Mission Control, get a grip.

This may sound familiar if you have followed along with my chronic and infuriating habit of being late, and thus spasticly (is that a word?) stressed as I race to appointments.

Yesterday as I launched Sweetpea and I out of the driveway (late), hunched forward in the seat, my hands tensely gripping the steering wheel, Sweetpea announced that she was Buzz Aldrin and I was Neil Armstrong and this was our spaceship, okay Mumma? I testily responded that I was feeling a little too impatient to play and needed to focus on my driving, to which she responded "That's oKAY, Mumma. You're Neil Armstrong! You just drive the spaceship, I'll do the rest."

And for the rest of the trip (my grip on the wheel loosening knuckle by knuckle as I realized that we would actually be on time), Sweetpea maintained a running commentary with Mission Control, only occasionally breaking away to tell me "Commander, avoid those boulders over there" or "I think we need to slow our speed for landing". When we arrived at our destination, she cheerily bounced out of the car/spaceship, and announced "we made it!".

When did my five year old figure out how to de-stress me?

Sweetpea in the rocket she and her classmates built at school.