Back to Normal. Finally.

I am sooo happy to report that after a 16 day stint on the Catastrophic Loss team in Baltimore, MD, aka "Cat Duty", Dan is back home again.
(Large, long sigh of relief.)

Dan put his name on the list and his name came up two Tuesdays ago on the list. He had 24 hours to rearrange his life, pack, book his flight and rental car, wrap things up at work and mentally prepare for being away that long.

We've never been apart for more than five days since we've met. 15 years ago.

I was daunted by the idea of being a single mommy for all that time.

Thankfully, it was actually a decent time for him to go: he would miss no birthdays, no sports games, no holidays, nothing really big except for the Lip Sync. This is kind of the slow time for us before the storm of spring sports and activities.

So he packed up and left, and we held it all together while he was gone.

The girls were really wonderful; their behavior was great and Michaela was really helpful to me. And Alec did fine and was in good spirits for most of the two weeks. I got a little lonely in the evenings, but have to admit I enjoyed not making the bed every day and slacking on the full-meal-preparation-every-night thing.

It was just hard to have no one else to hand off Alec too, to give me a hand picking up messes, and hang out with on the weekend. But we did okay.

Today at a little before noon, we picked Daddy up at the airport. Alec was beside himself. I was thrilled. Dan picked up the girls at school and they gave him a warm welcome.

He's back and we're back to normal.
(Large, long sigh of relief.)