The Sleepwalker, Night Owl, Tick and Our Brush with Fame

What a week! This last one was a blur of busyness for me. Here’s a recap….

Logan has taken to sleep walking. Twice this week, she has shown up downstairs, an hour or so after bedtime, sleepily looking me in the eyes and talking mumbo jumbo. She looks and acts as if she should make sense, but doesn’t. I just walk her back to bed and she’s out like a light. It’s scary to think of her doing it in the middle of the night. I hope it’s just a passing trend like the night terrors that she experienced as a toddler – I’m sure glad that’s over!

While Logan is out of bed of no fault of her own, Riley is out and about to all hours on purpose. She has been turning into more and more of a night owl this spring. One school night last week, she woke me up at 10:45 to tell me that she still couldn’t sleep. She basically requires little to no sleep – I should have known she’d be like this after giving up naps before two. Again, I hope this is a passing phase – I can’t tell you how much Mike and I need that downtime from 8:30 to 10:00 pm (if we’re able to stay awake!)

During what I thought would be a respite of relaxation giving Finn a bath alone while Mike took the girls for ice cream, I realized that I was sadly mistaken. At the first dump of water to wet his blonde curls, I saw it – a tick! Hunkered down and not coming out for nothin’ was that disgusting little creature (and I like bugs!) I ended up having to call a neighbor to hold him down and then, after it exploded and still held tight, another neighbor finally got the little sucker. Poor thing, a huge chunk of skin and hair came right out with it. In lieu of me relaxing, everyone was up an hour after bedtime and Mike and I were exhausted. Since then, three more neighbors have had them – what’s going on? I mean, we have one tree around here!

We spent our Saturday soccer-a-fied and even in the tornado-style winds and cold temps, I think watching the girls’ games have been some of my most joyous moments. I will do a whole post on this soon – there has been nothing like the outdoors – humor – cheering – feeling proud of your kid combination of these games. I love it! Taking Finn along is another story entirely.

Lastly, I have to mention our recent brush with celebrity. While writing a chef profile for a local magazine, I described it as – for me – the equivalent of interviewing Tom Hanks. The whole food and cooking thing does it for me big-time and I just find it all so enjoyable. Saturday night, Mike and I had the chance to go downtown for a night and ate with our close friend Matt and his girlfriend. We went to Frontera Grill and the foodie groupie in me was smitten with celebrity chef / owner Rick Bayless as he darted here and there through the restaurant. The food was crazy good and was only topped by Mike’s announcement upon his return from the bathroom that one of my favorite chefs – Bobby Flay and his wife, Stephanie March (from my all-time top TV show Law and Order) were sitting in the bar having dinner.

I summoned up the courage to say “Hi” and thank them for all the great entertainment, but chickened out at the last minute when Rick Bayless joined them. All three was too much for me to interrupt…. I mean, I didn’t want to come off as the crazy fan that I am!!! I did make eye contact though - and at least we exchanged smiles!!

How fun was that? All in all, it was a great week – big thanks to my mom for sleeping over and watching the front in our absence – we couldn’t have done it without her!!