Oh thank you god the whining stopped ...

... and it's only two and a half hours after I "put her to bed," including one extra session of books and singing, one long walk around the park, and one interminable "God Loves You" DVD from the local Mothers Of Preschoolers group. She made it through "six days" of the creation story told using cutesy vacation bible school songs and hand puppets made of velour gloves with eyes glued on (oh, how I wish I was kidding), and on the seventh day, I told her God went to sleep and so should she. I think somewhere about day four her brain shut down in self defense, so for now at least I'm safe from the whining.

I do think I know what triggered this, though. It's all Jason's fault. No, seriously - hear me out on this. He's been gone on a business trip - AGAIN - since Monday. Usually when he's gone, Liza will spend a little time each day saying "dadadadadadadadaaaaaaaaaaa" and I tell her that Daddy is on a trip and will be home soon. Well, this weekend, every time Jason left to run an errand, she would follow him to the front door, then stand there crying and banging on the screen door while he drove away without her. She was usually pretty easy to distract afterward, and Jason thought it was sort of cute.

When she started talking about him this morning, I told Liza that Daddy was on a trip, and would be home tonight. That was my mistake, because Daddy won't be home until long after Liza's supposed to be in bed. I guarantee you, that kid understood the gist of what I said, because she spent the whole time we were home occasionally saying "dadadaaaadaaaa" and whining aimlessly around the house. A couple of times when she did that, I told her no, Daddy wouldn't be home until tonight, after she was in bed. I swear, I think she understood that, too, and didn't want to go to bed because she would miss seeing him. The kid won't say 'Mama' if you pay her in chocolate and kittens, but Daddy goes to Jamaica and all hell breaks loose.

That's it. Next time, I'm going to the tropical island, and Jason can stay home with the whiny kid and get ready for his in-laws to visit.