My husband left me...

For real.

see him?

 waving 'good-bye' to the wife and minivan full of children all screaming at and pinching and squishing and annoying each other and basically not paying attention to the fact that daddy is leaving... 

and do you see how he is smiling? 

Well, it is only temporary. In theory, anyway.

He went to France. I know... again, right? Yep... again. This time without us.

It is the trade-off for me getting to go run in the Hood to Coast Relay at the end of the month as a part of the awesome Nuun Platuun.

Sounds fair, right?

Eleven days on the west coast of France for him... on the beach with no phone or internet access... taking photographs with a fabulous artist and teacher... relaxation and creativity will abound... in exchange for four days in Oregon for me...40 hours in a van with 6 other people... sleeping sitting up or on the ground or not at all... eating out of a cooler or a paper bag... running a lot... winding up on the beach...

Hey!

We both get to go to the beach! Well, that makes it Even Steven!

Go ahead... you can say it....

I am the best wife ever.

Ehhhhh-VERRRRRRR.

Keeping the kids from driving me crazy... oh, wait... let me take responsibility for my feelings...

My Sanity Protection Program includes:

• older three kids in camp from 9-4 every weekday. YES! *fist-pull from the sky*
• two-year old in preschool three days from 9:30-3. Heck YEAH! *both arms thrust upward like I scored a fricken touchdown*
• physical therapy, massage, and acupuncture on those three two-year-old-less days
• working out while kids are out of the house and/or in bed at night
• going to bed early (this is the one that will be tricky for me :P)
• bribery

I think this plan may work. Nonetheless, it looks like I picked a tough week to kick crack.

Heading to the zoo this morning seemed like a good alternative to hard drugs and booze.

They didn't bicker the whole time...

But the joyful picture at the frog area was marred by this guy getting in the way...
yo, dude... I may just be shooting with a craptastic phone camera, but these are still my family's moments to record and cherish... look before you step in front of someone looking like they might be taking a picture.


Some moments were downright sweet...

Baby X and Miss C always seem to get along.

Big G is becoming a more engaged and kind big brother.

In some ways, his maturity blows me away.

Here he has just made the following painful observation,

"Gosh, there are so many ignorant people here!"

which was based primarily on the fact that the people clustering around the gibbon enclosure kept referring to the ape as a monkey...

and not so much on their general behaviors and conversation...

but still...

We went with a dear friend and her little girl who adores Baby X and is roughly the same age as Miss C.

She thoroughly enjoyed some surrogate big sibling time!

For awhile, our little friend had a blast playing this funny leg-kicking game with Big G and Baby X...

This prompted another very mature observation from Big G:

"Boy, she sure is a handful! I don't know how on earth her mom copes!"

I eagerly look forward to the day when these new, mature observations lead to a new, mature way of treating his younger siblings and helping out around the house :P

I just may survive this brief stint as a single mom.

Now if I could only figure out how to get Q-Man to stop screaming at me about his dessert... without resorting to duct tape.