The weekend with my friend has been loads of fun. However, it hasn't always been easy to deal with Grace. She seemed to have sensed that she could get away with more since I didn't want to be constantly yelling at her, so she tried to push the envelope. By tonight I was rather fed up.

Then she didn't want to eat her dinner. For Grace not to eat is a major annoyance. I knew she was hungry, and she normally eats me out of house and home. I knew she was dawdling just to dawdle. My friend J had also called me to see what I wanted to do tomorrow, and during the phone call, Grace got down from her booster seat and proceeded to use me as a jungle gym.

Once I got off the phone, I made her get back up to the table and finish her dinner as I straightened up a bit. We started eating dinner about 6:45pm... an hour later she was still eating. That just frustrated me to no end.

Finally she finished, and it was time to put her toys away. She just stood there looking at me. She's normally a very good helper; she's almost obsessed with putting things in their places. I got so frustrated I yelled at her, and then couldn't deal with her any more so I put her in her crib so I could sit down, calm down, and realize I was being a dork about the whole thing.

After a few minutes I recovered enough to get Grace out of her crib, and I brought her in the living room to help me clean up. This time, when she just sort of stood there, I kept my mouth shut and cleaned around her.

I heard my email notification go off, so I sat at the computer and fiddled for a few minutes. I heard Grace go into her bedroom and thought nothing of it; I figured she was getting some last-minute playtime in.

As I'm reading CNN.com, Grace comes out to me completely naked, but with her socks still on. She's even tried to wrap up her diaper the way I do before I throw it in the trash. She hands me her diaper and says, "Help?" because it's not as tight as I do it.

She knew it was time for her to go to bed, so she had gotten undressed and taken off her diaper in preparation for putting her jammies on. She'd even taken the clips and rubber bands out of her hair and put them on the changing table so I could find them later.

Here I am, shouting at her, and she's just trying to help.

I lost it. Tears start running down my face and I tell her that I'm sorry, that I didn't mean to yell at her like that. She squirms off my lap and says, "Do you want a napkin??" She runs off to the kitchen to get me a napkin for my tears.

Of course, that makes me cry even harder.

I'm not sure I'm a good mother, but I sure as hell know I've got a good kid.

Kurt, if you can read this, thank you for the comments on my page and the text you sent me earlier. You know I miss you, baby. I'm going to can-x the emails till the system comes back up. They're coming back undeliverable anyway. I hope it's soon when we can talk again. I miss getting your emails. Love, Me