Friday, April 22

10:05 pm
Family Room
Hamptons House

Got the fire going, bottle of PG chilling, music on the stereo... now I just need my Cate.

She's upstairs with Romeo.  A little while ago I read him a goodnight story, a chapter from Dr. Doolittle.  He loves that book.  Cate was there with us, just listening. But when it was time to turn out the light Romey wanted Cate to snuggle with him.

I told him he's a Big 7-year-old now so he didn't need to be snuggled to sleep.  He can fall asleep all by himself.  But as I said the words my heart wasn't in them.  Hell, I like to be snuggled to sleep too.  And the sweet smile on Cate's face when Romey asked her that... Well, how could I say no?

So Cate laid down beside Romey on his bed and gave him a hug, then helped tuck Russell into the pillowcase where he likes to sleep.  I kissed them both and said goodnight and turned out the lights.  The last thing I saw in the glow of Romeo's night light before I closed the door was Cate smiling at me, cuddling my littlest son.

It was beautiful.  Brought tears to my eyes.

She's gonna be such a good Mama.

Romeo should be asleep by now, or almost.  He's tired.  Jakey could hardly keep his eyes open; I think he was out the second his head hit the pillow.  It's been a long day for those two, they were up early this morning, bouncing off the walls about coming out here.  And Cate and I kept them busy this afternoon and this evening.

I was disappointed the weather's so shitty today.  Cold, blustery, rainy... what the Hell is up with Mother Nature these days?  It's almost May, for fuck's sake.  I was hoping to take the boys to the beach this afternoon.  We went out and walked a little but we were bundled up in coats and scarves and a cold wind was whipping in off the ocean so we didn't stay out long.

Instead we came back to the house and played board games and watched an episode of Blue Planet on TV.  I forgot today is Earth Day.  Maybe that's why Mother Nature is pissed, ha ha. Sorry, Ma.

For dinner we decided to have a campfire cookout.  Well, Hamptons-style, anyway.  Since it was too cold to make a bonfire on the beach we lit up the fire pit in the back yard and had a little hot dog and marshmallow-roast.  Cate made baked potatoes too, which tasted great since it's so fucking cold.

For dessert Cate and I helped the boys make S'mores, which they promptly got all over the damned place.  I don't know why we bothered; they just ate the Hershey bar squares and licked the marshmallow off the graham crackers.  Apparently the graham crackers are Gross.  Must not have enough sugar in 'em, ha ha.

Jakey somehow got marshmallow in my hair.  Probably because he had the stuff smeared all over his face and hands. And Romeo looked like a refugee from Willy Wonka's Chocolate Factory, ha ha.  Chocolate spread ear-to-ear.  I'm not sure he got any in his mouth; I think it was all on his cheeks.

Good thing we weren't on the beach.  The Chuckles woulda had sand stuck all over them, with marshmallow adhesive, ha ha.  I had to basically carry their butts upstairs and hose them down in the shower as soon as we were done eating.  Then I had to de-goo my hair.  All three of us ended up down here in our jammies, all freshly-scrubbed, by the time Cate was done with dishes.

Anyway, after that we hung out in the family room for awhile and played another rousing game of Chutes and Ladders, then it was bedtime for the Chuckles.

Now it's playtime for the grown-ups, heh heh.

I'm thinking we'll just sit here in the family room where it's nice and toasty in front of the fire and look out the big picture windows at the ocean.  The weather may suck, but the sea is pretty when it's all stormy like this.  We'll just curl up here and sip our wine and talk about us and see where things lead.