Of course this is just temporary, until my inevitable stardom takes effect ...

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Ahhhh ...

All is right with the world. I went to work - yes, I still have a job - and went to pick up my girls at grandma and grandpa's afterward.

You read that right, the girls are home. I don't think I've ever seen two people happier to see me than they were. Bean was ecstatic when Dave called to tell her I'd be picking her up; my mom said she screamed "my mommy's coming to get me!!" And Miss O ... she came walking over to me with this huge smile that didn't leave her face until bedtime. Just beaming up at me, and reaching up to hug me over and over.

Bean announced to me: "I worked really hard and I earned you back, mommy."

This is the email she dictated to grandma today:

Dear Mommy,

Feel better soon and have me come to your house soon. And you always have to have a dog again and make sure you never forget that you will never make your dog leave. And please I really want to come to your house today and I really want you to be married to grandma and you always can stay with me all the time and stay with me overnight. And you are supposed to clean everything in your house and make sure your house stays alllll tidy and dusted up and when you make a recipe everyone can come to your house. Make sure you buy all the toys your kids want.

So when Dave sent me an email asking if I thought I could take the girls tomorrow night, I said absolutely! We went back and forth a bit about what the girls' school would say if my test for H1N1 comes back positive and the girls are now with me, but we decided that even by the most conservative estimates (me getting H1N1 the very day I tested positive for it), today is 8 days later and the CDC says people are only contagious 7 days. So then the discussion switched to is it okay for me to have them starting tonight, do I feel like I've recovered fully, etc. Dude, wild horses could have trampled me nearly to death at lunch and I'd still have said "I'm fine!"

I am so, so happy to have them home. And since they're still not "allowed" back at school (no test results for me yet), it'll be a slightly easier transition to working mommy, because my folks are willing to come here and watch them for the next day or two.

Work went well today. My brain was actually firing on all cylinders and I had a good day. More on that after I have a few days under my belt, but so far, I think I'm going to be happy here. And I think I'm going to like being a working mommy ... tho after 10 days without my kids, I'd like nothing more than to spend the day with them tomorrow. Oh well - that's what weekends are for, right?
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