Legoland Adventure

I planned our trip to Legoland for spring break ages ago.  I coerced my mom into taking care of Freddie (and Tony) for a few days and I booked the flights, hotel, and park passes.



And then I sobbed when I dropped Freddie off the day we left.  It was my first time away from him and though I craved the sleep and the opportunity to sever our breastfeeding relationship (the chubby leech has been sucking until he exhausted the milk and started drawing blood every night for the last month), I was loathe to go without him for three nights.  Codependent much, Amelia?

Luckily for me, I had this bedmate while in California (even though he had his own perfectly good Lego pirate bunk):



Also, this guy watched over me while I slept, so I guess I was well-protected:



When we arrived, it was almost 8 PM, but the kids were wired.  We stayed up to watch the poolside movie with some hot chocolate (Lego Star Wars, of course).



The boys were up SO STINKING EARLY the next morning.





Too early, in fact, for the early-entrance to the park granted to those staying at the Legoland Hotel.  So they did a treasure hunt and built Legos to pass the time.



The weather was great, as you would imagine.











We spent the middle of both days at the water park, which meant that we missed the crowds for the rides.  It worked out pretty well.  Isn’t it great when you accidentally do something awesome?











I cannot say enough good things about Legoland.  The hotel staff was awesome.  The restaurants were perfect for kids.  The buffet was great.  There was an opportunity to embarrass my children every time we rode the elevator: when the elevator doors closed, the disco dance party started and they were mortified, even if no one else was in the elevator with us.  The park itself was perfectly sized and had a wide variety of activities besides just rides.  The water park was fun.  Two days spent there was just the right amount.







I had no personal agenda during this trip, other than to have fun with my boys.  We did the rides they wanted to do, we played what they wanted to play, we ate what they wanted to eat.  I (sort of) enforced bedtimes and teeth-brushing and that’s it.  I let them have control and there were no fights or tantrums.  It was wonderful.





The only shaky part was the trip home, and it was entirely my fault.  In a spectacular showing of idiocy, I did not so much look at the map from Legoland to the San Diego Airport (they’re about 40 miles apart) as glance at it.  We left a bit later than I intended, during rush hour (which moved surprisingly well on the freeway – certainly MUCH better than Seattle), and I took an incorrect exit when the freeway split into two freeways.  We went from a little behind schedule to a lot behind schedule.

We made it through customs and to our gate just before boarding, so I herded the boys over to the bathrooms and we took turns sitting with the luggage (all carry-on) while the others peed one last time before the airplane.  We left a bag at the bathroom, but I didn’t realize it until we were in that little tunnel, about to board the plane.

“Where’s the blue-and-white striped bag?  Oh, shoot!  We left it!  Boys, GET ON THE PLANE, I’m going back.” 

And then I left them to get on the plane.  Which was probably a stupid idea, but it all worked out, you’ll see.

I made my way, frantically, to the bathrooms and then back to security.  Luckily, we were in the small terminal at the airport – at the big terminal, I might have just said “to hell with the bag.”  The bag was at security and after a bit of panicked explanation that I was not trying to leave it behind, I was just absent-minded, I retrieved it.  I ran back to the plane and boarded just in time for takeoff.  The boys had their Legos and were playing, totally unconcerned.  The other parents on the plane assured me they had taken good care of them and that everything was okay, God bless them.

What a gift it was to have been able to do this for and with my big boys.  Next year, we’ll stick close to home, but I promised them we’d go back and do Legoland again when Freddie’s four.

Freddie, who only screamed at me for a whole day upon my return.  He wouldn’t let me put him down, but he screamed at me while I held him.  Pour chunk was so angry.  He’s over it now, and he hasn’t breastfed since.

Get Right Outta Town!

There is a serious issue we have to discuss right now: WHY do children have to pee at the LEAST opportune times during a roadtrip?  I mean, come on kids.  If I’ve said it once, I’ve said it a thousand times: LISTEN TO YOUR BODY.  Don’t just ignore it until we’ve reached a traffic jam in the Tacoma S-curves and you have to go URGENTLY RIGHT NOW IMMEDIATELY MOM PLEASE I HAVE TO GO.

