We're making the drive with husband in the morning to work!

[gcvmom]

difficult child 1 has a GI appointment in Los Angeles tomorrow morning at 9:30am and husband's office is about 13 miles away, so we decided we'd all carpool together. We'll leave our house around 7:30am, drop off husband, then zip over to the appointment.

Then we'll pick up husband for lunch, take him back, then maybe go to a museum for a few hours and come back at quitting time. We'll probably hang out in the area for dinner... maybe some place near the beach! Then we'll head for home after traffic dies down. Should be a fun little adventure, provided the kids can be keep it together. Hopefully we'll keep things interesting and engaging enough so we can all have a good time.

 

[Fran]

Sounds like a good plan. It will help husband too. Do you pack lots of snacks and water?

 

[Suz]

What a great idea! It will help the whole family experience the drive and Dad's office and have a better picture of his day when he talks about it at home.

You are a good wife and mom.

Suz

 

[KTMom91]

Have a wonderful time!

 

[gcvmom]

Well, it started out ugly with a nasty difficult child 1 who was VERY tired and ticked that we woke him up. Followed later in the morning by three squirrelly AND obnoxious and rude kids during the doctor visit, which culminated in a very angry and crabby easy child who made the rest of the day miserable for everyone to the point where we couldn't go do anything because she would not budge from the car (she was mad about everything). So I figured since we couldn't go out of the car (I can't just leave a 10yo alone in a parking lot), I'd take them all on a sightseeing trip around that part of L.A. (made easy child even angrier). difficult child 2 was really the best behaved (overall) of them all, and he actually got out of the car to explore the beach a bit where I'd pulled to the roadside to watch the waves. The other two weren't budging (I think giving difficult child 1 a full Daytrana patch as opposed to his usual trimmed version that's about 5mg lighter was a mistake -- but when he's tired, his medications don't usually work as well, and in this case, too much made him overfocused and really irritable). I'd pretty much given up on trying to coax easy child out of her nasty mood. I just was not up for that.

We picked husband up for lunch and easy child's mood did not improve. She refused to get out of the car to eat (which only made things worse for her state of mind, the lack of food that is). And even when husband brought something back for her, she refused it. This kid digs herself into more emotional holes than anyone I know, and then you literally have to climb down in there with a ladder to help her get out. I frankly did not have the energy for that today and left it to husband to deal with when we picked him up around 4:30pm. As usual, after about a half hour with her, he managed to talk her out of the pit (she'd finally eaten by now) and by the time the boys and I met up with them (we'd stopped at a mall to kill some time and grab some dinner) she was all smiles and happy to see us (though a little sheepish about her behavior earlier -- weird that she immediately goes into grumpy mode as a defense it seems). So despite the hellish afternoon of driving around Santa Monica, the day ended well with everyone on good terms and in good moods.

I'm SO glad we can sleep in tomorrow!

Oh, and difficult child 1's GI checkup went great He's gained 7 lbs since September and grown a 1/2 inch, and he's nearly back up to the 50th percentile in height (which is where he was from birth to about age 5 when we think the Crohn's started up and his growth started to slow way down). The fact that he's still growing and gaining while playing active sports since August tells me the disease is in check and he's getting the nutrition he needs (although they said his labs showed he's fairly anemic, despite his other numbers being fine, so he's going to take a supplement until the next check up).