Only Child for Only a While

My girls were recently at a camp for school called Nature's Classroom.  (A friend asked me if Nature's Classroom would teach them all about frostbite and hypothermia.)  The camping trip was pushed back a day due to super-extreme cold so that the kids could experience it in merely extreme cold.  They had a great time, despite the fact that helping them pack reduced me to laughing and crying simultaneously (why can't they find basic things by themselves?!?) and Mona didn't discover until a slushy hike that her boots had holes in the heels.  They came back with stories of upper bunks vs lower bunks, games for learning about bats, and a night hike where they discovered tricks for seeing better in the dark.

The upper elementary students go every year, but this was the first time for two nights away instead of just one, and Aden has been away to camp for school twice, but his was Mona's first year.  Which meant for two days Quinn was the only child at home.

It was a brief experiment in having an only child, but interesting nonetheless.  It was markedly different from having three.  I try my best to get time one-on-one with my kids when I can, but that usually means for an errand or a game.  Never, say, breakfast. 

Some people express surprise that we "go to the trouble" of making pancakes or French toast or some other hot breakfast every morning before school.  The truth is it's cheaper and faster than anything else.  We have a griddle that fits over two burners on the stove and either Ian or I can crank out pancakes from scratch and have them on the table in about ten minutes from the time we hit the kitchen.  But for one kid?  I had no idea what to make for one kid.  The last time I had one kid she was still into dry Cheerios and yogurt.  I went with oatmeal because it's something the girls don't really eat but Quinn and I do, and I could make a small batch. 

And I decided it was important that it was something I eat as well, because normally I leave the kids on their own to eat breakfast, but it seemed weird to have Quinn eat all by himself.

The whole experience was so quiet.  And uneventful.  The adults in the house were not outnumbered.  With three kids we are always herding people and that impacts many decisions from which car to take to when we can do things.  With one kid, well, it's like we had lives and he was there, too.