My kids have peed out the door of the van in rush hour, on the off-ramp at the Ft. Lewis – McChord Army/Air Force Base (forcing me to go through the checkpoint and then be officially turned back around as a soldier stopped oncoming traffic for me and waved me through), in vast numbers of McDonald’ses and gas stations and in bushes by the side of the road.  I don’t think they enjoy such improvised bathrooms, but damned if they’ll change their ways.  This latest trip had us squealing into the parking lot at Krispy Kreme for Charles to run inside while I gathered the others – there are worse places, I’ll admit.  While I didn’t indulge in a donut, I did enjoy smelling the donuts.  Odors don’t have calories, right?  I’m down to one run per week due to schedule constraints, so donuts are off-limits.  Sad face.

I can’t recall being this antsy this early in tax season before.  Tony has been up and gone to the office before 4 am for weeks now and though he doesn’t like to beg, I can tell he wants to ask me for more time to work.  I pulled the kids out of school at noon on Thursday and we hit the road.  We listened to our favorite songs from the Cars soundtrack at least fifty times, had an earnest discussion about Ninjago, and generally made the most of 5 hours in the car together.  It helped that no one farted the whole drive, not even the dog.

This is what weekends at the beach are for:

Eating cake with your hands.



Hanging out with Grandpa.



Walking on the beach.





Playing in the sand.











Exploring.



Good friends.



Watching Victor Borge on the big screen.



Not pictured: My mommy making me dinner, Jamie handily beating me and Liz at Sequence Jr., that one glorious nap I took with Jamie, that one run I went on (did I mention I’m down to one run a week, even on a weekend away, and it’s KILLING ME), staying up too late drinking wine and watching TV with my dad, and general lazy relaxing during the day because nobody went to bed at a decent time or slept through the night while we were gone.

Does Tony appreciate our absence?  I think so.  Kinda hard to tell because less family time means more working time for him.  In his shoes, I’m not sure I’d relish the trade.  I mentioned to our doctor this morning that he didn’t even shower while we were away and the doc said, “Geez, he’s not in college.”  So now I know that my doctor thought showering was unnecessary in college.  I’m not sure how that makes me feel.

AWOK (Away WithOut Kids)

 

My husband, God bless him, is not a gift-giver.  I used to really like receiving gifts, so this was tough on me early in our marriage.  I buy little gifts all the time and I save up big gift ideas for Christmas and birthday, which, in Tony’s case, come back-to-back.  Often, however, Tony will ruin my gift-giving ideas by just going and buying himself whatever he wants when he wants it.  Clearly, he does not punish himself with delayed gratification like I do.

 

When Tony does give a gift, though, it ends up being super thoughtful and extravagant.  Gorgeous sapphire drop earrings one Christmas, pretty, delicate wine glasses one birthday, and then, for no reason whatsoever, a night away from the kids and the house last weekend.

 

Okay, it’s not for no reason whatsoever.  It’s because I’m going batshit crazy.

 

It’s because Charles throws a tantrum about stupid math homework every other day – he could breeze through it in 30 seconds, but he thinks it’s so. stinking. dumb. that he has to do counting and basic addition and subtraction problems that he whines and cries about how he wishes he could go back in time and stop the first teacher who ever assigned homework from doing so, thereby preventing this demonic concept of “homework” from ever being invented.  Guess who gets to be the homework parent right after school each day?  Yep, me.  I talk that kid off a ledge all the time about that ridiculous homework and honestly, I think half of the reason I have so much trouble is that Charles thinks that I am possibly too dumb to understand his homework.  He won’t listen, no matter how I try to explain the concepts.

 

It’s because Jamie’s emotions outrun his reasoning skills 8407256 times each day, and I have to employ every negotiating tactic I’ve ever learned from watching formulaic cop-dramas (“Put the stick down so we can talk about it, Jamie.  Why don’t you come over here and give me your list of demands?  You don’t really want to hurt anyone, so just let go of your brother’s ear and walk away.  Time-out is no fun, kiddo, put the rock down.”) just to get through the day.  He’s often in time-out and he often loses privileges.  He just as often snuggles up to me and asks me to read stories, but geez, it would be nice to have some middle ground between “infuriating” and “sweet as sugar.”

