No Mama Work

JT is in a terrible rut of seperation anxiety that has been driving me crazy - mostly because he does not want to go to his friends' houses - i.e. leaving me with no free hours at all. Today's car conversation went something like this:

me: Yeah! We're going to [friend's name]'s house! You are going to have fun playing.

JT: Papa work? Mama work? No! Hold ya! Five minutes.

me: Yes, mama is going to go to work and you can play with [friend's mom's name] and your friend.

JT: No [Friend], no mama work.

me: You don't want to go to your friend's house?

JT: No [friend], yes. {Starts crying.}

me: But mama needs to do some work.

JT: No mama work. [Friend's mom's name] work. JJ mama hold ya.

etc., etc., etc. for another 10 minutes.

I ended up watching the two boys while the other mom got a little work done. Then the boys had a picnic (well, pb&j sandwiches) at the playground. This whole episode was draining, and then on the way home, the little terror decided that it would be fun to tear a page out of the train magazine he was looking at - one loaned to us from a train-loving adult and not actually meant to be played with by a toddler. I could see the gleam in his eye as he proceeded to slowly rip the page out as I am saying "Just put it down, you have other books to look at, you don't need to tear that one," as calmly as possible. Then I lost it. "Bad JT," I told him, "You are in trouble when papa comes home." What a threat. I needed a time-out for myself and lo and behold I was near a Krispy Kreme. So we went through the drive-thru, and the nice young woman at the window commented on how cute JT was. Somehow this salvaged the morning. Yes, he had been fussy and annoying (he was also throwing woodchips at the playground which the other moms did not approve of), but he really just wanted to be with me! This cute little guy just wanted to be with his mom. So I let him have one of my doughnuts (I had originally planned to eat them when he was sleeping) and he was beyond estatic - "Big Doughnut! Yum!" (He then fell asleep clutching half of it in his hand with sugar smeared all over his face.)