This has been one of those very strange days.
Having Dad home again always makes Tai Chi more fun; and
that made for a great start to the day.
Doing the full country breakfast was good too, and Mom went over the
work assignments with us while we ate.
For me, after helping Rowen to get her things back home where she was
going to be helping her Mom; job one was to go with Dad and Aunt Leanne over to
Grandma and Grandpa’s house to get it ready for their return home tomorrow. We couldn’t do much of the outdoor work that
Dad would have liked to get done if the weather had been nicer, but we did a
quick once-through of dusting, vacuuming, cleaning, and bed-making. That only took us a bit over an hour to get
done, and then Dad and I went home again to work there while Aunt Leanne went
grocery shopping.
Alicia wasn’t working with Mom today because she and Erin
were babysitting tonight instead. Violet
had been helping Mom while we were gone, but shortly after we got back, she
went to spend a little time with Dillon before he’d be working at the Inn. Getting ready
for incoming kids tonight was my next assignment; and the babysitting had
morphed into another big sleepover event.
I needed to get the extra beds in Ethan’s and Ehlana’s rooms ready for
Aiden and Naomi; two second-floor guest rooms ready for the guys; and the two
extra bedrooms on the third floor set-up for the girls. Add in three bathrooms to clean, and that
kept me busy through until we stopped to have a late lunch at a bit after one.
Cue up strange moment of the day number one.
Mom took me shopping at Palmer’s and Taylor Shoes.
It was not a coincidence that Rowen and her Mom just happened to be
available to go along. While getting new
dresses and shoes for Easter was the advertised reason for the little mother
and daughter outing, the weird came when Rowen and I found out that our Moms
had decided that we also needed to shop for our first ‘real’ bras.
Rowen was thrilled about reaching that little development
milestone; I wasn’t nearly as excited; and we were both a little shy about
going through the fitting process with Abby for the first time. Choosing a new underwear wardrobe continued
the weird for me, but I am really, really, glad that Aunt Leanne was not along
to offer her advice. That would have
likely escalated the weird to ultra-scary!
Even without her there, I was having a little trouble dealing with the
transition from plain and simple to lacey or satiny bra and panty sets that
made me look and feel a lot different – and emotionally uncomfortable.
We’d needed to do that first before shopping for dresses,
and while that wasn’t nearly as weird as the bra and underwear shopping had
been, I was nearly as uncomfortable to discover that we were apparently ready
for the next level in dresses too. I
love dressing up and looking my best as much as the next girl, but looking in
the mirror and seeing the same ‘wow’ factor that I see in Mom or Aunt Leanne
when they’re dressed up, if not quite to that level yet, was high on the weird
scale too.
I didn’t feel that way at all about seeing Rowen in the
dresses she picked out, and while Tommy does have a girlfriend, if he – and
every other guy our age – doesn’t notice her next weekend in a big way; then he
seriously needs to get his eyes tested.
Mom and Patricia seemed to find the entire visit with Abby entertaining,
and the fact that Rowen and I were practically the opposites of our usual
selves may have had a lot to do with why they seemed to be amused so much of
the time. Between the four of us, we
picked out a total of eleven new dresses, and Abby was a happy camper by the
time we paid for everything and moved on to Taylor’s to pick up new shoes to go
with the dresses. That wasn’t as weird
for me, though Rowen and I moved up a level or two with our choices of dress
shoes too; and the new footwear definitely matches our dresses.
After splitting up and going home, I was only at the house
long enough to put my new clothes away before going over to Rowen’s to help her
pack again for our second sleepover in a row – and the last one of our March
Break. it had been raining off and on by
then, so we waited for a break to make the dash back to my house; and we were
there in time to take over watching Ethan and Ehlana while Mom and Dad got
ready for their date night with Uncle Adam, Aunt Leanne, Uncle Nick, Aunt
Deborah, and quite a few of their collective friends.
The next couple of hours were fairly standard for our end of
a parents’ date night. Alicia and Erin
came over in time to handle the kid incoming.
Philip brought Naomi over first, and over the next half hour, Aiden,
Patrick, Scott, and Lindsay were dropped off by one or both parents. Aunt Leanne was a designated driver, but Mom
and Dad went to pick them up so she’d have the extra seating in the minivan for
driving their friends home from Sheldon’s whenever the party started wrapping
up for the night. Violet was staying to
help Alicia and Erin with our pizza-making dinner party, but then she was going
to be staying overnight at Dillon’s house; and planned on hanging out with him,
Jake, and Stephanie at the Inn while they
finished up their work for the night.
Making our personal pizzas was fun, even with some goofing
around by Patrick and Scott; and we made it through dinner and the clean-up without
any major problems. The second round of
weird didn’t start until the rest of our overnight guests arrived. Miranda and Jacob were two of the winners of
a kid-free night, and they dropped Rebecca, Michael, and Tim off on their way
home from the Inn before getting ready to meet
up with everyone else at Sheldon’s.
There really isn’t an easy way for me to write this, so I’ll
just say that my old training bras were, well, holding things in closer to my
chest than the new bras do. I didn’t
need to sense anything empathically to know that Michael noticed the
change. I should add that Rowen’s
dealing with a similar change, and that Michael wasn’t the only guy in the
house to notice both of us. The really
weird part of that, at least when Michael and Tim first got here, was that I
was trying to be my normal, fired-up self; and Rowen was back to being even a
bit more shy than usual.
The lounge and my room was kid central. Patrick and Scott had already taken over the
lounge to play video games; and they dragged Michael and Tim into doing that
with them for a while. Rebecca was again
helping Alicia and Erin as an unofficial junior babysitter; and we all played
with Lindsay and the four younger kids. That
included some music time, and Michael joined us for a while; playing my
saxophone while I played my keyboard with some rotating help from Lindsay,
Naomi, and Ehlana.
