This week, Seth and I went to Las Vegas with Matt and Evie stayed with Granna and Grannadaddy while we were gone. She's been at home for a couple of weeks now, and it hadn't occurred to me that she might feel left out or left behind by us going out of town (which is a big oversight on my part), but when it came time for us to leave on Friday, I could tell Evie was feeling anxious. She'd been hearing Seth, Matt, and I talk about what was on our agenda for the weekend and I hadn't spent any time reassuring her that she would also be having a good time with Granna and Grannadaddy. But when Granna came to pick her up, my magical mom immediately sensed that Evie was a bit trepidatious and began telling her about all the things she'd been looking forward to doing with Evie: gardening, feeding the birds in the backyard, going to the park and the zoo... Evie's face immediately perked up and she seemed to be in good spirits when they drove off, and every time I talked to her while we were gone.
I'm sure Granna can write up a bit about their experiences together to share (she may have already done it and I can't find it - I'm drowning it too many different email addresses these days).
On Thursday after I picked Evie up for the weekend, she talked to me about having a funny feeling in her stomach because this was the first time she had been left by both her parents in a long time. I told her about a time I was homesick at my Aunt Thelma's, and that seemed to help a little.
ReplyDeleteWhen we got to our house, we fed the birds, played Trouble and the Cat logic game, and then we picked up trash at the park. Chris, who is a park employee, saw us and said he was glad to see me back. Evie chatted with him a bit too. Then he went home and came back with a tee shirt for her, one that fits better than the previous one. We ended up walking and picking up trash for about 40 minutes!
When we got home, she was ready for her laptop and videos with Kraft Mac and Cheese for lunch. After an hour, Evie wanted to go outside again, and we checked under the rocks to see the beetles and roly-polies. We sat for a bit and saw several birds. Then we went to the front and did some weeding, and she was a quick study on what was a weed or a plant I wanted to keep. Evie seemed to sleep ok that night.
On Saturday morning, Evie suggested going to Incredible Pizza, but after we discussed that an arcade would be more fun with someone her age playing games with her and that it might hurt her wrist, we decided to go to the Children’s Museum. She wanted to recall the memories of being there when she was young. She enjoyed the time with other children, younger than herself, and was very kind to them. Two mothers told me how wonderful she was to organize their younger children in playing with the Fed Ex packages. We were there for about 2 hours, and then we got burgers from McDonald’s and gelato from Jeremiah’s – mango with vanilla ice cream. She ate some gelato on the way home and then switched to her burger. She froze about half the gelato and ate it the next day. In the car we discussed the 2 break-ins that she thinks have made her less trusting than most children her age. She is such a thoughtful child, and I hope my encouragement helped her a bit.
I fixed spaghetti, sauce, meatballs, and bread for supper. She ate all of hers! I even fixed some noodles with butter in case she didn’t like the marinara, and she ate them too. Again she seemed to sleep fine.
On Sunday, I dropped her off at Sunday School and went to Aldi’s for some fruit for a smoothie Evie wanted to make. Mike had asked me yesterday if I thought Evie would want to go with him to Hamlet. I thought she was too young or might be concerned about all the deaths after we had talked about the break-ins. But then today I thought I should ask her opinion, and she said she had read the kid’s version and would like to go. We went to lunch at Exline’s with the group (the droop as Evie used to say), and of course, Evie, Nathaniel and Lydia most enjoyed the arcade games! But Evie ate almost all of her spaghetti. We met Mike at Tennessee Shakespeare theatre. Evie so enjoyed it! She was taken by the young woman who played Hamlet, who was indeed exceptional. There were some light moments added in, some anachronisms (like guns for the soldiers), and it was a great production. Several times the characters came right to our seats to look right at us to give their lines. Afterwards, Evie asked “Hamlet” for her autograph, and we chatted for several minutes with her. She encouraged Evie to continue in theatre. Mike’s friends who read Greek with him seemed impressed with Evie’s lines from “Peter Pan,” when Wendy gives a synopsis of Hamlet for the kids. As the kids in the play ask what happened to Hamlet (he died), to Ophelia (she died), to others in the cast (they died), to the rest (they lived happily ever after). [You may need to take this out and put in Evie’s rendition.]
ReplyDeleteI didn’t think when Evie asked for a Mountain Dew that it might keep her awake that night, but something certainly did. She seemed to finally rest about 2:00 a.m. She still got up about 8:00 on Monday. I left shortly after giving her muffins for breakfast to take a friend from church to jury duty so that she didn’t have to walk around alone downtown. When I got back, Evie and I did a few things together including making the smoothie. Emily and Seth were due to pick her up about 12:30, and Rosemary called about 12:15 that she was ready to go home. Mike was on his way home from church, and Evie encouraged me to go on and get Rosemary (Because she is counting on you, Evie said), so I left, and Mike was there within about 10 minutes. I got back in time to visit with Emily and Seth for a few minutes before they all left for home. It was a good weekend other than the long night for Evie on Sunday night.
Love, Granna