This is turning out to be one of those days that I'll be glad to see end. I just hate ending the day feeling like that, although the promise of a fresh start in the morning feels really good.

After Accalia was finished with dance tonight, she was so excited about playing with Mercedes. I was a bit more ambivalent since I'd personally gotten my fill of having her over for nearly two straight days over the weekend. The doorbell rang soon after we returned home, though, and Mercedes was over for about two hours. They weren't very pleasant, though, especially since Cole was in a particularly big "I want to play with you but don't know how to do that except to be the perfect pesty younger brother" sort of mood. It didn't seem to matter what I did either. Finally I just said, "You know, it's really hard to come over to play at our house and expect Cole not to be around. It's not fair to keep Cole restricted to one small part of the house either. If you guys want to be by yourselves, maybe you can go over to Mercedes's house." Mercedes went absolutely still when I said that, and I asked Accalia later if Mercedes ever said why they can never play at Mercedes's house. Accalia has no idea.

Tomorrow Accalia has a hair cut right away in the morning (just a trim so she can keep her hair longer for the bun she'll be wearing again for her Riverboat Days performance). Then there's art and swimming lessons. I need to make a trip to the store to pick up some supplies for our camping this weekend, too. I think we'll do that while Accalia's at art.