Weekend Recap.

Man, this weekend has truly been exhausting. Really my weekend began on Thursday because I left early from work and came home to spend some quality time with Claire, and to also check on Sam because earlier on in the day she ended up chewing on glass from beer bottles that had toppled onto the floor from our kitchen island. I came home panicked because had she swallowed any shards of glass this would have been an immediate hospital visit. Thankfully she had no signs of distress or unusual behaviors, including coughing or pacing. So after this was all resolved, I took Claire to the pool. Which, may I say, is AWESOME. Aside from having to wait a while to get into the pool for open swim, because they were doing lessons, I can say this was a much enjoyed moment for Claire and I.  This summer has been incredibly rough for us to spend time together with my schedule and how exhausted I am when I get home and with her "Mommy, Mommy, Mom, Mommy." Stewie type behaviors as soon as I walk through the door. Words can't even begin to describe just how much Claire and I needed that time with one another. It was a long overdue moment for each of us.
So Thursday ended up giving each of us sunburn but it was not something that money could ever buy. We needed this type of fun for us. That's got to be the hardest thing with having an only child--they're lonesome when they have little to do. She said to me while we were in line to get into the pool, "Mommy, I'm so glad we have the opportunity to spend time together. It's been rather lonely when you're not around. I'm happy you took off early from work today. Thank you for that!" Claire is one of the most appreciative children I know. She always makes it known that she misses us and wants to spend time with us. This weekend, I did whatever I could to make that happen.
Thursday night I went to the Humane Society. I have enjoyed working there so much and having the chance to give even just one dog a happy moment that doesn't consist of being in a kennel. I look forward to going there as often as possible. These dogs are truly some of the most appreciative creatures in this world.
Friday I went into work in the AM and ended up staying until 3p because we got our asses handed to us. We had one group of people come in and order 10 pastries to sit down and eat. Good God it was insane. All throughout the day we had a line going out of the door. It began at 1230 and kept steady through 3p when I left.
I was supposed to have an appointment with the doctor on Friday for prescription renewal but unfortunately they were too busy therefore made me coming in impossible, especially when it was more than 20 minutes away, thanks to all of the damn roadwork. So I come home on Friday and wasn't really hungry so I began to clean up the kitchen and do some odds and ends around the house. Before we know it, winds begin to pick up and hail is hitting our windows. Claire looks out the window and states that our pool had gone missing, which it did. Then our neighbor's power line or something of that sort fell about 5 ft from the ground. While my thought process knew we'd lose power, I thought to myself, it'll come back on, and then it did, for all of 10 seconds and it went right back out. Winds continued to blow powerfully as I see a large branch from a tree and swing itself only a foot away from my truck. I then decided that I was going to grab our girls and leave the house, knowing that Easton Carmax has power and on my merry way to Morse Road. On our way there parts of our streets were shut down in the area, all of the stop lights were out, debris from trees were all over the roads and well, lets not forget about the above situations with Ohio drivers, who don't have a clue on how to drive. 
Claire and I showed up just in time for a transformer to blow extremely close-by. Claire was frightened, as were Sam and MeiMei so we stayed in my truck until we felt comfortable. Once we went into D's work the girls were still freaked out because of the new place/new people and weather. Carmax was extremely slow, so over some time, D decided to take off from work and go with us to get something to eat. Every place I had passed on my way to D's work had lines wrapped around their buildings, and that was quite intimidating to say the least. Finally we found a place outside of the immediate city area that was busy but not so bad that it was impossible to get some food within 10 minutes. The gas stations had cars parked at the pumps waiting for them to come back on. It was so unusual. After we ate, we came home and walked in the door to no electric. At this point it had been 3 hours since the outage had started. 
Claire and I ended up sleeping on the couch due to the 90 degree plus weather we were having without any electric and candles being lit throughout the house. Tossing and turning and being sunburned as all heck made for an extremely uncomfortable night of "sleep". Come a little after 1p, D woke us up and we went to bed because our power had came back on at that point--Thankfully! 
Saturday was a day FULL of cleaning and finding out if any food had gone bad, which none had, thank goodness. We got a lot done, worked together and attempted to enjoy the night. While exhausted we still managed to get a lot of stuff done. Everything that was taken care of was inside, which was due to the heat and the lack of motivation because of a large tree branch coming within inches of my truck along with all of the random things that had landed in our yard, front and back.We were out there from 8-11 cleaning up and it had gone from 78 to 96 degrees within that time. It was so muggy and uncomfortable to be outside that I was thankful that we were done when we were. Coming inside from that made my body feel like it went to the North Pole in comparison. Then once that was done I came inside only to find that the sunburn that I had, had begun to bubble on my skin with the pockets of sweat from being outside. That made my sunburn even worse. 
On Sunday, when we got done cleaning, we did some craft like things and some hang out time. Claire is yearning for extra time with D and I. She's been doing puzzles, drawing, melty beads, and so much more. Her creative side is truly coming through. She's also become less hard on herself when it comes to different drawings, or craft type things. So we watched a movie together and no sooner did we do that, that our electric went out yet again. Another strong storm came through and it was nearly as bad as the first one. So, we sat in the dark for a little while and we hoped that we'd get it back and a couple of minutes had gone by and we got it back on thankfully. We went back to watching the movie after 10 consecutive minutes w/out interruption of service. We were on edge so much from the previous storm that we didn't want to take the chance that it'd go out again like it had the day before. 
Sunday was just chill time... Trying to recoop from all that'd gone on, on the weekend. Eating watermelon, making rice krispy treats, eating yummy food and just chillaxing. A nice note to end the weekend on. Then we went and watched a movie and another storm rolled through which made for another power outage. This power outage, thankfully, was only for a few minutes and we were able to resume our movie from which we stopped and finish out the movie. It was something that was much needed, I think, for both of us. 
Sometimes I must admit, I feel like a really bad mom. One who is so busy with trying to gain a name out in society that home life is strained. It hurts to know my daughter feels lonely so often. But, when I am at home I do whatever I can to include her in my daily routine. It is especially hard knowing that she has some difficulties with her behavior which then makes me believe that I'm the reason for the behavior problems at hand. We're just so damn busy with life that sitting down for 10 minutes just isn't as simple as it used to be. I especially hate coming home when I have had another bad day at work and it comes out at her because I'm too tired and fed up with the bullshit that gets dealt to me on a daily basis. 
Welp, that's about all there is to say now.... Thanks for reading.