DuMontelle Daily

Matthew At The Lake

2011-05-04T09:23:00.001-05:00

There's no question, at least in my mind (and in the minds of the speech and occupational therapists that work with Matthew twice a week at our local elementary school) that Matthew has sensory issues. I've known it since he was tiny. It was nice to finally have other people see what I've seen for so long and not try to write it off as being 'quirky.'

It becomes blatantly apparent, though, when you take him to the lake. Especially when the water isn't exactly calm and it's not exactly warm. This time, there wasn't very much wind, and that really helped. But as soon as we stepped onto the sand, Matthew started to fuss and even cry a little.

"There's sand in my sandals!" That's okay, Matthew - that's why they're called SAND-als. "It's too loud!" Try putting your hood up and see if that helps. "I want to leave this place!" Let's just sit on this log for a few minutes and see if we can see any boats in the water, and play with your toys.

So we sat on the log. It was probably 30 feet from the water, but Matthew was still wary. I assured him over and over again that we weren't going swimming and not getting wet at all. And we sat.

And then I took off my shoes. The sand was warm and soft against my skin. I showed Matthew how I could wiggle my toes into the sand to bury them. And he took off his shoes, too! And after a moment of hesitation, he put them in the sand and wiggled his toes like me. And the issues just ... melted away.

I left the log. Scooted my way across the sand, about 3 feet, toward some rocks and shells that were nearby. Matthew followed with his little toy action figures that he had brought with him. He played with them in the sand, burying them and digging them up. Making them talk to each other and having adventures. He dug his hands deep into the dry sand and found the damp sand underneath. He made a road.

I scooted a little farther away, and Matthew followed; he never left my side. So I stood up, walked toward the water a little, and we looked for pretty rocks and intact shells. The noise of the water was just too much for him, though, so I told him to find a place to play on the beach where he was comfortable and that I would be there in a minute to play with him. And that's all it took to detach him from my hip. He found a nice little spot, plunked himself down, and played for 10 minutes without me. This is an advantage of going to the lake when it's 50 degrees outside - there was NOBODY else there. We had it all to ourselves.

After a few more minutes, it was time to head home. We gathered our things together and carried our shoes. It seems that as long as he doesn't get sand in his shoes, he doesn't mind walking in the sand. I will know next time to have him take off his shoes before we take a single step on the sand - we'll see if that helps his mood at the beginning. If it doesn't, that's okay. I know I can help him enjoy the beach, even if he is worried when we first get there.

And I know there will be a next time, because he asked me as we were leaving, "Can we come back on a different day, please?" And he was all smiles.

Quote of the Day - 05/02/11

2011-05-03T10:03:00.004-05:00

"To live is the rarest thing in the world. Most people exist, that is all."
— Oscar Wilde

I can't agree enough with this statement, especially for my own self. How long have I sat here, just waiting for circumstances to change so that I can live my life? What a convoluted life I've been 'living.'

I'm not waiting anymore for things to be 'just right' so that I can stop merely existing. I'm not going to look forward to that anymore, but rather try to embrace life now, while I can.

When I'm done posting this entry, I'm turning off this computer. I'm packing a picnic lunch and driving my son to the beach in Indiana. It's not good swimming weather, but that doesn't mean we can't enjoy the sand.

An Interesting Day Out

2011-04-28T08:45:00.005-05:00

First, I know it's been a while. I could lie and say I've been terribly busy and haven't had a chance to post. But the truth is that I gained some weight back, gave up the effort, and was too embarrassed to post. I am going to get back on track, though. Ugh.

Anyway, yesterday the kids and I ran errands. They are on Spring Break from school and I've been trying to keep them busy since it's done nothing but rain the whole week so far. We started out at Walt's, a local chain of grocery stores where there were a few good deals on the front of their sales ad. Instead of trying to navigate the store with a crowd of kids, and constantly directing and distracting them from bored behaviors, I split them up and sent them on food-finding missions of their own.

It was an amazing success! I kept Matthew with me since he's only 4, but gave the girls each a short list and a carrying basket and told them to find me when they were done; I saved the produce and meat for myself. I honestly don't think we've been in and out of a store in such a short amount of time. It was awesome!

Way at the end of the walkway outside of the store there is a mail-drop box, and I just happened to have a letter to mail. So I ... gasp ... let Matthew out of the van to drop the mail in the box. There were two cars parked there with women inside, maybe waiting for their shopping partners to be done in the store. The horrified looks that I got from those women ... wow! Jaws hanging open, eyes wide. Matthew got down from the van, looked both ways before stepping out, crossed the 10 feet of pavement and mailed the letter, turned around, looked both ways, crossed again, got in the van, put on his straps, and off we went. I'm not sure those women will ever be the same. Clearly they have never given their young child a smidgeon of independence. I thought for sure they'd smile at his absolute cuteness, especially after he completed the task with no harm to him at all. But no - they still looked pretty traumatized when I pulled away.

