bouncing back - literally, sleep vs puke, all good

I last left you in a sort of panic because it was Thanksgiving night and Curly was puking.  The girls and I were leaving for Louisville the next morning for Midwest championships of Irish dancing.  (I am not counting the 'Low Hanging Fruit' post because I wrote that in advance of all the impending dance drama so that you would have something to amuse you while I was in dance-mom mode.)

This is Curly's hair AFTER she takes the little
ponytails out that are needed to attach the pain
 in the neck wig.  Working backwards with
 my photos here, but this poor girl and the bobby
 pins and discomfort of wearing a wig all
 day.  Guess who would be happy
 if she gave it all up tomorrow?  

Well, I am back.  With stories - of course!

So keeping Curly out of school Monday and Tuesday kind of blew up in my face when the preschool kid I sit for showed up with puke germs festering somewhere in his mouth under his more-annoying-than-you-can-imagine lisp.  

Yes, I am mean but I am also a mom whose son, Tank, started speech therapy before he was 2 years old, because he could not speak.  This was more drastic then what this kid has going on, but still ya notice these things as a parent.  How do you wait until preschool to recognize that NO ONE KNOWS WHAT THE HELL YOUR KID IS SAYING?  When I interviewed the mom last spring, she told me that her kid would be going to preschool in my district for free.  He 'just barely qualified' because of his speech.  Um, the school district was being polite- trust me here, he MORE than qualified.  Does it sound like someone needs to consider a job change?  I digress.

Curly bounced back from Pukeville in record time.  I handed her a sandwich baggie stuffed to the gills with cheerios as we piled into the minivan.  She was relegated to the very back row of seats in order to not breathe on Mini and I.  She was also armed with a bucket, a book, a blanket, a pillow, a DVD player, Gatorade and vitamin water.  Imagine my surprise when we arrived in Louisville that evening and I told her to bring the bag of cheerios up to the room.  She had already eaten them ALL!  I was shocked but decided that was a good sign.

Later when we were in our room, she ate half a can of chicken noodle soup, some rice, and an applesauce cup.  When it was time to leg tan her, she could NOT stand still.  *Insert my own eye roll here and I will not blame you if you insert your own eye roll as well.  Judge away, peeps.  It is the nonsense that sucks the fun out of this little OBSESSION my kid has with Irish dancing.*  She was Irish dancing in front of the full length mirror.  Leaping across the floor.  Practicing her fancy footwork.  Then I knew:  SHE WAS BACK.   

Mini and I did not end up puking, which was a huge relief.  The night before a big competition is historically a night when sleep eludes me.  Stress kicks in and I end up with few z's.  Honestly the more years that dancing suck the life out of me I spend at these competitions, I realize it is NOT worth the lack of sleep.  This year I promise I really was not that stressed.  I was bound and determined to sleep because a day with sufficient sleep under one's belt is SO MUCH MORE pleasant than one without.  I reminded myself that Curly was well prepared and she was feeling better.  Still . . . 

I crawled into bed at 8 pm.  It took awhile to go to sleep.  Once I did, Curly woke me up.  More than once.  She wanted me to know that she was still awake.  I finally pulled her into my bed gave her a vigorous back rub and sent her back to her bed.  I told her under no circumstances was she to move or look at the clock.  She WOULD NOW SLEEP.  Damn it.

I woke up to pee at 1 am.  I struggled to go back to sleep because I was so hungry that I could have eaten an entire turkey.  Crap.  I tiptoed into the room where Mini slept on the pullout and dug around for some trail mix that I knew was in one of the bags.  I did this with no lights and I succeeded without waking Mini.  I sat in the bathroom and munched on trail mix while reading my book.  I kept wishing I was sleeping, but I reminded myself that it was better to be reading and snacking in the bathroom than puking and intermittently sleeping in the bathroom.  I eventually slept again for about an hour before my alarm went off at 5 am.  Time to make the donuts get the dancer ready.  

Have I mentioned how much I detest this weekend?  Tune if to find out about how she placed and our crazy room and how much fun it is to travel with a microwave.