So Far, So Good

I can't believe we're being as brave as we are today. Never before would we have tried such a feat -- getting everyone up and ready and heading to someone's house for dinner that we don't know very well. The whole thing is a potential recipe for disaster.

It took us a while to figure out how to do Thanksgiving this year. We knew that getting everyone together on the day itself would be difficult as Salinda would want to be with her boyfriend's family and Kyle would want to be at his girlfriends family. I was planning to convince Bart to be practical and move our Thansgiving to Friday to accommodate the significant others, present and future, but messing with my husband and tradition really isn't wise, so I tried to keep my mouth shut as long as possible. The whole situation was brought to a head a couple weeks ago when Salinda's boyfriend's mom suggested we all come there for dinner. She was very excited about the idea, but i KNEW Salinda would not be.

I spent the weekend convincing Bart we could do things that way and making a plan that seemed like it might work. I finally had him on board when Salinda came home and made it very clear she didn't think it would be a good plan. Finally I talked her into it as well and began to talk to the mom to finalize plans.

We're heading there (about an hours drive) -- the six who can act like decent human beings in social settings 90% of the time going with me early to help with dinner and the three who can't act like decent human beings in socisl settings 90% of the time going with Bart. He will spend only the time it takes to eat there and plan to escape with the more challenging children as soon as one of them can't hold it together any longer. The rest of us will stay and help clean up and spend a few hours in the afternoon there.

Then tomorrow we'll have Kyle and his girlfriend here and Salinda and possibly her boyfriend.

John is here and has been doing very well. It's fun having him here when he is calm and not agitated at all. He's doing great.

So far this day has gone very well. Of course, Bart and I and one other child are the only ones awake, so that helps. ;-)