8:50 a.m.

Ahhh, the end of the schoolweek mornings -- for two days, anyway. It’s a relief, even though sometimes my sweetie lets me sleep in while he gets the boys their breakfast.

3:30 p.m.

Been out playing clerk/bookkeeper while two other gals sorted and weighed the produce in the shed on a farm about half an hour north of here. Haven’t had a fire in the woodstove since sometime during the night when it burned itself out; outside the temperature is hovering around 0 degrees C. It feels like spring, like you could scoop up a handful of snow and it would be moist enough to squeeze into a ball.

My two little darlins will be home in a few minutes. I’ll sit here at my desk and watch Don labour down the schoolbus steps and into his walker, which Barney will bring to the door of the bus for him. Barney will bring in some wood and go out to the barn to feed the cats, and Don will come to the door and tell me he is going to stay out and “get some fresh air and sun.” He’ll walk out to the pigpen and stand there looking at the dirty grunty beasties; yesterday he stayed out for two hours.

Tonight is our usual movie night and Barney will relish that, as always, no matter what we are watching. I want to rent “The Three Amigos” and watch it with him and Don sometime soon, because I don’t think they’ve seen it. Tonight though, we might get stuck with Rudolph and the Reindeer, which he’s been agitating to watch with us.

I asked Loverboy for a Saturday night date, to dance.

“Where?” he asked. We were swaying together in front of the tv, where a quartet was playing the tango.

“Right here.”