer 2006 Holiday scrapbook
• start daughter’s lifebook
• (start to) learn Amharic
• work on front garden

Things Moms actually do while daughter is away:

• go see a documentary animal movie at a real movie theatre (and think how much Giggles would enjoy seeing the animals)
• clear all the end-of-school stuff off the dining room table, recycle some and put some away for “future reference” (aka embarrass daughter with when she’s 15)
• write blog posts featuring daughter’s escapades
• wander around the house wondering what to do
• tidy up daughter's desk
• spend half an hour listening to daughter on phone tell how much fun she had at the stampede and that she bought new pink cowboy boots!
• listen to the radio
• prepare jiaozi (dumplings) and put in freezer so when daughter returns she can gobble them up in two sittings (or three if I’m lucky)
• read until 11:00 pm
• try to sleep in but get woken by the cat at 5:30
• weed the garden
• work on the Summer 2006 Holiday scrapbook I started last fall, featuring lots of photos of daughter
• go for a leisurely shopping trip at Canadian tire and spend half the time buying stuff for daughter (while happy she’s not there to say “Mom, can I have this? Mom, can I have that?”)
• listen to daughter on phone tell she has two new stuffies – two dogs named Sally and Sis (and Sis is flat like a pillow and she can sleep on her), and have a chat with Sally and Sis
• visit friends’ house while they’re on holidays, water plants, feed fish, and wish daughter were here so we could have a swim together in friends’ backyard pool
• read until midnight
• try to sleep in but get woken by the cat at 5:15
• prune the dogwood
• defrost the freezer and discover a half-dozen items prepared early in 2005, before travelling to China, for fast meal preparation in the post-adoption haze
• listen to daughter talk on the phone for 20 minutes about all the fun she had at the zoo with Laolao and Laoye
• make wontons and put in freezer so daughter can enjoy wonton soup when she’s back home
• pay bills
• eat (some of) the food from 2005
• read until 1:00 am
• try to sleep in but get woken by the cat at 4:55
• start removing the spirea from the front garden (which needed work last summer but I never got to it)
• think about making daughter a “heritage dress” to go with her new pink cowboy boots
• reconcile bank records for last three months
• forget to brush teeth after breakfast (EVERY day!)
• read until 11:00 pm
• close bedroom door when going to bed so cat won’t wake me
• keep counting down the days (“Mommy, I wish you were already here.” “Only seven more sleeps until I come, Giggles.”)

Well, two “starts” out of 5 things on the list ain’t so bad, is it? (Might make it to three “starts” before the last seven sleeps have passed… and who knows, might even finish off one of those “starts”…)