We set the clocks back last night, and Milly got up at 7:30, which felt like 8:30 to her. Usually one of us is ready by the time we get Milly up to get her ready for church, but since she was up before either of us had finished getting ready, it put us back a few minutes. It wouldn’t be a big deal, but Grow Zone fills up pretty fast and a minute or two can put you a lot further back in line for getting your kid checked in. Fortunately, we made it a couple minutes before the surge.
It was cold today, and Milly wore a pink pea coat that Karen had bought her. She and Amanda were both complimented on their coats today.
We skipped Atlanta Bread and Mayfaire this morning. Milly was pretty fussy on the way home. Of course, to her, it was an hour later than the time we usually get out of church. I put her to bed when we got home and Amanda went out to pick up some bagels for breakfast. We watched TV and made a few phone calls (I talked to Mom and Baba, Amanda talked to her grandparents) then I took a nap (probably no more than half an hour) before Milly got up.
Milly was hungry for lunch. She ate a banana, a cup of applesauce and some chicken. Not the tastiest sounding combination, now that I think on it, but it did the trick for her.
After Milly finished eating we packed in the car and went to the Frazelles’ with a quick stop at Old Navy so Amanda could pick up some gloves. It should have been quick, at least. Amanda said the people at the registers were taking forever for no apparent reason. At least that gave me some time to chat on the phone with my sister, Erin.
We had a lot of delays today, come to think of it. We hit literally every light on the way to church and got behind a very slow person after we turned onto Vision Drive. Then there was Old Navy, and as we were leaving that parking lot I waiting for someone who was coming down the parking lot aisle. In hindsight, as slow as they were going I had time to pull out in front of them. Then they wanted to turn left, but there was a very steady stream of traffic coming from the right (preventing him from going left), whereas the right-bound lane was completely clear. He did eventually go right anyway, but it annoyed me to have to wait so long when I could have pulled out in front of him anyway.
After we got to Anna and Barry’s, Barry asked if I wanted his Xbox 360, which he’d shipped off to get fixed a while back and never even unpacked. They thought they’d keep it as a DVD player, but he said they had enough DVD players. So I have a working Xbox again.
Milly wandered back to Hannah’s room with Kirsten and found a shiny shirt of Hannah’s that she really liked. I thought it looked like chain mail. Anyway, Kirsten put it on Milly and she walked around with it for a while. As long as it was on her, Anna said she looked like a wizard, and when she picked up the Xbox DVD remote, which lights up, she looked even more like one. It made kind of a slinking noise, so you could hear it anywhere she went.
After a little bit, Anna, Barry, Amanda, Milly and I walked to Vito’s. It was a bit cold outside, but it was made even worse by the wind. Milly wanted to get out of her stroller, so I carried her for a bit. It wasn’t too bad for a while because I was able to wrap part of my coat around her, which acted like a sort of carrier. The extra 20 pounds did weigh me down though, and I had to put her back in the stroller after a bit despite her protestations.
I called Kirsten when we got to Vito’s and she drove up to meet us. We had half cheese, half pineapple pizza tonight. I can’t remember exactly all that we talked about, but we had a great time hanging out with the Frazelles, as always.
The walk back was much better because the wind had died down. Milly seemed pretty tired, but she was very playful after we got back to the house and changed her diaper. She walked back and forth on the couch, flopping around and just kind of being silly. She also took one of my hands and one of Barry’s hands and put them together, but I figured out that she was trying to make us clap.
We went home and got Milly to bed. On the way in from the car, our neighbor Bonnie, who was also just getting home, asked if we wanted some sweet potatoes. She’d gotten a few bags of them at church.
Milly went down just fine and Amanda and I wound down by watching some TV. Amanda went to bed just a little before 10:00. I started watching The Walking Dead, but I was also recording a Duke season preview on Fox Sports. That was only half an hour long, so I switched to that a little bit before it was done and was able to fast forward through its commercials as well as the ones on The Walking Dead. A very efficient use of television time, if I do say so.
Zach Dotsey