with yoshi going to shimane, i didn't see him for three days. three days! *sigh* hiro is on half days so i have to be sure to be here when he gets back, then we have to have lunch. yesterday was a 'farming lecture' day, so we went out in the middle of nowhere inakaville (actually, the town is right next to iizuka city so it's not that bad). it was hot and the kids didn't have any hats. hiro and sasha got mighty bored, and tired, and by 9:40 we walked back to our car (which took more than 20 minutes) to take them off to nishimatsuya for some hats. then back where we waited some more before having a picnic lunch with everyone in a shrine. yoshi wants the kids to 'enjoy' this but the only one close enough to being old enough is hiro, and even he got tired and bored. the next lecture, yoshi has to go to a family wedding and wants me to take the kids (to the farming lecture. sure, if we don't have to walk from field to field to field again. this is not working out....) this is how i get to spend my only chance at free time for the week.

so. today yoshi had a new year ceremony for the other lecture series that he does on sundays (usually every other sunday, some kind of university lectures for anyone. the topics vary from lecture to lecture.) great. and, he drops this on friday night: his parents are coming. double great. so, i have no time to clean, no time to myself and three small children to run after all week. i made pizza for lunch, but of course yoshi's parents came with too much food. again. i actually have lunch with everyone then off i go to do the recycling and then my 'free time'.

i got three hours before i got *the* phone call.

i figured it out. 168 hours in a week right? i got three hours to myself. during the busiest part of the day on sunday, when practically everyone else is out and about. no where for me to go and have a quiet sit down, drink something cold and work on something. also, i had to go to the recycling center and the grocery store, so it wasn't like all that time was actually for me (though i admit it is soooooo nice to go shopping without whiny hangers-on.) and those 165 hours? not a one was kid free, because i have to sleep with them, too.

maybe it sounds like i'm complaining, and maybe i am. but i know that i am not alone when i want some time to myself, to take a break from mommy. i love my children very much and i am not ungrateful to have them in my life. but they take so much energy and i feel like i cannot get a damn thing done when they're awake. but i don't want to wake them up when they're asleep. my house is a mess. it's sad. the garden was awful (but i guess my PIL got their hands dirty and weeded. the shame. yoshi says they like to do it.)

so how do we cap off the week? while yoshi was getting his hair cut by his dad, and his mother was out weeding (hiro was 'helping'), sasha went outside to find hiro and tommy followed. tommy tried wearing yoshi's huge sandals so i go out there to bring him back in. he steps out of the shoes and as i was putting them back into the house, he backed away from me--off the step. he slipped down, fell forward and landed RIGHT on his forehead, splitting it open. oh yes, we ended the week with a trip to the emergency room. yay.

tommy's fine. we opted for tape instead of stitches, mainly because it was so shallow and stitching would probably be more traumatic than necessary so...my poor baby is wounded! will there be a scar? i can only hope it will fade....