Day 480: Fun in the sun

Well, we’re back! Or, at least I am back. Maddie is taking an extended vacation. She was supposed to return with me, but she decided she really needed a bit more time to work on her tan. Okay, actually I had to leave her behind with my mom due to a rough start with round 1,836 of the home renovation project. Let me paint a picture for you: Our kitchen – or, I suppose, the space where our kitchen used to be – is now a gaping whole. Ditto the bathroom. Our furniture is all piled in the basement, the porch is half-torn down, my bed somehow ended up in the garbage bin at the end of a long day of demolitions (Fernando is still sketchy on the details of just how that happened), my entire wardrobe is packed away in boxes that I can’t find, and at last count there were 3 people, 3 dogs, and a cat sleeping in the not-so-big basement suite. So Mads is on the island for another few days until we are able to at least sleep in our rooms if nothing else. But really, bathing and eating are so overrated, don’t you find?

Vacation was great, though it seems a long, long time ago. Maddie is officially a beach bum. The girl lived in her little polka dot bathing suit. And she really has got the greatest little tan going. Whereas I burn to a crisp under a dull lightbulb, she just soaks in the sun (yes, I had her lathered in 45 sunscreen every day… fingers off the child services speed dial button). Fernando was able to come join us for a few days, which was great. We just hung out and the beach and marveled at the little girl our baby has become. At one point there was a group of kids on the beach – maybe 4 or 5 years old. They were all playing together, doing the things that kids do on a summer day – filling various buckets with sand, splashing in the surf, screaming. Poor Mads wandered off in their direction, thinking I guess that she should be with the kids too. They looked at her suspiciously, her unsteady walk and muteness giving away the fact that while not quite a baby anymore, she’s not quite a big kid either. So of course off they took, leaving her standing pathetically on her own looking after them. Is it too awful to admit that Fernando and I just about busted a gut laughing? It was just the sweetest, saddest little scene. But then she returned to our blanket, pail in hand, deciding that for now at least mom and dad are cool enough playmates. Sadly, I know that won’t last long!