Sometimes I really find myself wondering what exactly goes
on in Ellie's mind from time-to-time. On the surface, it certainly seems like
her every action is driven by some kind of basic animalistic instinct. For
example, when food is on the table in front of her, there is no sense of her
pacing herself. Instead, it's somewhat akin to placing Filet Mignon in front of
a starving canine. If you need another example, what about those times that she
refuses sleep to the point of mental anguish (both hers and mine)?
 |
| Color me shocked that someone would actually do this... |
I find myself wondering about these things more than normal
right now. The reason why? Well, this week marks the first time in her fifteen
months of life that Ellie has gone without Bethany. Don't worry, nothing bad
happened to Bethany or anything. I didn't sell her to the circus. Nope, she's
just on a business trip in San Francisco which means I'm parenting solo until
she returns on Wednesday night.
Obviously, I've been responsible for Ellie during the day
throughout her tiny life. I've even fed her dinner alone, bathed her, and put
her to bed all on my own before. However, those experiences have played out for
one night here and there. I've never before spent this long a period of time as
Ellie's sole giver. Taking all of that into account, it should be no shocker
than Ellie has already started #MissingMommy (It's been a while since I busted
out that hashtag).
 |
| Oh yeah, that's why I don't use that hashtag anymore... |
This may be a shocker to you, but Ellie has a remarkably
good sense of time for a baby. I'm sure it's just a result of her getting
hungry or maybe the sun going down. Regardless, Ellie has a very firm concept
of when Bethany should be getting home from work each night.
Actually, in all seriousness, I'm guessing she's put
together that Bethany calls each night on her way home from work. I'm pretty
sure that's the case because on Monday night when Bethany called us to
check-in, Ellie dropped everything she was doing and went to the window to
stare at the driveway. All of this in spite of the fact that Bethany wasn't
just calling us, she was using Facetime! Even when I showed Ellie the video of
her mother on the phone, I still couldn't persuade my daughter to leave the
window. In fact, typical of Ellie's one track mind, the only thing that could
draw her from that window was the promise of food.
 |
| My child is the human embodiment of Dug the dog... |
Of course, it's not just food that is needed to distract
Ellie from #MissingMommy. Sometimes, a little adventure is in order is in order
to distract her from all that ails her.
That was the case for us on Tuesday afternoon. As we had received an e-mail that morning that Ellie's most
recent round of library books had come due, I decided that a library trip was
in order. The thing about me is that I'm never quite willing to take the easy
approach when a more difficult one will do just fine. In this instance, rather
than heading to the perfectly good library less than two miles away, I decided
instead to drive fifteen miles up the road to the branch in Smithville.
I know you're wondering why I would do that. Number one, I
feel like Smithville's branch has a better selection of board books to choose
from. Number two, I feel like there's less people that go there. As a result,
it's much easier to let Ellie walk around on her own with me trailing along
behind rather than carrying her everywhere. That was certainly the case in this
instance as I was able to set Ellie down right next to me as I browsed the
books. However, as you can probably guess, she wasn't too keen on staying put
for long.
Before I knew what had happened, I turned around to see
Ellie happily darting into a room right behind us. Like any doting parent would,
I immediately headed after her to see what she had found. There was nothing to
fear as she had stumbled upon a children's play area. Between the little
clubhouse with seats just her size, the activity walls with plenty to touch and
move, and those wire things with beads on them that you move, Ellie was happily
distracted for well over fifteen minutes.
Of course, any trip to the library isn't complete without me
seeing if I can find anything for myself.
While I was unable to find anything
that interested me, I did find something else that interested Ellie.
While
quickly perusing the movie aisle, Ellie became fussy and really wanted down.
Therefore, I went ahead and set her down on the ground with every anticipation
of having to stop her from pulling items off the shelf. Instead, she
immediately took off happily jaunting down the aisle. Before she was done, she
had covered practically every aisle in the place. She even spent some time
climbing in and out of a big chair for good measure. Once she was finally done
exploring, we checked out our books and headed for home.
Even though things have gone just fine with Bethany gone, I
still find myself eagerly anticipating her return home if for no other reason
than I desperately need a break from baby duty. If I'm telling the truth, I
think Ellie probably is ready for a break from me as well. I mean, who wouldn't
be? #DaddyWrite
No comments:
Post a Comment