One more sick day

Today I was held hostage in my house to my sons' colds: they both seem to be feeling much better, but they're sneezing and coughing so much that I knew Alex's teacher would thank me to keep him home for a day.

Since we were trapped at home, and since the solstice is tomorrow, I figured I should jump on this last, best chance for some spring cleaning. So I hauled out my hated mop and bucket, while Joey watched me curiously. No wonder: he certainly hasn't seem me do this any time in recent memory.  And I started to draw the mop across the ground, he, just as carefully, carefully tipped his juice cup over and dribbled orange juice across the floor.  Just to add a little interest to the chore. But he made amends by taking his own turn.

I much preferred Ella's method of helping, however.  When she came home from school she watched our Roomba run around the floor for a moment, and then decided some improvements to my little helper robot were long overdue. She really wishes she could figure out a way to make the Roomba say "ouch" whenever it bumps into something, and "om nom nom nom" the rest of the time.  But, as I told her, that's a project for another day.

She had plenty to keep her busy, anyway.  Ella, inspired by the castle in her room, has long been conceiving a play.  She drafted her brother and nochElla as actors.  She herself is more interested with the technicalities of the production, and has written herself into the script as "stage hand."  And she's given herself a fair par, with three major scene changes, plenty of lighting and sound cues, and a dangling sun and moon that she's put herself in charge of operating.  All with a mere two pages of dialogue.  But I think she kept the roles simple, purposely, as she's very mindful of the limitations of her actors.  Particularly Joey, who she's cast as the dragon.

Cue the sun

Anyway, I was cleaned walls and scrubbing the couch free of the stains that I swear to you are chocolate, but fully understand if you find them disgusting, regardless. And Ella was busily finished her script, cutting out and painting cardboard trees, and doing technical dry runs of her production.

Ella has had a gummy feast sitting prepared for weeks,
post-production refreshments for Dennis and me, and
nochElla's parents as well. Mmmm.

Meanwhile, Joey and Alex convalesced, Alex strewing no fewer than five of his beloved pocket handkerchiefs around the house.  At one point Joey had a particularly juicy sneeze, and Alex looked at him with a dawning excitement.  "I know just what you need," he said over his shoulder as he ran off to Dennis's dresser.  And when he came back, he handed Joey his very own handkerchief.  "Keep this with you, always," Alex advised him.  Joey took one look at it and threw it across the room.  He's more of a pretend-to-hug-his-mommy-while-really-wiping-his-nose-on-her-shoulder kind of guy, really.

I wish I could say Alex was as helpful and well-meaning the rest of the day, but being shut inside all day suits him just about as much as it suits me.  He spent most of the day swiping toys from Joey (who just wanted to play with his matchbox cars, darn it!) and finding other ways to needle at his brother and sister, until I finally sent him in to his room to do his own share of tidying.  Finally, finally, he got involved in his own project, building a maze for his remote control robot.

Still, by the end of the day, he was frustrated: bored because I'd been cleaning all day instead of playing him, and he was tired, but with nervous muscles from not exercising all day and a full nose that made breathing difficult. When I tucked him in, he quoted Kevin Henkes to me: "Momma? I think today was a difficult day. Tomorrow will be better."