 

 

It’s because Freddie never sleeps and he never, ever wants to stop nursing.  I can’t really remember what it feels like to be well-rested.  At this point, it would take me a month just to fill the giant hole of sleep debt in my life.

 

Tony, apparently, has been making plans for me to have a night away with some girlfriends for MONTHS.  That’s love, people, plain and simple.  My friend Jodi picked me and two other friends up on Saturday morning and drove us to Canada.  I felt like yelling to my children, “Sorry, SUCKERS.  I’m going to be in A DIFFERENT COUNTRY for the next 36 hours!”  Oh, sweet freedom.  We drank all day long, soaked in a hot tub, went shopping and walking, shared laughs, and gorged ourselves on fantastic sushi.  And then I didn’t get out of bed to nurse a screaming child once, all night long.

 

36 whole hours of ADULT TIME.  Best gift of the year.

Nurse Freddie Helps Out

My mom had hip surgery two weeks ago and I haven’t quite recovered.

 

She, on the other hand, is recovering quite nicely.

 

The surgery was September 30, and we decided to go ahead and do a big strategy retreat for our business a few days later.  The beginning of the month is always busy for me at work (bank reconciliations, sales tax returns, etc), but then we talked our way into a huge list of new tasks and undertakings at that meeting.  Additionally, Freddie has decided that he will never sleep again, so I face a raging sleep-deprivation-induced migraine every day while Tony steadily gets angrier and angrier.  We look like raccoons, so deep are the shadows under our eyes.

 

Mom came to stay with us a few days after her surgery, right after my in-laws came to stay for a day, which was right after the surgery and right after my dad was here for a few days while mom was in the hospital (that’s a lot of houseguests).  We kept mom in the basement, which sounds bad.  And maybe it was, but she had bathroom access and it was all one level, straight from the garage to the elevated couch (here’s a tip: if someone you know has a total hip replacement, raise your couch up several inches – six or seven – so they can easily get on and off of it).  Charles practiced piano for her, Buster guarded her during the day, and Jamie and Freddie were mostly out of her way.

 

Well, mostly.  Freddie liked to visit for a second at a time.

 

Leland had a hard time seeing our mom in the hospital and then in recovery at home.  I understand it – I mean, no one wants to see their mom as an invalid, in pain, unable to walk.  But after some self-examination (am I so hard-hearted that I was emotionally unaffected by mom’s state of health?), I realized that I was totally cool with this whole surgery thing because, more than anything else, it indicated that our mom was healthy and on her way to getting healthier.  Nursing a post-op patient is so much different than nursing a terminally sick one.  There were no big issues of life at stake here.  Rather, there is nothing but hope in her convalescence.  In a few months, mom will walk better than she has in years.

 

This is not to say that it was easy.  Caring for anyone is hard work.  After I safely delivered mom to dad (with the help of afternoon coffee on the long drive, something in which I don’t usually indulge), Freddie and I proceeded to clean house, grocery shop, and cook a dozen or so freezer meals for my parents.  Well, I did those things.  Freddie took care of grandma and practiced his cute.

 

 

So here it is mid-month and I’m still doing beginning-of-the-month stuff at work, Charles has early release all week so I go home early after not finishing my work at the office, I haven’t had time for a run in almost two weeks, and I am completely out of ideas for dinner.  No matter what I make, the children complain about it.  So, you know what?  I’m fucking done.  Breakfast for dinner and all the vegetables shoved into a smoothie.  I hope my mom gets better soon so she can come visit and take care of me.

I Have A Black Thumb, But with Cars

Do you know what’s not a good idea?  Taking a baby in a white shirt camping.  Ask me how I know.

 

Over the past month, I have driven five different cars.  Not like, test driven, but driven around, kids in the back, running errands, living my life.  First, our van broke.  The repair has taken FOREVER, but it might be (fingers crossed) that Toyota will pay for the whole job (including valve replacement and cam shaft something-or-another, I have no idea what all those words mean, but they are expensive words), so that’s lucky.  After my van broke down, I drove my parents’ Suburban for awhile, until they needed it to pull their camp trailer, so I swapped for my mom’s Mini Cooper.  My parents live 230 miles away, so car swaps are not easy for anyone, but it sure beats having to rent a car.

