There ain't too much sadder than the tears of a clown (when there's no one around)

KB's mom left this morning. Nolan and I drove her to the Newark airport and dropped her off, and she is even as I type winging her way across the country back to the Bay.

I am bereft. I suppose I should feel lucky that I get along so well with my mother-in-law, and I do, but right now I'm feeling sorry for myself at losing my wing man. She's like a combination mom/friend/sage/mentor/protector figure in my life, and it's been a great two weeks having her here. She has endless patience for Nolan and all his foibles, and is always willing to get him when he wakes up, or play with him when he wants to play, or just generally take the pressure off of me being the only adult at home all day.

She loves to cook, and we always eat well while she says with us. Plus she's so considerate - pretty much every morning during her visit she's unload the clean dishes from the dishwasher, and just this morning when she was making herself a turkey sandwich for the flight home, she made an extra one, wrapped it in Saran and stuck in the fridge for me to eat later.

She just knitted another sweater/hat combo for Nolan, this time in a pretty teal blue and gray pattern that he looks adorable in, so he's all set for this winter. Nolan got so used to having her here - the first thing he said when we got home from dropping her off was "Where's Grandmama?" as if he expected her to be waiting for us even after we just watched her walk into the airport an hour before. Sigh.

Plus, she's like the greatest gardening guru of all time. She's been instrumental in planning where to put things and deciding what plants to buy, so any success we have with our beans, peas, tomatos and herbs will be mostly to her credit. I wish I had taken a "before" photo of the garden (although the camera was dead) so you could see how much it has improved. I'm going to take some extensive photos of the house (one day, when it stops raining every day) and I'll get the garden in there so you can see how much we've done.

So I am sad.

Thanks for reading.