When Dad's Away the Musicals Play

Ian's off doing military classes out of state for a couple of weeks.

The downside of this is all the juggling I have to do.  When you design your life around two parents in the picture and you pluck one of them away (the stay-at-home one, no less) you have to rely on babysitters and people to cover you at work during school pickups and the like.  I'm suddenly doing all the laundry and all the cooking and all the cleaning and (nearly) all of the dog walking, etc.  But it's not bad.

The main thing I struggle with when we have these mini-deployment flashbacks is my stress level.  I get impatient with the kids when I have to do everything alone all the time, and I'm more prone to yell.  A few hours after I took Ian to the airport I snapped at Aden because she only has one chore--to empty the dishwasher--and she never remembers to do it.  Then I apologized because I'm supposed to be the grownup and yelling makes me feel stupid.  I resolved that damn it, I could make it two weeks without yelling, and I told Aden if she would try harder I would try harder, and so far so good.  What I've been doing is leaving her a note on her breakfast plate in the morning so she'll remember to empty the dishwasher before she eats (which she really needs to do because Mona's chore is to fill up the dishwasher again after meals).  The most recent note read:  "Knock knock.  Who's there?  The dishwasher.  The dishwasher who?  EMPTY ME!" So it makes her smile and I don't have to yell and life is better.  My hope is that she'll get into a habit of looking forward to finding the note, which may turn into a habit of simply remembering to empty the damn dishwasher.

That's been the height of the drama around here and that is nothing so I can't complain.  I like having more time at home, I'm getting things organized, and the kids are helpful but they miss Ian.  I miss Ian.  I have trouble sleeping when he's not home.

But there is an actual upside to Ian's absence when we must do without him.  We watch movies he would never be able to sit through.  Namely musicals.