We moved on to the next store, where I again separated the kids and sent them on missions. Hannah and Clara went together this time and I gave them a list of heavy stuff so that they'd need to use a cart. I did feel a little more self-conscious this time and I did notice a look from someone as we were splitting the lists up. But you know what? I just don't care. If I don't teach them how to do this stuff, how will they learn? I think it's important to tell them, "No, that's not the right cheese, you have to go back and find the cheese that I put on your list." I think it's ok to tell them that if they can't find something they are looking for, to ask a worker politely for help. I don't want them to grow up having never done this stuff - it should be natural for them to feel ok and confident at a store.

And they were so proud of themselves. They navigated the store, found the right items with only the cheese as a send-back, successfully used a cart and/or basket, and didn't freak out just because I wasn't in their direct line of sight for 15 minutes. It puts all of the, "Watch where you're going, look out for people, stay out of the way, don't swing the basket like that or you'll hit someone" and other of the usual grocery store lectures to the test. Guess what - if you swing the basket like that, and you hit someone, and mommy isn't standing right next to you to take care of it, then you have a problem that you have to deal with yourself. Even if you're only 9. No, that didn't happen. Well, I assume it didn't; I wasn't there to watch every second. I didn't hear about it when we met up again so ...

I know people who won't let their children play in their gated, privacy-fenced backyard without constant adult supervision. Not tiny kids, either. Older kids - 8 and 9 years old. These kids have never been unsupervised - ever. It wouldn't surprise me if they still get help in the bathroom. I'm not kidding - I know women who still control the toilet paper in their houses when their kids are SIX, because their kids don't do a good enough job of it themselves. Someone told me the other day that children are not cognitively capable of crossing a street until they are 8 years old.

That was a tangent and a slight rant, sorry.

After our grocery shopping escapades, the kids and I went out to lunch at Pizza Hut. This is going to sound ridiculous, sorry in advance. The waitress seriously teared up when the kids ordered their drinks. Because they politely and individually said, "I would like chocolate milk, please" while looking directly at her and smiling. She actually asked me if I beat them to make them so polite. The disturbing part of this is that on Tuesday, when I took the kids to the dentist for our appointments, one of the ladies in the office asked me the same thing - if I beat them to make them so well-behaved and polite. What?!

Am I the only person out there who is teaching the kids to be polite and respectful, and how to behave even when they aren't being constantly entertained? I don't mean to offend anyone at all, and hope that it doesn't come across that way. Maybe it's just around here - everyone just seems so surprised when kids have good manners. Of course they are not perfect and everyone has good days and bad days, but still. It's a little crazy. Matthew's speech therapist once told me that in all her years of being a speech therapist, she had never heard a child say, "You're welcome" after she said, "Thank you." Seriously?!

I swear I am not bragging; that is not the intent of this post at all. Goodness knows that my kids are no where near perfect - wow, we have had some days!!!!!!!

I just think it's a little weird that people are so amazed that kids even can behave. It seems to mean that everyone has lowered their expectations of kids, so that when they are rotten at a store it's somehow ok because we don't expect anything more of kids anyway. Maybe I'm wrong, though. Maybe there is some magic age where kids are all of a sudden aware of their behavior and they decide on their own in some amazing fashion that they are going to start being good. I don't know. I don't think I'm going to risk that one.

Weight Loss Wednesday - Week 3; Blizzard 2011

2011-02-02T17:05:00.008-06:00

I did pretty good this week. I played Just Dance 2 on the Wii with the kids two days in a row. It was really, really fun! And a great workout.

Then I made peanut butter fudge. And ate it. A lot. And then I made Swedish Meatballs and ate rice with it. A lot.

Nevertheless, the scale this morning said xx2.2. Not quite the xx1.9 that I wanted, but not too far off and less than last week so I think it still counts as progress. Goal for next Wednesday, xx1.7 - a half pound loss.

Today, after Tyler dug out his squad car with the snow shovel, I helped him push it out of the driveway. His front tires were spinning and he just couldn't get any traction. We put a cedar plank under his tire (um - I had to go find the pile of cedar planks under two feet of snow on the back patio - yeah.) He finally was able to rock the car onto the plank and then was spinning on the plank! So I dug in and gave it a big push from the front. You should have seen the look of, "You're crazy - that will never work!" on Tyler's face when I braced myself. And yet ... off he went. (Insert applause and back pats here.)

