Monday, November 26, 2007

Drewbie Downtime

We learned this weekend that the Drew Monster can handle two guests in our guestroom but as soon as additional guests take up space my office, he gets a bit off. Of course, we didn't figure out he was not dealing well with this until we couldn't calm him down for lunch on Friday. He'd been fussing a lot every time we had to stop playing somewhere outdoors and go back home. And usually we could get him calmed down within 15 minutes of getting home and he would go back to being his chipper self. Not so on Friday. Finally, at a loss, I took my father, stepmother, and grandmother out and abandoned Mark to El Boyo Diablo. Seconds after we left the house, Andrew calmed down to ate a good lunch and took an OK nap. Dinner on Saturday was very similar. We were a bit squished into a booth, and Drew could not settle down--he even swiped napkins and silverware off of the table and tried to dump a glass of water. Mark took him out for dinner and romping at the McDonalds across the street, and he was fine after that.

It was so strange to see Drew act out in this way. Yesterday after everyone left and today, though, Drew has been fully back to normal. It's interesting that just one extra person and one other room being occupied did him in, though. Next time we have that many guests, Mark and I will be sure to schedule in some Drewbie downtime with either one of us alone in the house at least for an hour. And we'll look for similar signs of overstimulation when we have any overnight guests in the house in the future (which will be this weekend, actually; Mark's brother John is staying with us so he can run a marathon down in Tucson on Sunday).

Given Mark's introvertedness, I shouldn't be surprised that three guests and two rooms off-limits at once rubbed Drew wrong. Hell, it's probably a tall order for any toddler used to it being just him and Momma most of the time in the house. Mostly I'm just happy that the bouts of cryfests and crankiness and acting out so unusual for him (or at least, unusual for how long they went on) seemed to be unique to the stress of the situation, and not a sign of the coming norms.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

It was a great time and even Drew was great company! I'm still working photos when I can get time on the computer. I have some great ones particularly Drews Heisman moment.

Love,

Dad

Kellie said...

We're looking forward to your pictures, Dad. Glad you had a good time, even during Drew's couple of freak out moments.