Alicia and Erin had Ethan, Ehlana, Naomi, and Aiden tucked
in and possibly off to sleep by nine-thirty.
They cut Patrick and Scott off from their gaming at ten-thirty; and
didn’t really have them in their second-floor room for the night at
eleven. Lindsay had fallen asleep before
then; and they’d moved her into the bedroom across the hall from the
lounge. The top weirdness of my day
started shortly after eleven when Alicia, Erin, and Rebecca all decided to go
downstairs to watch a movie in the living room; leaving Michael, Tim, Rowen,
and me on our own in the lounge.
I don’t really want to know what they were laughing about as
they went downstairs, but I can probably guess.
So there we were, just a couple of hours ago, just hanging
out in the lounge. My emotions were
already all out of whack from our afternoon shopping adventure, and I was far
too acutely aware of how my new underwear felt under my soft, cashmere sweater
and jeans without having to think about how Michael was feeling about me
too. Three out of four of us voted to
watch a movie, and I voted to be scared.
Why? Because I’ve been having fun
while feeling really uncomfortable too.
And before you think it; no, I am not crossing over!
We picked an action-comedy; Michael and Tim added bonus
entertainment when they needed to deal with Patrick and Scott trying to spy on
us and attempt a few pranks; and while we haven’t really spent time together
like we were doing tonight, I’m sure that Michael and Tim had as much fun as
Rowen and I did. The uncomfortable side
of that couple of hours came from the fact that we were in my lounge, and,
except for the interruptions from Patrick and Scott, mostly alone with guys
that both have girlfriends. We weren’t
doing anything to really feel uncomfortable about, but I was in the tweeird
zone for sure anyway. Add in the ongoing
issue I was having with my reaction to wearing the new underwear, and I had to
keep resisting the urge to move as far away from Michael or Tim as possible and
still watch the movie – not that we were cuddling on the sofa or anything like
that either.
No, Rowen, I do not wish that I was cuddling with Michael
now even though we are still warming up from being outside – and that’s not
nearly as funny as you seem to think it is.
Okay, maybe it is that funny, but I am not laughing.
Going outside was Michael’s idea, and Alicia and Erin gave
us their blessing when we told them we wanted to shovel the driveway and
sidewalks before Mom and Dad got home from the pub. That seemed like a great idea, and we had a
blast doing the work together right up until the time that Aunt Leanne pulled
the minivan into the driveway – and caught us in the middle of a post-shoveling
snowball fight. I’m beginning to wonder
if she recruited Mother Nature for her matchmaking too, since their timing
getting home couldn’t have been worse for me or better for them from an
entertainment perspective.
That’s right; Cassie Proctor was involved in another snow
incident with Michael. Nobody cared that
Michael had slipped and fallen while dodging a snowball that I hadn’t even
thrown at him, or that I’d only landed on him because he’d pulled me off of my
feet when I tried to help him up. That
was bad enough; the teasing was worse; and I don’t even want to think about how
that new, lacey underwear was making me feel while I was lying there despite the
fact that Michael and I were both bundled up in our winter coats, gloves, and
hats.
There hadn’t been a lot of snow, and it hadn’t taken long to
clear the driveway and sidewalks. The
fact that it was late kept Aunt Leanne from teasing me too much about catching
Michael and me in the snow, but she had a little time for a few zingers while
she waited to give Alicia and Erin a ride to Alicia’s house, and Dad, Michael,
and Tim went with Uncle Adam to his place to get their driveway and sidewalks
cleared.
It was heading toward two o’clock by the time we were all
inside again. Mom and Dad went straight
to bed then, and so did Rebecca, but my best friend in the whole world decided
that she hadn’t had enough fun yet; and suggested that we – and Michael and Tim
– should warm up with cups of hot chocolate first before splitting up and going
to bed. Add in Olde Bakery snacks, and
that was a recipe for another half hour or so of tweeirdtainment – at least
from my perspective. Going up the back
stairs after that reminded me way too much of stories from Dad and Aunt Leanne
from when they were teens; and I’m not going to comment on why Rowen was
grinning the way she was when we said goodnight to Michael and Tim on the
second floor before continuing on up to my room.
Okay, I have two comments about that:
1. He has a
girlfriend.
2. I am not
crossing over!!!
Moving on, but not really; getting changed and ready for bed
felt weird tonight too. That was
definitely a combination of the new underwear, and the fact that Michael and
Tim were literally just a handful of feet away while we were getting changed –
even though they were below us and there was a solid floor and ceiling between
us. Having scenes involving
Superman-like x-ray vision playing in my mind did not help.
I’m going to need to not dream about bunnies and puppies
tonight - soft, cute, and cuddly bunnies and puppies.
So we haven’t really been in bed that long; and I’ve been
working on this most of the time while Rowen’s been having fun teasing me. Though we’re alone, and all is quiet in the house;
the tweeird continues for me. Now it’s
the absence of that new lacey bra that feels strange; along with the
inescapable realization that I really liked the way it feels to wear a real bra
– even with all of the emotional turbulence I’ve had today.
Rowen Emerson, that is so wrong! Here are two more comments for you:
1. You should not be messing up a perfectly good dream-catching
technique by telling me that Michael might be dreaming about auburn-haired
Playboy bunnies with emerald-green eyes.
2. I AM NOT CROSSING OVER!
With that said, I’m going to wrap this up, snuggle with
Mandy, and possibly stare at the ceiling for however long it takes to pass out
for a couple of hours.
Until next time, this is Magi Master Cassie Proctor; logging
out!
