New Day

Thursday I was a bit of a downer, huh? Well, I'm over it, back on track.

On Friday evening I flew to Detroit to pick up my niece, Lauren. She is ten years old and gets along great with my kids. Well, except for Amanda, but Amanda doesn't like anybody at first. I'm sure by the end of the week she will love Lauren. It was nice to spend a few hours on the plane by myself to regroup, and even better to spend time with my brother and sister-in-law on Friday night. We stayed up way too late (what else is new?) but was so worth it to catch up with them. It's times like that that make me really wish we lived closer.

Saturday morning Lauren and I flew back to Dallas. She does not fly very often so it was weird for me to fly with someone who was so nervous about it. She was fine the minute we were up in the air, but the anticipation of it all was very difficult for her and surprising for me. Sometimes I forget that my kids are seasoned travelers and really do take everything in stride when we enter an airport.

So far our visit with Lauren has been great. The kids have had lots of fun swimming and yesterday we had some friends over for a bbq and Lauren was very helpful and got along with everyone. Makes it seem like four kids would be a piece of cake, except I'm smart enough to know that if she was actually my kid she'd be giving me a run for my money. Kids are (almost) always better for someone else than their parents, at least my kids are.

Today we are off to the zoo. It will be hot, but that's okay, at least we'll all be having fun and won't be stuck in any doctor's office.