We escaped the brutal heat of Monday by heading to the Jersey shore for a fun day with Carl’s cousin’s family. Amy played hard as she always does at the ocean, getting completely covered in sand and romping for hours in the waves. Sarah mainly watched the waves and chased birds. We spent the rest of the week visiting Mom-Mom and Pop-Pop and Grammy, Granddad, my brother, and my uncle. It was wonderful spending time with everyone and we dealt with the heat with water balloons, sprinklers, and air conditioning. Amy also dressed up as if she could go to the Met Gala, wrapping herself in a pride flag and using my mom’s costume jewelry with a giant stuffed animal lion serving as her purse. On Wednesday we saw Inside Out 2 in a theater. Sarah hasn’t seen a movie in a theater since Frozen 2 came out years ago. Usually she likes to talk a lot during movies so it was a surprise and a testament to her love of Inside Out movies that she was quiet the whole time. If you haven’t yet seen Inside Out and Inside Out 2, I highly recommend them for any age.
Ever since Inside Out became a family favorite, we sometimes talk about our own emotions as if they are the characters taking over. Carl handled many of Sarah’s upsets beautifully by talking about how Anger really took over. I was glad he had the space to do that because my own Anger and Anxiety were too strong in those moments for me to have any flexible or creative grace towards Sarah.
At Grammy and Granddad’s Carl got to open an early birthday present of Fritos wrapped in tissue paper, which led to the usual silliness of tissue paper hats because what else are you to do with it?!
Friday the girls and I drove home so we would have plenty to time to get them ready for their sleep-away camps that start this afternoon. Carl stayed in Delaware for a very hot couple of days of rowing races. The amount of laundry I did between Friday night and Saturday night was immense since I wanted to wash everything from our week in Philly so any items could be packed for camp. Luckily the blisteringly hot sun helped everything dry quickly. I helped each girl put everything needed into their trunks, then take everything out of the trunks to label each and every thing now that it was decided-upon and pack it again neatly. We took a midday break to pick up prescriptions, get hiking boots for Amy for camp, and to enjoy water ice at Rita’s. I organized all of Sarah’s pills into individual labeled baggies for her camp. I lost track of how many times I wrote names on things - and that was with Amy helping!
Amy has notably been stepping up to help with unloading the car and she was also immensely helpful yesterday during our outing. After we stopped at a lemonade stand, Sarah announced as I drove that she didn’t have her seatbelt on! Egad! I stopped immediately and said she needed to buckle up before I would move on. This was not long after she had thrown herself on the floor of CVS because she desperately wanted new sunglasses, and I could tell she was ramping up her resistance as I awkwardly sat at a red light praying it wouldn’t turn green until she was buckled. Amy brilliantly said, “remember Sarah, click it or ticket.” That is one of Sarah’s favorite signs on the highway. That reminder worked not only to shift Sarah’s energy to relaxed fun, but also to get her to buckle up. I told Amy I felt like we had been playing a card game where you can stop one player’s intended move by whipping out a certain card in your hand if you have it. It was as if she had the magic card to whip out just as Sarah played her resistance card. It was masterful, creative, and oh so helpful as I was just heading towards tension.
I hope you aren’t roasting too much in the 95 degree heat we have had in Philly and Pittsburgh. May you have the perfect card up your sleeve at all times.
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