Sneaky Kids

I have survived music and arts camp. Barely. Today was crazy, and I only got through it because we spent most of the time rehearsing for the program instead of doing the usual classes. Otherwise, I spent the day tracking down kids making a break for it. There was one whose mom was helping out elsewhere who kept wandering off to see his mom. I had one who somehow followed a different group to the playground instead of following our group to the next class (I didn't buy the excuse he gave that he was really that confused because he knows the people in our group and he knew we'd already been to the playground). I had three run and hide in the bathroom to try to escape from art class. I had two try to run off instead of going to rehearsal. Fortunately, I seem to be smarter than a second grader, so I always knew who was missing and where he'd have gone, and I had a teenage boy helper I could send into the bathroom to look for them. Then to top it all off, at the end of the day we had a couple of missing kids (not mine, thank goodness). The mom came in to pick up her kids, rather late, when almost everyone had left, and her kids weren't there. These tend to be good kids who aren't the type to run off and hide, so panic ensued. After we'd searched the whole church and the playground the mom remembered that she'd arranged for their grandfather to pick them up that day and she called the grandfather to verify that they were with him. I think those of us who'd been frantically searching and panicking wanted to strangle her for totally forgetting her own plans and then blaming us.

But now I'm totally done, and the director said I don't have to come to the program tonight. I've seen the part my kids are doing. I really need to get some work done, but I'm considering a brief nap to recharge because I'm dead. I also got myself a cupcake at the grocery store on the way home because I figure I got enough exercise from chasing kids to earn a cupcake.

In other news, thanks for all the nice things you're saying about the new book and for the Amazon reviews that have definitely raised the star rating. When a book has been waited for as long as this one, there's the chance that expectations might be so high that the book couldn't possibly meet them, so I was a little worried about the reception it would get. But it sounds like people are enjoying it, and I'm glad.

And it seems that Google Books now has it available. You can either get it directly from them or via your favorite independent bookstore. Though the indies may or may not have it. I just searched a couple of independents I know of and it didn't come up in the search, even though I'd just found it on Google Books. Maybe it takes time to propagate.