Thank God he wasn't twins

This morning instead of the usual Wednesday playdate, I had two almost-three-year-old boys to myself for three hours as mommy two had an appointment.

I'd like to say that we had a lot of fun, but there was an inordinate amount of train track knocking down (I tried to build one, I swear to God, eight times and they knocked it down over and over and over again, and the first few times I was like, in my chirpy mommy voice "that's ok! we can fix it!" and by the end I wanted to tie them both up on the couch until I finished but I did manage to keep my head on and remember that OH YEAH, this is FOR THEM.) And then there was the not eating, and so the boys got crankier and crankier and there was only ONE Thomas and only ONE cool remote control car and only ONE steamroller and ... we have a lot of things that there are only one of, you know? How did that happen?

Oh yeah. I only have ONE child.

When they finally left at three (we try and keep them together a while on Wednesdays, because they do play -- usually -- so well together) we'd had a number of tears from both sides and some terribly bad sharing (or lack thereof) and while I normally love our Wednesdays together I was starting to think ... man, I'd just like to put on a movie and sit down. When the door finally closed and we went back to the toys, The Boy was quiet and I said "Are you sad because P went home?" and he said, "No." 

Ah.

But there were several moments, I admit where I had the rapt attention of two small and earnest boys, both telling me their great ideas and their neat thoughts and staring at me, trusting and happy, that I remembered why the hell it is that we do this. It's not all bad.