Afterward, I shoveled the car out just in case we had an emergency and had to go somewhere. Like the mall.

Totally kidding. About the mall; not about the shoveling. That is some hard work, I'll tell you what! I was fine while I was shoveling but I don't think I let my body cool off gradually enough - it was like an adrenaline dump.

Later in the afternoon, I shoveled out the front walk and the front steps for the mailman, who never came. And when I was done with that, I shoveled out our neighbor's sidewalk and front walkway because she is 85 and was out there trying to do it herself.

And then I died.

Not really. But I did make a snow angel. And drink two cans of Diet Pepsi.

Hopefully, all of that exercise will pay off. I still have to dig out the van, which will be a huge job since the plows came through and buried it. I think I'll do that tomorrow.

Total loss since Thanksgiving - 15.8 pounds. :)

8 Hours From Now...

2011-01-27T09:34:00.002-06:00

...the pork butt roast will be finished in the crock pot. I put it on two hours ago and it is just starting to smell good.

Simple, simple recipe - stick a pork butt roast in the crock pot and add a small bottle of your favorite barbecue sauce. Cook 8-10 hours on low. After that time, shred the meat with a couple of forks, remove the bone and any big hunks of fat, and then heat it through again if it cooled off too much while you were shredding it. I'll offer hamburger buns to the family tonight but I think I'll skip the bread, myself. We're having fresh cauliflower and baked sweet potatoes as sides.

The best part? I found this pork roast on sale at the store because it was approaching the sell by date. The cost was only $11.50 for an 8 pound roast. Eight pounds!!! The first thing I'm going to do is put half of it in the freezer for a future meal.

Weight Loss Wednesday - Week 2

2011-01-27T09:22:00.005-06:00

I know I am a day late. I thought about skipping it but then decided that would constitute hiding, and that's not who I am. Embarrassed, yes. Cowardly, no.

I stood on the scale yesterday and was sad to see xx5.4. Up instead of down. :(
This morning it said xx3.7 so it's at least going back in the right direction. My weight seems to fluctuate a lot day by day. I'd like to see it keep coming down, of course.

I know what happened, though. Our grocery budget got tight and I did the 'responsible' thing by cooking from our pantry instead of spending money that we don't have at the store. Well, in our pantry were 3 boxes of pasta and a bag of rice. Carbs anyone? Clearly my body reacts unfavorably to this type of eating. Tyler, on the other hand, lost weight this week. Unfair!!

Thankfully, yesterday was payday and our fridge and pantry are stocked again with some better choices. I bought several bulk packages of meat and split them up into more reasonable servings and froze them. I think that will help a lot.

Goals for this week:

Get back to Taekwondo. I still haven't managed this one yet.
Keep climbing the stairs at school. I'm doing very well with this.
Skip snacks or at least choose wisely.
Have only one can of diet Pepsi per day.
Pack a lunch for school on Friday since I am there all day.
Stick to the meal plan!
xx1.9 on the scale next week.

Me and You Day

2011-01-20T11:11:00.004-06:00

Yay, it's Me and Matthew Day!

With the new semester, we are lucky enough to have two Me and You Days every week - Tuesday and Thursday. Mondays are reserved for Daddy while I'm at school, and he has half-day preschool on Wednesdays and a full day on Fridays. I like Fridays at this school because there are a lot fewer kids enrolled that day so he gets a lot of quality time.

So far today we have played Sorry Spin and Sorry Sliders. We had a candy cane (well, he had a candy cane - I pocketed mine 'for later.') We went to a grocery store that we don't usually go to since I found a gift card that had a remaining balance. I don't know if they're having a sale or something, but I found great prices in their meat section so I stocked up on some stuff to make this week. I also ran across a huge box of Cheerios that was half price just because the box was torn up. The inner bag was completely fine and sealed. Now, we're watching Blue's Clues on Netflix; soon we'll have lunch.

I know it probably sounds boring to some people, but we just love these days that are so laid back. After lunch, he'll play quietly by himself and I'll get some homework done. Since he's our last baby, I know all too well that before I know it, he'll be in school all day and it will be a lot harder to find time to do these little things together. I'm treasuring this time with him.

How to Get Compliments on Your Hair

2011-01-19T21:06:00.002-06:00

I have the kinkiest, curliest hair of anyone I know. It's always been really hard to manage and to be honest, it hardly ever looks nice. It's ok - I know this about myself and it's something I have come to terms with. My hair is never going to look like those women on the shampoo commercials, you know? It doesn't swing around when I turn my head and it doesn't cascade down when you lift it up and let it fall.

Anyway, yesterday I got TWO compliments during the day about my hair. