Just dropping by to visit with you all

I awoke with a headache, the niggling beginnings of a migraine. I will have to do everything in my power to keep that from being full blown today. Its not going to be an easy feat. Tinks little chatty, noisy, girlfriend is coming over this morning and I also have the 7 year old I babysit and Tiger Lily.

Mr. Darling drove to Seattle yesterday for the first of several procedures on his esophagus. They are going to freeze off the Barrett's lining in the hope that regular lining of the esophagus will grow back in that place. Barret's lining is stomach lining that has begun to build in the esophagus and it can end up cancerous. Thankfully my husbands is not to that point. He will be coming home today so I'm going to have to keep things semi quiet so he can rest and recuperate.

Yesterday my girlfriend came for several hours in the afternoon so I just sat around and visited. It was a welcome break from all the work around here. She left at 5:00 pm and about an hour or so later I went out to pick blueberries. I was still out there picking and it was getting dark. I hear a car drive in and so I peek out from behind the bushes and there I see another friend pulling in with her grown daughter. They were coming to ask me to go out to coffee with them.

With Mr. Darling gone I couldn't go so they stayed here and we had a snack and visited around the kitchen table until 11:pm. It's so nice to have friends stop by and break up this tired moms day! I get so busy in the summer that I don't take the time out that I should to just play.

Last night Peter went over to the neighbors to swim. There were 3 other little kids his age swimming and Tink felt all left out cause she wasnt invited. Now, often the kids in the neighborhood swim over there without invitation but this was a little more of a formal thing. So Tink watched a movie. When her movie was finished she looked out in the backyard and saw that older kids her age had now joined the younger ones so she asked me if she could go over.

I told her to go ask the neighbor lady if she could swim now but I cautioned her that it was almost time for everyone to quit as it was already 8 pm. So the dear child gets in her swimming suit, pulls on her shorts, and goes over there.

I was still out picking the berries when I heard her coming back, crying as she came. Well, as it happened she didn't ask to swim. Instead she asked the lady when Peter was coming home and the lady said she'd let him swim a half hour yet. So Tink comes home crying at the top of her lungs because the lady didn't let her swim.

I explained to Tink that she never even asked if she could. "I know," she wailed, " I am too shy to ask."

This kind of behavior from Tink is so frustrating. I see her do this with her friends too. When she sees a friend playing out in their yard she goes out in our yard and twirls the flowers or picks a blade of grass or just dawdles around, the entire time looking at the girl to see if she has noticed her. The little girl notices but she too does a sort of front yard mating dance and eventually she goes in. Tink then comes crying to me that the neighbor girl doesnt want to play with her.!!

I have tried to explain to Tink that she needs to just ask the neighbor girl to play, but no, the slow twirling front yard show goes on. Sometimes Tink is afraid of her own shadow then other times you wish she had a shadow to be afraid of. She yells and cries and tells kids they have to leave cause they're not doing things her way. She certainly isnt shy then! Oh the joys of growing up; oh the complexities of parenthood!

Now here comes my older daughter in the drive. I better go. That means Tiger Lily is here.

This morning is cool and overcast; perfect for working outside. I have to finish picking the berries and continue in the arduous process of deadheading flowers. I'm going to be doing some pruning in the shade garden too. The Rose of Sharon is out of control, devouring the catnip, the impatiens, the hollyhocks, and the peonies! It needs to be taken care of NOW before it eats up every plant out there!