Yom Kippur

We almost had a disastrous Yom Kippur. My friend Julia was supposed to babysit but she got sick and couldn't do it. Luckily she told me on Sunday so I had a little bit of time to try to find alternate plans. I called Yaya to see if he could go there and then I would have asked Pam to pick him up on her way and bring him home after, but Yaya didn't have room for him because she was going to have Felix's sister and Hiroki's sister because they didn't have school. She suggested that I call Pam and see if her sister Barbara could do it. Thank God Barbara said she could, but she couldn't come until 1pm. That was better than nothing. When I told Simon that Barbara was coming, he immediately said "is she bringing donuts?"
When David went to Kol Nidre, I was left to do bathtime and bedtime alone for the first time. Simon went to play with Sophia so that I could try to get Eli to go to sleep at least long enough to bathe Simon and put him to bed. But Simon and Sophia got into a fight and were having sharing issues, so Simon had to come home a little bit sooner than I would have liked. Eli was screaming and Simon was whining, so I suggested to Simon that we give Eli a bath. He liked that idea, so we did. Simon likes to hang the washcloths to dry so that kept him busy. But when I wasn't looking at Simon once I took Eli out, Simon managed to lean over the edge of the tub so far that his arms and his head were in the baby bath. He said "look at me, I hangin'!" It was funny.
After Eli's bath, I fed him and read books to Simon and then put Eli in the swing which we had left on--a very good call. Eli slept while I gave Simon a bath and put him to bed pretty easily. Then Eli stayed asleep long enough for me to finish cleaning up the kitchen and dining room and most of the den. I felt pretty proud of myself for doing all of that before David got home!
The morning was very long, but both kids were very well behaved. Barbara got here just as Simon was starting to get cranky and at first he didn't want to stay with her but then she told him that she was going to take him to Yaya's house for Hiroki's birthday party and that made him happy. I took Eli and went to shul finally. We got there just in time for the break! I didn't want to walk all the way home, so I went to Yael and Jesse's and hung out with them for a couple of hours and then went to shul for mincha and neilah. Of course Eli was awake at that point so I didn't really go into shul and mostly just stood outside.
I hadn't seen David all day since he went to Young Israel for the morning and then Maimonides for the end and I went to the Washington Square Minyan (which would be much more convenient if it were actually still in Washington Square) and we hadn't coordinated at all about getting home after the fast, so I decided to take the T. Stupid decision because I waited 15 minutes for it to come and I would have been halfway home by that point if I had just walked! David got home 1/2 an hour before I did, but Barbara and Pam (who had come over after Yaya's house) were just leaving when I got home. Simon had a great time with Barbara and then at Yaya's house. He hadn't had much of a nap because a car alarm was going off and it woke him up and he told Barbara that she should go check to see if it was her car making noise.
Simon went to bed really late last night because he got a big package in the mail. He was so excited that the box was for him and not Eli (usually when a big box comes it's for Eli) and he said "maybe there is a car or a truck inside." We opened it up and he said "oh my god it's a new Sodor!" It wasn't actually (Sodor is the island where Thomas and his friends live), but it was a very cool play mat with roads and train tracks that then folds up to become a storage bin. Stephanie and Shachar sent it and it is very cool. He really wanted to play with it right away, so I let him and he ended up not going to bed until after 9. He was cranky this morning and cried when David left him at school, but when I picked him up his teachers said he only cried for about 2 minutes after David left.
When we were walking out of school. we stopped to look at the bulletin board by the front door. Simon's class had made houses and glued people to them to represent their family members. Simon showed me which one was his and I asked him who the people were. He said "you are there Mommy!" I pointed to one and asked if that was me. He said "no, that is Dada." Then he showed me which was me and which was him. I pointed to the 4th one and asked who it was and he said "I don't know. Who is it?" He sounded like he really didn't know, so I said "is it Eli?" and he said "oh yeah, it IS Eli!"
Outside, he couldn't go play in the gazebo because it had been turned into a sukkah. I said "look at that sukkah" and he said "that is NOT a sukkah. That is a tent!" I wonder what he will say about our sukkah/tent that David is building tonight. I also wonder just how long it is going to take David to build it. My bet is that he doesn't take him very long before he decides to hire someone else to build it.