Well ok then Miss Screechy-Pants

Life with children is so predictably unpredictable.

Thursday morning, I received a phone call from my friend cancelling our get-together which had been slotted for that afternoon because her friend had had her baby. Fine then baby, just mess up a play-date over your arrival into the world. Don't worry about the fact that I haven't seen said friend in over a month and multiple plans were changed in order to make that afternoon work for us.

In the evening, Nicholas' cold (which had been bothering him since the previous Friday) kicked into high gear. Out with my plans to attend the LLL meeting and in with the new plans of cuddling a beet-red boy who couldn't stop hacking.

I actually did make it to the chapter meeting on Friday night, but there were only Lily, myself, and one other adult present as opposed to the 10 or so ladies and 6 or 7 babies who were present last month.

Tonight, though, was the real kicker. I'd originally planned to go to both a movie and dinner with the girls to celebrate Krista creeping closer to becoming an old woman...I mean, to celebrate Krista gracefully aging another year.

Anyhow, I decided this afternoon to cancel the movie part of the evening since Nicholas kept us all up for most of the night last night. It started with him screaming and yelling in his sleep for 5-10 minutes at a time. Fun. Next, he showed up in our room at 2 am refusing to sleep anywhere but in our bed since he was too scared for anything else. After much arguing, Lillian and I shuffled over and Liam took a blanket a pillow downstairs to the couch.

So, back to tonight. I decided to meet up with everyone at the restaurant at 6:30. Things went really well for the first, um, 30 seconds? I took Lily out of her snowsuit then Krista picked her up and passed her to Helen. That is when Lily decided that this night out was for the birds and she began to scream.

These, by the way, were not normal cries or sobs but rather full-body ear-piercing screams that threatened to shatter every glass in the building. I have three ladies and most of a restaurant who can verify that fact.

I tried to calm my seemingly-posessed baby first in the washroom then outside before deciding that something was wrong and I should get home and figure it out. By the time I left Helen and I were pretty certain it must have been an ear infection that was causing all the trouble.

As soon as I got Lillian strapped in the carseat, she started to calm down. By the time we arrived home a few minutes later she had only made a few small complaining noises. When we got in the house, I immediately took her up to bed for some serious snuggling and she proceeded to nurse, babble, and coo.

Now, before we come to the conclusion that the Lil simply decided that Opium was for the decidedly un-cool, I will point out that she did have another short episode of screaming about 15 minutes later. I popped some Tylenol and teething tablets in her and she cheered up soon after.

The next 2 1/2 hours were filled with a happy playful baby who fell asleep within 5 minutes of lying down in bed with me and she's now been asleep for about 40 minutes.

While I'm grateful that tonight ended on such a tranquil note, I sometimes wonder if it's worth making plans when my kids are young. Maybe I should just stay home, cuddle with my kids, and read some good books.