This is what the sky looked like as I waited for the train this morning.  It never got really nice (nor did it get dark and stormy).  It was just a cool, cloudy day.  Very,very nice after the hot, humid weekend.

You know how you have vague plans for your weekend?  Grocery shopping, swapping out the summer clothes, cleaning out the craft room (which has become the “I don’t know where to put this so I’ll put it in here” room), yardwork, etc, etc.  Our weekend plans mostly went out the window.  Thursday night, my sweet, innocent grandson poked his father in the eye.  He scratched Patrick’s cornea causing him great pain.  They went to Urgent Care on Thursday night and by Friday morning, Patrick had a red, swollen, very painful eye.  I left work and took James so they could do what they needed to do.  He is young enough to need constant looking after and Kate had her hands full with Patrick.

So, twist my arm reeeaaalllly hard and make me take care of my grandson!  Jamie ended up spending most of the weekend with us while Kate and Patrick got his eye sorted.  We had things that had to get done and things that could wait.  We went shopping for a new refrigerator.  There is nothing mechanically wrong with our current one but we have not liked it since we bought it 12 years ago.  It was a quick purchase when our old fridge broke and it was what we could afford.  

The new one comes as a result of a surprise bonus from work.  It didn’t pay for the entire fridge but about 1/3 of it.  We were able to decide what we wanted/needed and spent a lot of time looking online before we went out to the store.  And we took James.  He enjoyed the day.  He opened every refrigerator on the sales floor.  We chose a french door refrigerator with 2(!) ice makers.  We use a lot of ice.  


It’s being delivered tomorrow.  It means I am taking another day off, and will have Jamie with me as Kate takes Patrick back to Wills Eye Hospital to get checked.  I don’t mind the day off but I am going to be stretched tight when it comes time to take off the time at the holidays I usually take.

Saturday we took James to Johnson’s Corner Farm to take a hay ride and pick a pumpkin.  Unfortunately, the line was so long, and he is so little, it would not have been worth it to stand in the line.  We walked around and with all the things he could see and touch, what did he choose to play with?   The mulch.  We chose several pumpkins

        Of all shapes and colors.  Some of them will get carved.  Some we’ll just save the seeds and plant them next year.

It was too crowded to easily shop in their farm store so I got some blueberries so James could have a snack.

We came home exhausted and hot and dusty.  There was DinoTrucks on the television and chicken fingers and french fries for dinner.  It’s part of the beauty of being a grandparent.  I don’t worry about his eating healthy for every meal.  I just feed him what he likes.

Saturday night we had to make sure he was asleep before we put him into the porta crib because he can climb out of it now.  He’s tall and strong for an 18 month old child.  We all watched the movie Babies (if you’ve never seen it, watch it. It follows 4 babies from different cultures from their birth to their first year) and James finally fell asleep hard enough to be picked up and put in the crib.  He slept through the night and we got up early Sunday morning and did some of the other chores we had put off.  The bed linens got changed and the laundry got done.  The rest of the groceries were put away and things were generally cleaned up.  We collapsed into our chairs when Kate came and took James home.  

And today was Monday and the week starts all over again.  I have groups of Temple Univ. students coming to my group this week.  They will be with us for 8 weeks.  They’re rec therapy majors and for some of them, this is the first time they’ve met individuals who have mental illness.  It is an eye opening experience for them and my group loves it.  I think they get tired of hearing my voice all the time.

Tonight we are making pizzas on naan bread.  I hope it’s as good as I imagine it will be.  I can hear Elanor upstairs laughing.  I’m going to go see what’s so funny.  I could use a good laugh.