Oh. My. Gosh.

What a long day. Mike had a work-related dinner tonight, so it was just me and the boys from about 6:45 this morning on. If it weren't for preschool today, I might not have made it! Or maybe things would have been better without school. All appeared normal when I picked up Dominick, but somewhere between the playground gate and the sidewalk, a demon slipped into Dom's body. Suddenly, Dominick didn't want to go home; he didn't want lunch; he wanted to stay at preschool. This was a fact he made quite clear by repeating it, screaming it for the next hour. Getting him to the car, into the car, in his carseat and buckled in was nearly impossible. Dom thrashed wildly, crashing his head into mine hard. (Sweet Noel sat quietly in his carseat, looking at a book, throughout this episode.) Dom continued this way at home for some time before finally calming down.

So the day went on with the usual toy snatching and such, until it was time for me to fix dinner. Noel ran out of patience and became clingy, which is not good when I'm standing in front of a hot oven working with raw chicken. Dinner was still about 15 minutes out when Dom sat at the table and started whining for his food. Eventually, we did eat, and Dom finished first. He asked me to put a CD on, and I said I would when I was done. He wouldn't accept this answer and kept asking and asking and asking. Grrr.

Fast forward to bedtime. Noel went down first. Dom and I read a story, and he almost threw a tantrum over not getting to read it again. Then he said he wanted to sleep with an envelope. I assumed he meant the (second) one he was so attached to today but couldn't find it so gave him another one. He went into tantrum mode and said he wanted a different envelope. I found the one he liked in the kitchen trash and brought it to him, but he wouldn't have it because it was torn open. So I found a third envelope which was unused, but that wasn't it, either. At that point I gave up and went to wash the dishes, and Dom got out of bed. I told him there were three envelopes on the kitchen table that he could choose from. He picked one, saw it was torn, and got upset again. Then he said something about closing it, and I said, "If we tape it shut, will you sleep with it?" He said yes, so we put four pieces of tape on that stupid envelope, and now he's asleep with it.

That's life with a preschooler for you. What joyous possibilities does tomorrow hold?