Real Conversations (perhaps TMI)

Henry:  Hey, Mommy!  I found a rocket.  Wook! In his hand he is holding an empty tampon applicator*.

Me:  Ummmm, Henry.  That is not a rocket.  That is trash.  Please throw it away.  He obediently threw it away. 

So I continued to wash dishes.

Henry:  Wook, Mommy!  He returns to the kitchen twirling something above his head.  He is very proud of himself.  I made the trash wocket shoot this out.  It's a ghost on a string! 

I couldn't help myself, I burst out laughing. 

Me:  Nope, Henry.  That's trash too.  Please throw it away.

Henry:  (very sad) So it's not a ghost on a string?

Me:  Nope.  Trash.

*Yes.  It was a clean one.

It should also be noted that this afternoon he connected two towers he built with legos with a sanitary napkin. 

Henry: Look, Mommy!  Thomas is going over the bwidge I built with the sticky sticker!
Me: (once again revelling in my stellar parenting) Where did you get that sticky sticker, Henry? 
Henry:  The diaper bag?
Me:  Henry, put the sticky sticker in the trash.  And the diaper bag is also Mommy's purse, so please don't go in there without permission. 
Henry:  Oh-kay.  And then he put the sticky sticker in the trash.  But not before affixing it to his shirt.

I'm not dead (or Gilligan's Island Three hour tour Road trip)...

I've just been on vacation.  And reprioritizing my time (as in enjoying my last weeks of playtime with Henry before school starts). 

But the following will begin my recap of my most recent vacation...I wrote it en route to the beach. 
************************************************************************************

Still full from the previous night’s 6th Anniversary dinner extraordinaire—Fried Green Tomato Beignets, Filet Mignon wrapped in Applewood smoked bacon, Grilled asparagus, and Bananas Foster, and oh, yeah, a bottle of Veauve Cliquot—this morning began wonderfully. I awoke super excited about the summer’s last hurrah—our family vacation to Litchfield. Weren’t we just at the beach, you ask? Yes. But it was a last minute vacay planned with the in-laws and so Sloan had to work the week and was gone on business for three days of it. And let’s just say it’s not really a vacation if you can’t burp in front of your fellow vacationers. (I did not blog about that trip in order to protect the guilty, err, me.) And to add to the excitement (or insanity, depending upon how you look at it), we invited 2 of my sister’s kids to join in on the fun. That’s right, we intentionally added a seven year old and another 3 year to the mix. It is either pure genius or pure lunacy…I’ll let you know in a week.


I’ve spent the last week rewashing all our bathing suits and beach towels, packing snacks, making lists and checking them twice. Seriously. Lots of lists. On post-it notes. Typed and printed. On the backs of napkins and receipts as I thought of things. We’ve got snacks, games, sticker books, toys, stuffed animals, loveys, blankets, a mattress (for the pack and play), bottles, candy, formula, baby food, pull-ups, diapers, no less than 15 trains, sand toys, pillows, and sunscreen. I even packed it neatly so that it all fit into our car with the third row in without interfering with looking out the back window.

My sister arrived with Jonathan and Isabel around 8:45. Our goal was to leave around 9 so that we’d arrive at the beach around 3. Plenty of time to hit the grocery store, unpack, and still get to the pool and lazy river. As we were putting in the kids booster seats, we learned that 2 full back boosters and one backless booster seat do not fit into the third row of a Suburban. We needed to have all three of the big kids in the back row so that we could fold down one of the captain’s chairs for stuff. And for optimal movie viewing. So Sonya and I dashed off to the Target around the corner to get Isabel a backless booster, seeing as she’ll be 4 years old in two weeks anyhow. That’s cool, officer, right? But even with the backless booster, it still takes an act of God and Congress to get all three seats in and buckled. Which makes potty stops a bear. It literally takes fifteen minutes just to wedge the three kids in the back. We will be doing some rearranging once we get to beach. Anywho….

We were finally wheels up around 9:45. No biggie, still time to have a poolside picnic dinner. We decided we’d have lunch in Rocky Mount, NC around 11:45 or so.

Well, you know what they say, right…The best laid plans of mice and men and all that jazz…

We’re barreling down I-95, making pretty good time, the kids are watching Mary Poppins (which my niece Isabel knows all the words to every song, or at least the phonetic corresponding sounds to all the songs…BONUS). Sloan and I are talking about how wonderful the past 6 years have been (because it IS our anniversary), what we want to get at the grocery store, when Sloan suddenly asks, “Hey, did you get the keys?”

“What keys?” I ask.

“The keys to the beach house.”

Oh. My. Gosh.

“Mother Effer!!!!! Are you kidding me? I remembered to pack seven different types of chips and I didn’t pack the damn keys?”

“You really didn’t grab them?”

“No. I really didn’t grab them. Did you?”

“No. I thought about asking about them this morning but got sidetracked by a poopy diaper.”

