Big Day

Gioia's daddy has been in the US all week for work, so it has been just the two of us (OK, and the nanny during working hours). Yesterday, we went to my friend's house to swim in her super phat pool.

It was a seemingly small thing - go to pool, swim - but it took a whole lot of effort. First, Miss G babbled in her crib for a whole hour at naptime and then slept for another hour, so we were miserably late even getting started. When we finally made it out the door, I struggled to find a taxi with seatbelts, install the carseat, get Gioia settled, and then get in myself so we could get going. Stupid me remembered later that I could have just called up our car guy and had him drive us around for the day. That would have been immeasurably easier.*

We made it to the pool - albeit two hours later than promised - and had a fun time. The nice pool dude even blew up Gioia's floaty thing, so she was able to splash around with ease. She was much more comfortable in the pool this time, perhaps because she had so much practice in Indonesia.

We went to Costco next, to stock up on baby wipes and vittles. By the time we made it home, it was 6 p.m. We had missed Miss G's second nap and she was starting to lose it. I decided to lay her down in the crib for a quick cat nap. She slept, and slept, and slept. The catnap turned out to be "down for the night." Oops.

It is hard to work it all out alone. How in the world to single parents do it? Wow. Hats off to ya.

*We decided not to buy or lease a car here in Taiwan, primarily because it works out to be much cheaper to just rent a car and driver whenever we need it (which is usually for four hours or so on the weekend). But in order for this deal to work, I have to actually remember to hire the car service on days like these.