 

Then I drove Tony’s truck this weekend, though it remains to be seen whether or not he’ll ever let me drive it again.  Not that it’s MY fault that these things happen to cars I drive, just that I have the misfortune of being the driver when shit happens.  Case in point: When I was 17 years old, my boyfriend at the time (one of those great mistakes on a long list of many that helped me know what a fantastic catch Tony was) totaled my first car, so I had to drive my parents’ original Suburban (they had a 1986 model and now a 2001 model) for a few months to get myself and Leland to and from school and work and extra-curriculars.  After I had driven it for a couple of months, I told my dad that I was sure something was wrong with the engine; the truck sounded so loud and weird and was starting to smell (more than just over-perfumed teenagers with poorly-managed B.O., too).  Dad didn’t believe me.  He totally brushed me off.  So I told mom, and she drove it, confirmed that something wasn’t right, and crawled under the truck, at which point she noted that the entire exhaust system had rusted out.  My dad was livid – it’s no fun to be facing a multi-thousand dollar car repair after your daughter’s idiot boyfriend just caused the complete loss of another car in your fleet – but obviously it wasn’t my fault.  The injury had happened over years of driving it in the salt air.  To this day, though, he’ll say things like, “You only drove that truck for three months, but you rusted out the ENTIRE exhaust system!”  I think he’s mostly joking now.

 

Anyhow, I packed the three kids and the dog in Tony’s Dodge Ram pickup on Friday morning and headed south.  We stopped at the kennel in Stanwood to drop off Buster and his cloud of fur (seriously, he’s like Pigpen from Peanuts, only with fur, not dirt) and proceeded to wend our way through terrible traffic toward Olympia.  It used to be that we could leave early and blaze through Everett, Seattle, Tacoma, JBLM, and Olympia at or near 60 miles per hour, but not anymore.  In the last year or more, EVERY trip hits a slowdown in each of those cities/areas along I5, JBLM being the WORST.  So yeah, when we FINALLY made it to Tacoma, it was time to stop and have some late lunch.  Really late.  My poor, hungry boys were almost eating their own arms.

 

After lunch, we drove for another hour to Millersylvania State Park, where my family reunion has been held for the past several years.  Just as I pulled up to the ranger station, the engine (the big, burly diesel engine that makes me feel like a total fraud driving it – shouldn’t I have a sleeve tattoo or a gun rack or something?) started making this whap-whap-whap-whap-whap noise and smelling a little burn-y.  Not cool.  I drove to our campsite, turned the engine off, and was immediately greeted by a fellow camper smoking a giant cigar and drinking a beer (he’s the type of guy who should drive this truck) who said, “Sounds like you’ve got something stuck around your fan.”  Sure enough, the serpentine belt had split and half of it was wrapped around the fan.  Tony brought the appropriate part and tools and then he fixed it.  No big deal, I guess.

 

  Jamie the gearhead helped.

Then we camped.  The kids got dirtier than they’ve ever been, ever.  We ate, we hung out with family, it was great, and then it was time to leave.  Tony and Charles headed south with my parents for a week of fishing, while Freddie, Jamie, and I headed north in Tony’s truck.  Of course, I was immediately snarled up in terrible traffic.  The baby started screaming, Jamie fell asleep, and I began to dread the loooong drive home.  Maybe, I thought, we’ll be able to make it all the way to the Fife rest area before stopping.  Hahahaha!  I should know better than to tempt fate, because that’s just when I noticed the temperature gauge on the truck: it was pegged all the way to the right, a clear indication that something was WRONG.

 

I pulled over and killed the engine.  I was still on the freeway, but within sight of an exit ramp.  Still, I didn’t want to exit without at least cooling the engine a bit.  I popped the massive hood and couldn’t see anything wrong – there was no steam, no fire, all the liquid reservoirs were full.  Some young guys pulled over and checked to see if I was okay, but they couldn’t offer much help.  I chilled for a few minutes, fired it back up, cranked the heater on full-blast, and drove the shoulder to the exit ramp and pulled into McDonald’s.  For the second time in a month, I used my AAA benefits.  The tow truck didn’t arrive until almost 7:30 pm (it was 5 pm when we got off the road), so we had ice cream and a happy meal and waited. 

