Kid and Caboodle

Chris has been doing more than his fair share of parenting the last few days. On Saturday, I had to work all day to get out a lot of information about the situation in Haiti, including articles, texts, a podcast transcript and a photo gallery. I started my work day about 9:15 a.m., after making breakfast for everyone and getting cleaned up, and didn’t finish until about 10:30 p.m. Poor Chris not only had to take A.J. to his taekwondo and Chinese classes, but he also had to spend a few hours in the library trying to find information about a relatively obscure spider for a project A.J. has due next week. (He didn’t find anything useful in the library; we’re looking for good Internet resources now.) Chris didn’t get any break at all on Saturday; he also had to prepare dinner, a task I normally perform, and get A.J. to bed without any help. I really hope I don’t have to work again next weekend!

Tonight Chris also helped out a lot. He got home as A.J. and I were starting to get frustrated with each other over some homework that is fairly simple but that has to be turned in tomorrow. A.J. kept saying he didn’t know the answers and wanted me to tell him what to do. I refused. Chris took over the situation, delaying his own dinner, to work with A.J. After dinner, he again stepped in, helping A.J. bathe himself instead of having me handle that part of the evening ritual.

I’m really lucky to have Chris. I wonder how single parents manage?