I am pretty sure by this time my blood pressure was lethal. And the worst of it was that I had no one to blame but myself. And by this time, we’d just crossed into North Carolina. “We’ve got to go back. We’ll need the keys to the owner’s closets and the golf cart.”

We pulled into the nearest rest stop, took the kids in to go to the bathroom, and then struggled to get them strapped back in (a stop that took no less than an additional twenty minutes). I may or may not have told my child to stop whining about having to hold my hand as we crossed the street or I was really going to give him something to whine about. I may or may not have told my son that I just didn’t have the patience to deal with him wanting a juice box because I was the stupidest flipping person on the planet and causing us to have to drive three (really four) hours out of our way. I may or may not have told all three of the children that the week was probably going to be horrible as I had planned it and I am an idiot.

Sloan told me to go sit down as the giant cross on my back was making it difficult to strap the kids in.

So we turned around and headed back home. As we’re driving back to Richmond, the kids start with the how long is it going to be until we get there junk. And at this point, we literally aren’t even going in the direction of the beach. I thought I was going to lose it. Sloan claims that by this point I’d already lost it. Fortunately, Jonathan had an answer to this—“Isabel, don’t ask that. When you start seeing palm trees, then you’ll know we’re near the beach.” Sweet Jon-o-fun.

As we drove home, I stewed in my self-disappointment. Sloan seemed unphased, which honestly, pissed me off. I told him, “I don’t want you to be compassionate. I screwed up. Big time. I want you to be mad at me. I remembered to pack four books for myself, but couldn’t remember to grab the daggone keys.”

“For one, we both forgot the keys. Two, would my being mad at you help? I think you’re mad enough for the both of us. And I don’t think taking it out on the kids is helping the situation, either.”

“Don’t start on me for taking it out on the kids. Does it help you to take it out on us when you have a bad day at work?” I snapped back. Because it is much easier to point out someone else’s flaws instead of dealing with my own.

“Honey, it’s fine. We’re in no rush. We’ll get the keys. We’ll go through some drive thrus. It’ll all get done. Besides, didn’t you say that we forgot to grab Henry’s night-light?”

“Screw the night lights. I made all those dang lists and not once did I write down “Pack keys.” Packing the keys didn’t cross my mind once. What the heck is my problem? I’ve single handedly ruined the first day of our vacation. AND I’m going to have to go the grocery store by myself tonight once the kids are in bed.”

“Well,” Sloan said, “it is going to be difficult to push the cart while simultaneously flogging you. But that seems to be an adequate punishment.”

And this, my friends, is why I married him six years ago. He was able to a) point out my sin in a way that didn’t crush me, and b) make me laugh. Not many people can do this. Sure. I made a mistake. Because I am human. But what really was chapping my hide was the fact that God was serving me a heaping piece of humble pie. But having Sloan for a husband at least made the humble pie a la mode.

It was one o’clock when we pulled back into our driveway. We hit the McDonald’s drive thru on the way back and I climbed back in the back to give Gracie some food and a bottle. The children had already watched the entire movie Mary Poppins before we even left Richmond the second time. We made the kids stay in the car as we did the mad dash for the keys and night-lights.

The entire trip back, I said things like “oh look, there’s the rest stop we peed at when we’d first noticed I’m incompetent,” or “Hmmm, it is the second time today we’ve crossed into North Carolina at precisely the time the Magellan said we’d be getting to the beach the first time around,” or, when passing South of the Border, “Pedro sez who leaves for vacation and forgets the keys.”

The good news of the situation is that McDonald’s has pretty good happy meal toys—Marvel comic figurines for boys and Madame Alexander dolls for girls. And did you know you can buy extra toys for a dollar so your 3 year old girl doesn’t have to share her Dolly with your 10 month old who really only wants to gnaw on it?

So a 6 hour car trip with four kids turned into a ten hour car trip with five kids (I’m including myself in this count). Sloan would probably say that having him be the responsible adult in any situation is problematic, but this time it worked. In total, the kids watched Mary Poppins, Space Chimps, The Princess and the Frog, and G-Force. I rode shotgun in a pool of self-loathing pity typing furiously on my laptop.

It took all of Sunday for me to relax about what a boob I was for forgetting the keys. I probably won’t ever forget them again.

Next time, I’ll probably forget to pack my underwear.

Is it me?

Or does the book title "The Complete Idiot's Guide to Connecting with Your Angels" seem a bit redundant?

10 Months

Sweet, sweet Grace.

You bless me everyday with your smile, hugs, and cheery disposition.

Do you see her two new teeth?

They came in last week while at the beach with the grandparents.  The tooth tally is now at 4.

Gracie is the most laid back child I've ever seen.  She doesn't let a little thing liked missed naps or meals bother her.  Which makes her a wonderful traveler.  She'll sleep in pack and play, a car seat, a lap, a high chair, a stroller.  I think she gets this from her father as I, well, let's just say I'm a little more Princess and the Pea...

