Matt Totally Called It

So Matt's mom is in town for a couple of days, doing a grand driving tour and stopping with various friends and family all over. Her plan was to arrive last night, spend today and tomorrow here in Williamsburg, and then head out again Friday morning.

She'd told us not to expect her for dinner last night, so we'd told Penny that she wouldn't see "Grandma Jill" until today, and I hadn't altered our usual Tuesday night meal from chicken nuggets (Penny's favorite) to something a little more guest-worthy.

So, naturally, Matt called me at 5:15, on his way home from picking the kids up from daycare. "Guess who's here?"

(Naturally, I'd been putting off cleaning up until last night, as well -- any earlier, and the kids would've just undone it all -- so it's a good thing yesterday was the day the cleaning service came, because I shudder to think what kind of pigsty the place was when we left in the morning. I am not a good housekeeper.)

Not that Jill's early arrival was remotely a problem. Matt just threw some extra chicken nuggets onto the pan for dinner, and Penny was absolutely beside herself with glee. I've never seen her take a bath so fast, and we had to tell her about every ten seconds to calm down and stop shouting. (It was cute. But loud.)

Jill was tired from the drive down from DC, where she'd been last weekend, and she'd taken a detour halfway to stop at Monticello for a tour, so she went back to the hotel as soon as we put the kids to bed. But then, I give it even odds that the whole reason she pushed to get to town earlier than we'd expected was so she'd have time to visit with the kids, so it was a success.




Matt's taking today and tomorrow off to spend time with her. Tomorrow, he's going to keep Penny home from daycare and the three of them will go to Busch Gardens (using the tickets we won from the daycare carnival raffle earlier in the summer, finally). We figure that will go one of two ways: Either Penny will be totally in love with everything and not want to leave, or she'll decide she doesn't like it after about half an hour and whine for three hours until they give up and go home. Odds lean slightly toward the first, since Jill will be there.

Since Matt's home, he took the kids to school for me this morning (usually I drop them off and he picks them up), so I made it to work nearly an hour early. Which is good, because the dinner I have planned involves a marinade, so the earlier I can get home and get it started soaking, the better. (I'd have made it last night, but it's one of those tricksy marinades that you're not supposed to use for any longer than 4 hours.)

Here's hoping for a nice smooth day!