Camp TarAlana

My sainted friend, Tara (Alana's mom), graciously offered to keep Kendall at her house for an entire week for which I did not have child care.  I had 11 of the loooooong 12 weeks of summer covered and this one stumped me.  No camps.  No parents.  No ability to use the back up care plan through work for two consecutive weeks.  

Kendall and Alana have been best friends for 3 years.  One half of their lives at this point.  And they haven't even been at the same school the past 2 years.  This was by far Kendall's favorite week of the summer!  For all intents and purposes, it was an American Girl Doll camp.  Kendall took a suitcase of doll stuff, as well as enough clothes for herself for several weeks, on the first day.  She did not spend nights there, but she was prepared to do so.  And actually probably would have if given the opportunity.  The girls played dolls most of the time but also did cooking projects, art projects, some outings and fed the animals at Alana's school a few mornings.  After the first morning where the girls freaked (Kendall really does have an honest fear of chickens) and let not only the chickens but the goats loose, I think it was a fun thing for them to do.  Poor Tara texted me that afternoon and told me about the screeching 6 year old girls/chicken/goat drama and that the girls were now contained in a movie and she was going to have a beer if that was ok with me.  Drink on sister.  

On Thursday afternoon, I left the office a bit early and we all had tea at the American Girl Doll Cafe. Thankfully, no one at this place seems to expect proper tea time behavior so we had a good time.  Sadly, they do not serve wine or beer.  It really would help their sales in the store but they probably do not want to have to deal with tipsy mothers in addition to unruly tween wanna be little girls.  

This happened in the car 4 out of the 5 days on the way home.  Blissful peace in the car!

There was no "blissful peace" to be had on the last day of the week.  The girls had reached their capacity of sanity and decided to be monkeys in Alana's room.  They pulled the curtain rod right off the wall.  They will each be paying 1/2 of the repair costs.  Earlier in the week, I had jokingly asked Tara if Camp TarAlana can be an overnight camp next year.  On Friday, she told me that was a fabulous idea and that she'd keep them during the day but would send them home with me at night.  Hmmmm, Benadryl nightcaps anyone?  

It was a great week for Kendall and SO nice of Tara to do this for me.  I wish it hadn't ended in destruction and property damage, but at least there were no trips to the ER, right?  And the chickens and goats were eventually all returned to their rightful homes.  And the bloody nose in the movie theatre, well, it was in the dark.  I'm going to give Tara some space and then will take her out for drinks as a "thankyouIamsosorrypleasecontinuetobemyfriend" gesture.  It'll all be good!  :)