It was a good day

Things like this can go either way, you know? So much depends on one's attitude. It was a good Thanksgiving. 

Light did most of the cooking. She loves to cook, and doesn't have any way to cook at school. That works out really well for me, because she's eager to cook when she comes home. Today she made pies (pumpkin and pecan), rolls, green bean cassserole, and some other stuff, too, I think. I did the turkey, and showed Light how to make my stuffing. It turned out really well. I like my stuffing. Superman made cornbread to go in the stuffing. He is the best cornbread cook in the house. I made the sweet potato casserole with the sweet potatoes Superman cooked. Oh, and he fixed Brussel Sprouts using a nifty recipe he found earlier this week. The Brussel Sprouts were GOOD!! I mean, like really good, not like Brussel Sprouts which taste nasty. Maybe I'll have him post the recipe as a guest blogger here. What fun. 

Anyway, there was lots of food and it was all good. Mostly, anyway. There were just the six of us for dinner. I haven't seen C and S since mid-morning. I'm not sure who they were with today, but they've got many friends and an extended family-of-choice around here. S has local family of origin, too, but he doesn't usually spend much time with them. C's family of origin no longer lives here. He stayed, they moved. Eh. But I digress. (as usual)

We didn't have dinner until after 7:00. Light set the menu and the dinner time. She had us scheduled to eat at 6:00, but as these things do, the cooking lasted longer than expected. She's a good cook, but not too experienced. She moves much slower than I do in the kitchen. I didn't realize that until we tried to work together today. She takes her time with all the chopping and mixing, etc. I move like a whirlwind with my chopping and stirring and stuff. I'm dumping things into pots and bowls in a blur of activity. She carefully measures each ingredient and meticulously stirs the mix. It drives me crazy to watch, so I mostly stayed out of the way.

It was warm today. We almost got up to 70 degrees! With the oven blasting it got really hot in the kitchen! Way hotter than it should be this time of year, by golly. Superman and I had the window open in our bedroom most of the afternoon. 

I watched the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade this morning. I'm not overly fond of parades, generally, but I love to watch this one every year. It's tradition. We don't watch football around here, but we do watch the parade. Well, I watch the parade. I turned it on in the living room so the kids could see it, but I'm not sure they really watched. 

Diva was really tired today. I think she was up a lot the night before. I know she got up at 3:00 a.m. and I gave her some pain medicine then. I don't think she went back to sleep after that. By mid afternoon she could barely keep her eyes open. She almost fell asleep at the dinner table. Poor kidlet. She's doing much better. She still can't talk well and is a bit sore, but not bad at all. Night time is the worst. She drinks enough during the day to keep her throat well hydrated. It gets dry and very sore when she sleeps. 

But she's so quiet! This is a new state for her. She and Sproing are exceptionally loud. Children are loud. My children are very loud children. Except now Diva just shuffles around the house barely making any noise. Well, except when she wimpers and whines. That's annoying!!! I told her even if her throat hurts she is not allowed to whine! Sometimes that works. 

Sproing wandered off this afternoon to see one of his friends. He didn't return home until amost 5:00! Lordy, child, where have you been? What if we'd planned supper for earlier in the evening? Oh, well, as it was we didn't eat until 2.5 hours after he got home. And while he was gone the house was fairly quiet. It was lovely. As soon as he got home, though, things got really loud again. He was hungry, and he doesn't do well when he's hungry. Superman and I tried to get him to have a snack, but not eat too much. That was tricky. And it didn't work. He griped, yelled, argued, and screamed from the time he got home until he stomped off to bed. He was contentious at the dinner table. He argued with anything else anyone said. He refused to eat the stuff he'd asked for. This is typical Sproing behavior. It's tiring. He jumped up and stormed out of the room at least twice in the course of our dinner. Matching him scream for scream makes things worse. Mostly we were quiet but firm with him. Then he screamed at us. 

But it was a good day. He was screaming and acting out, but I was calm. I didn't get overly upset. Superman was really good, too. He didn't rise to Sproing's bait, either. We were both calm but firm with him. He didn't follow the plan quite so well, but we did our part. The boy is kinda funny sometimes. Between 5:00 and 8:00 this evening he was "going to bed! I don't want supper!" at least 5 times. The second time he left the dinner table we were all about finished anyway. I made him wash one of the serving bowls then he went to bed seething with anger. About 5 minutes after he got into bed I went in and sat on the bed beside him. I asked if he'd like me to scratch his back. He didn't answer, but I did anyway. I know he likes it. Then he started talking to me. He told me why he was frustrated, what it was he really wanted when he was screaming earlier. He actually listened to me! It was a good conversation! Both of us really like it when we can talk reasonably like that. He just hasn't figured out how to talk that way in every situation. It's almost as if he can't just talk until after he's screamed and pitched a fit. I don't know why. But the less upset I get about the drama, the less drama there is. As I said, today was a good day. I stayed cool!

But damn, that boy wears me out!