 

Though I wanted to cry, I quickly realized how blessed we are.  Not only was no one hurt, but I called around and family immediately jumped into cars to come help us out.  My uncle and aunt forewent an additional night of camping in order to pick us up and drive us to Kirkland, where my brother met us at our cousin’s house to take us home.  The tow truck beat us home by about 20 minutes and my neighbor drove our truck off the tow truck and into our driveway.  It was a stupidly late night for me and the kids, and Freddie refused to sleep anywhere but in the crook of my arm, but we made it. 

 

The most surprising loaner car has been the last one: Leland is allowing me to drive his 2015 Jeep Wrangler Rubicon until I get my truck fixed.  He is even allowing me to put my kids and dog in it (!).  I never thought I’d see the day when this would happen, but it just goes to show that he loves me after all.  In return, I changed all of his radio presets to the most obscure foreign-language stations I could find.  Hey!  Maybe he’ll learn Russian now!

Mess with Your Kids and Your Car Will Explode

ED: There's still a bit of a "tick" in the engine, so we won't be getting our car back anytime soon.  It's stuck at the beach awaiting official diagnosis and repair, and we are stuck praying that this won't cost us an arm and a leg.  Sheesh.

Holiday weekends are the WORST time to travel: it’s a billion degrees outside, traffic is bumper-to-bumper, and all you want to do is get where you’re going (rather than enjoying the journey) because there’s usually a barbeque or family or something fun on the other end of the drive.

I honestly dream of a time when we’ll do road trips, rather than destination trips.  We drive to visit family, but we don’t ever drive just to see the world.  Someday, someday, I’ll force my boys to take trips south or east or north (probably not west, as I get horribly seasick) with only vague destinations in mind, stopping at every roadside lookout and viewpoint and attraction along the way.  Every time we drive home I think, I wonder if that restaurant is any good or I hear that there is an amazing park in this town.  Someday…

Until that day, though, we are destination travelers.  We drive to get places.  We have three small children and a dog and THANK GOD they are all male because of THE PEEING.  When we left on Thursday to head to Ilwaco for Independence Day, I made sure that every seat had a water bottle within reach.  Charles sits alone in the way back (the way-way back is the trunk space, creative namers that we are), so I put a 24-ounce sports bottle of cold water there with him.  When we got close to the rest area outside of Arlington (20 minutes from home), I asked if anyone needed to go potty.  Charles did, so we stopped.  And then he had to go again in Everett (another 20 minutes down the road); luckily, we were very close to the Everett rest area.  Then, as we were tooling along I-405 (yet another 20 minutes later), he had to go AGAIN.  We managed to pull off the freeway just in time for him to water some bushes and I scrambled to the back of the car to check.  Yep.  He drank his entire water bottle in the first hour on the road.

Traffic really wasn’t horrible on Thursday, and we made decent time, but the weather was excruciating.  Our van registered 97 degrees in Olympia.  We had to get Taco Time drive-thru so we could go to a park because there was no way the dog could stay in the car while we ate lunch.  The van’s air conditioner, which is rarely used, was on nearly constantly for five hours.  The heat and long drive clearly took a big toll on the vehicle when a problematic oil hose burst, spewing engine oil EVERYWHERE.

We had made it almost to Raymond and were driving up and down the twisty hills just south of the Pacific County border.  I was in the drivers seat and we were entertaining the kids the best way we knew how: messing with them.  Jamie had asked me to “look, mommy! I have ten fingers!”  To which I replied, “Do you know how many fingers I have, Jamie?” 

Charles, from the back, “She has the same as you, Jamie.”

Tony, sensing the mischief in my voice: *Sideways glance, like “what kind of bullshit are you going to feed them now?”*


Jamie: “Ten?”

Me: “Nope.  I have fifteen.  Want to see?”

At this point, I held up my right hand for him to see, palm facing the windshield while Jamie counted, “one, two, free, four, five.”  Then, I put my right hand on the wheel and reached across my body with my left hand.  “Six, seven, eight, nine, ten!”  Then, I grabbed the wheel with my left hand and put my right hand up again, palm facing the back of the car this time. “Eleven, telve, fourteen, fourteen, fifteen!”

Cue the mad giggling.

