Saturday, January 07, 2006

From monster to mom

I've been having the most amazing day. The. Most. Amazing.
HB has a commitment that takes him out of the house every Saturday morning for a few hours, and will continue to do so until the middle of March. We discussed it before he accepted, and decided that I would make myself available to be with Frodo and Mini-Me on those mornings, rather than leaving it up to HB and the kids' mother to handle. We've finally learned that if we involve her in these things, our lives become way too complicated.
Anyhow, my point is that this decision has been one of the best gifts I could have given to myself and the kids. We've been having time to spend together, and we're developing our own little relationship now ... which is kind of neat.
So today Frodo had an 11 a.m. hockey game. This means that they need to have a good breakfast, beds need to be made, showers taken, hockey geared packed, teeth brushed, and warm clothes put on ... all in time for us to be out of the house by about 10:15 at the latest. Shouldn't be too hard a chore except that we're all procrastinators, and inevitably we end up cramped for time at the end ... with the house exit being very hurried and frazzled. This morning, they both did everything after one request. And with no whining or fighting. We left the house at 10:10 a.m. ... a record!!!
The other thing that was going on was that the team was hosting a bottle drive right after the game. HB was going to meet us at the rink after his meeting to take Frodo to the bottle drive.
Mini Me decided that he was going to pass on the bottle drive and hang out with me at home. Now I suspect that his true motivation was a completely uninterrupted afternoon of solo time on the PSII, but hey, I take my strokes where I can get them - so hang out with me it was going to be!
We went for lunch with HB and Frodo, and then started to head home. Our plans got completely turned around, and instead of an afternoon at home, we ended up spending most of it in the car together, driving around delivering stuff to either HB, or meeting up with their mother to pick stuff up. He was fine with that - and consequently we ended up in a place where we were gabbing away with each other in the vehicle.
And somehow that gab turned to a conversation about the band Kiss. Don't even ask me how we got there...but get there we did. And here's where the day gets amazing.
I casually mentioned that "way back in the '70s when they were really popular, I went to a Kiss concert".
His eyes widened. His mouth dropped open. And then he said, "can I use your cell phone?".
He called his best friend, Joey. And then I heard:
"Joey? Yeah. It's Mini-Me. Guess what? My step-MOM (wow!!!) says that Kiss used to be really popular waaaaaaaaaaaay back in the 70s. And guess what else? SHE SAW THEM IN CONCERT! How cool is she???"
I almost had to pull the car over. From stepmonster to stepmom with a 'cool' thrown in ... all in 30 seconds.
Yeah. They're worth it.

6 comments:

Thalia said...

Yaay for mini-me - that's wonderful!

Lut C. said...

That's a fun story. :-)

Donna said...

Funny how its the little things that make the most difference! This is kind of weird; I just downloaded the original version of "I Was Made for Loving You" the other day, its now on heavy rotation on my iPod. Let me know if you want me to email the MP3 to you. [:o)

April said...

Wow. I hope that you have many more days like this.

You make an amazing mom to those two. You really do.

Sue said...

I love hearing your Frodo and Mini Me stories. They choke me right up.

x said...

I think one of the best days of my life was hearing that my stepdaugther had a "my stepmom is cooler than your stepmom" conversation at school. I was told my tattoo put me over the edge and I won.
It's a great feeling - I am glad your relationship with the kids is improving - it only gets better once the walls start coming down.