When she is hungry, she does cry a little bit.  But not in the whiny battle cry that is your typical baby crying for food.  Rather she sticks out her bottom lip, flares her little nostrils, slowly releasing crocodile tears, and just sort of whimpers, as if to say, "I am the saddest, hungriest baby in the world.  Oh won't you pretty please feed me?"  So, of course, we oblige her.

Her favorite food is sweet potatoes with cinnamon.  When she eats then she shakes with delight and says, "MMMMM!"  and even claps her hands.

She claps her hands quite often.  This is vastly different than Henry.  Gracie constantly wants to interact with us and so often claps when we speak to her, sing to her, or put her in her high chair.  She also likes to clap to music. 

Which brings me to her real love: dancing.  She claps to the beat and sort of rocks back and forth.  She raises her hands in the air like she just doesn't care.  She raises the roof.  She hops along the floor and squeals with delight.  And when trapped in her car seat, she rocks back and forth and slaps her thighs.  It is awesome.  Her favorites Stevie Wonder and the Black Eyed Peas.  But she'll dance to anything--be it the commercials on TV, Henry singing a song, or the noise from a toy.

She adores to crawl over Henry and she doesn't even mind when he crawls all over her.  Henry also likes to pretend to ride her as she crawls,  straddling her and waddling as she moves along, saying "Yeehaw!  Giddy up Gracie!"  I used to discourage this, saying, "Henry, it is never appropriate to ride your sister."  But he's now taken to standing while doing it rather than actually sitting on her.  And, well, I've just sort of given up.  I figure if she minded she wouldn't be giggling and making fart noises.

She cruises around all the furniture and will walk when holding our hands.  She walks on her tippy toes.  She especially loves to stand holding on to the couch and bounce up and down.  She also jumps up and down in her crib while holding onto the railing.  She has also begun to let go and stand for a few seconds before plopping down on her behind.  I predict she'll be walking by Halloween. 

She waves occasionally.  And she doesn't just do a little hand flapping.  She raises her hand up above her head as if she is flagging someone down.  In truth, she first learned this behavior from Curious George. (I imagine that many of her talents and favorites will be directly related to her older brother's favorites.)

Violet (9), Gracie, me, and Bo (7) at the beach. Gracie and Violet became the best of friends.

She continues to draw attention wherever we go.  She shamelessly flirts with every man within a 20 foot radius.  I've tried explaining that anyone older than 3 years old is too old for her, but she doesn't seem to listen.  She also adores her cousins and aunts.  While she is not a big fan of either set of grandparents (which just makes me feel horrible), she does adore her Aunts Sonya and Holly.  She also can't get enough of Violet, Rachel, or Caleb. 

But, in the end, she prefers her Mommy.  Which just melts my heart.  I think it is her femaleness versus Henry's maleness.  Henry could go days without human contact.  I could just set out Zbars and Capri Suns and he'd be happy as a clam to play trains or Legos by himself.  (Just this morning he told me he couldn't come down to breakfast because he needed to play trains by himself in his room.  He said, "I just need 5 more minutes of me time and den I can hewp you."  Hmmm.....wonder where he heard that?)  But Gracie is the opposite.  She'll play with toys by herself, but only if she can see me, Sloan, or Henry.  

And despite her constant nearness, she has yet to find her "inside voice".  She has begun to constantly babble.  In various ear piercing tones.  Sometimes I think she is just practicing her scales.  Other times she seems to be calling butterflies.  And other times, it is to get our attention, channeling her inner Elizabeth Edwards, screaming "LOOK AT ME!!!"   

Well, my darling Margaret Grace, it is my joy to look at you.

Figure Eight

At the beach with the in-laws.

Six adults.  Five children--Violet (9), Bo (7), Gigi (3), Henry (3), Gracie (10 months).  12 bottles of wine. 3 lap tops.  1 Ipad.  4 Ipods.  1 Kindle.  Too many bags of chips, cheetos, Doritos, Cheez-its, popcorn, pretzels to count.  It's a bit like Costco threw up here.  3 Ginormo holes dug in the sand courtesy of Uncle Marshall.  1 time Sloan forgot to put a swim diaper on Gracie and she pooped in her swimsuit. 

Good times. 

The best part?  I haven't worn shoes all day.  And tomorrow's not looking good for shoes either.

Just Singing in the Rain...

Sorry for the foginess of the pics.  Couldn't wipe the lens fast enough. 

Dancing in puddles ...

So thankful the thunder finally stopped so we could enjoy the shower.

Boys and their trucks...after playing in the drain pipe.  That's right--my son was playing in the gutter.

And now we must swing in the rain...

Are you kidding me?

Yeah...  I have the cutest kids on the planet.  And what is even more dear is how they love each other.