Then I told them that Tony had twelve fingers, so Tony was forced to participate in my game, holding up an extra finger for each hand so he had six each time Jamie counted.  Charles couldn’t stand it and was yelling at us that we were lying, LYING!, from the way back.

And then, all of a sudden, into the chaos of a happy family in remarkably good spirits for being hour five into a six-hour trip, the engine started making a VERY funny noise, like when you accidentally suck a shoelace into a vacuum cleaner and the aglet hits the side with every turn of the beater or like a baseball card in the spokes of a bicycle, but louder.  I turned everything off and then pulled over.

There was oil dripping from the passenger’s side front wheel well and oil all down the side of the van.  We were toast.  The boys peed in the woods, we thanked our lucky stars that we were in a shaded area and that it was now only 85 degrees, and I called AAA.  Not for the first time, and probably not for the last, I was happy that I pay the $130 annual fee for this great service (plus, I like the AAA magazine) (I know that sounds boring, but it’s really good, I swear).



We read to the boys and kept the dog out of the sun while we waited for the tow truck and my dad and Tony’s mom to come rescue us (five people and a dog and our stuff are too much for conventional vehicles).  Upwards of 10 cars stopped within that hour to ask us if we were okay or needed water or anything – people are fundamentally good and want to help others, I think.  See how I just turned this into a feel-good story?



Fortunately, my dad has a lift in his garage and he, Tony, and my father-in-law were able to quickly identify the problem.  We had a new oil hose shipped and dad made the part swap last night.  For now, I am driving my parents’ hulking 2001 Chevy Suburban around town.  For years I have fought against driving big cars, and now I am driving the biggest.  How thankful I am that they had a vehicle that would fit three car seats across the back to loan to us.  Pedestrians and small vehicles beware, however.

And you know what?  The trip home was completely uneventful.  It probably had something to do with the fact that we left at 9 AM.  From now on, we will ALWAYS leave early to avoid the headache.  That is, until we’re in a position to take the scenic route home and stop at all the attractions.

We Camp; We Are Campers

We took our brood camping last weekend, and conned five other families with young children into joining us.  Oh, we didn’t go far: just 45 minutes away to Deception Pass State Park.  But it was far enough to completely remove ourselves from the stress of running businesses and households.

 

    

I want my boys to grow up camping.  My family camped when I was young (my kids’ age), but it was not something we continued to do when we moved to Washington.  The family reunion was held in our hometown and my parents had a job (owning and managing a 50—room hotel) that kept them extremely busy.  When we did vacation, it was often to conferences so that they could learn how to improve their businesses and we could visit Disneyland.  As far as I know, Tony and his family never camped.

 

 

Let me be clear: I am not complaining.  Those trips my parents took us on as kids were great, even when they were horrible (Hwy 1 in California will make you sick, every time, and sullen teenagers are THE WORST).  But the way Tony and I have structured our careers means that we can take more time off than our parents did.  My hope is that we will do the hotel trips to Disneyland, Williamsburg, D.C., Boston, New York, etc, and that we will also camp frequently.

 

 

Camping is less expensive than the hotel trips and, to me, more relaxing.  When we “do” stuff camping, we go to the beach, hike, kayak, make s’mores, and spend hours talking with friends.  When we vacation to a destination like New York City, we spend our time going from place to place, tourist site to tourist site.

 

 

It is a lot of work.  Packing, unpacking, cleaning, realizing halfway home that, no, you shouldn’t stop at Starbucks because you haven’t showered in three days and you couldn’t smell yourself back at the campsite, but now you can and, hoo boy, you stink.  However, I think it’s worth it for the time spent with friends, relaxing outside, and s’mores.  Damn, I love s’mores.

 

 

Camping teaches us to make the best of things without all the sanitized conveniences of home (dropped your hotdog on the ground?  Give it another turn over the fire and eat it anyway).  You get dirty and there are no TVs, so you’re forced to hold conversations.  It’s a great opportunity for kids to learn new games and explore nature, even if it’s “state park nature.”  And I just LOVE group camping with friends.  Not much makes me happier in this life than a big group of people all hanging out together, sharing food and stories.  And s’mores.

 

 

Come camping with us, for real.  We’re going again as soon as I can talk everyone into it.