For the past two weeks, Tom has stayed home with me, because between illness, injury, and the ever-evolving (and ever-problematic) late stage of my pregnancy, I was particularly ill-equipped to handle things alone. Fast-forward to today, when, despite being bigger and more sore than ever, I'm otherwise doing pretty well compared to many other days, and Tom really needed to get some things done away from home.
I made sure to get to bed at a relatively decent hour last night, but had no control over when Michael would awake, which, sadly, occurred at the depressing hour of 5:30 am. He was coughing pretty heavily, and seemed almost to be choking in the process, so Tom went up to check on him. However, stayed up there with Michael for quite some time, and between my worry for my sickly son and my usual tendencies toward insomnia, I was unable to get back to sleep.
By the time Tom was set to go, we had determined that a doctor's appointment was in order for Michael, since he's had this cough for over a week, and was sounding worse today than ever. Tom made plans to leave for home as early as he could, and I set an appointment for as late as I could, so that I wouldn't have to drag two babies out of the house by myself, a near-impossible task for me at this point in time.
And so my solo day began. Abby was defiant, Michael was cranky, and though I managed to get him down for two naps, he only slept an hour each time. Through it all, though, I managed to catch up on the dirty dishes, grab a quick shower, dress, and have the kids ready for Tom when he walked in the door. I wanted us all to go to the appointment together so that we could stop somewhere to eat afterwards and, in doing so, manage to recognize Tom's actual birthday in a small, albeit casual and last-minute, way.
Tom got home just in time, and everything seemed to be coming together until we got in the van and I was informed that the ambient lighting had been turned on and left on, and the van would therefore not start. We wasted about ten minutes trying to jump the battery before we began desperately passing babies back and forth and moving car seats into the working car.
Somehow, some way, I was able to fast-hobble into the doctor's office with Michael at exactly 4:30 (the appointment time), after calling ahead to beg permission to be five to ten minutes late. Of course, I still had to wait five or ten minutes to be seen, but I needed that time to catch my breath, anyway.
Michael, as it turns out, is just fine. It's likely that he's sounding worse today because he's finally moving all of that junk up out of his lungs. I hope it happens quickly; we could all use some better sleep. In the meantime, we've been advised to try honey as a natural cough suppressant, so we'll see how that goes.
Appointment done, we drove just a block down the street to a nearby pub we've been wanting to check out: Ireland's Four Provinces in Falls Church. We actually had our very first date at a Four Fields in DC, and I'd remarked to Tom several times that I wondered how similar this local pub was to that one we'd dined in way back when.
Turns out, it was lovely. In fact, we liked it so much that we may celebrate an anniversary there sometime, instead of in DC. And it offered one of the most interesting appetizers I've ever tried: baked brie.
Mmm mmm good.
As we waited for our food, I finally got the chance to do something I'd been too distracted to remember to do all day: wish Tom a happy birthday.
Abby had a grand time coloring, especially since she was given eight different crayons, rather than the standard four. We ordered the usual mac n' cheese for her, which I think she liked, but got a little frustrated with, as it took time to cool to her satisfaction. After several attempts that ended in brief tears, despite our near-constant efforts to mix and test the bowl, she focused her attention back on the soda bread, which was a big hit with both her and Michael.
Though we got him to eat quite a few bites of potato leek soup (which was fantastic), in the end he had eyes only for the soda bread, as well.
Don't let him fool you. He's trying to look all tough here, but he had a great time.
Both kids enjoyed the frequent visits from the manager, who came by to tousle toddler hair, make conversation, and generally take very good care of us.
I made sure to mention to the waitress that we had a birthday boy in our midst, so she put a nice little candle in Tom's Bailey's Irish Mousse (which, by the way, was amazing, and will be at the top of my list of things to go eat sometime when I am no longer pregnant).
Make a wish!
And now, for some brief, baby-free time with the birthday boy. You can be sure we'll be using it to basically sit around and do nothing as we recover from the day.
The joys of parenthood, right? ;)
