Flying Solo

So Dave has been gone for work for more than a full week ... and we still have to wait until Friday evening for him to come home. He left last Sunday early in the afternoon to head to Europe for work. He spent the first week touring different companies in Switzerland, Italy and Germany, including BMW. That is exactly the type of thing that fills his bucket, so I'm glad he had the opportunity. He's spent this weekend sightseeing in Rome, which has been amazing for him, and he'll spend the rest of the week in Italy for the first run with a die-casting tool his company is purchasing.

As AJ calls it, it's Papa's vacation. Dave was creative enough to take along a Lego pirate captain to photograph for AJ in different places on his journey. It's been great for AJ to see all the different places where Papa has been. (And Dave got frisked by German airport security for having a Lego sword in his pocket.)

We've been able to talk on the phone briefly more days than not and have managed to Skype once or twice. The 7-hour time difference makes that a bit challenging. AJ enjoys seeing Papa with Skype and talking to him, and Teddy gets so excited to hear Dave's voice. I can only imagine how excited both boys will be to see Dave again.

I give all the credit in the world to single parents, military spouses during deployments and other parents who are solely responsible for the health, safety, happiness and all other aspects of their children's lives. I dreaded Dave leaving so much that I knew I'd be better once he left. And I was.

We've managed to finish a week of AJ's swim class, thanks to our sitter handling Teddy all those nights. We started AJ's tumbling class with the amount of tears I expected from him. We all had fun at the Children's Museum for Teddy's 0-3 session. I've managed to escape to work a few days (with one more scheduled this week). We spent the weekend playing with the boys' cousins. The lawn is mowed, the garden is (finally) weeded, strawberries are jammed and I got my long run done this weekend.

Teddy's been putting himself to sleep every night except when we were at Grandma's house. It was rough the first night and again tonight after the weekend at Grandma's. He's had one night where I got to keep him company from 3:30-5:15 a.m., but at least he was tired enough that I was able to doze off and on in his room instead of wide awake Teddy who wants to play.

Teddy and I have taken advantage of our friends and family to spend some time together. We went to the local water park last Sunday, and Teddy had the best time. We went down the water slide 12 times! (Imagine me carrying a wet, slippery Teddy and a tube up 2 flights of stairs. Yeah, after two times, we switched to the slide that didn't require a tube, which Teddy liked even better.) We stopped on the water slide after my wrist was literally numb from carrying my lovable lunk. We may have looked extremely ungraceful exiting the lazy river, but neither of us drowned, so it was a success.

I'm smiling because I'm done hauling Teddy up the stairs for the slide.

I greatly appreciate all the help, whether it's a friend offering to take AJ for ice cream or for a sleepover. As I told my folks, for these two weeks, I'm all about leveraging the odds in my favor of surviving with some of my sanity.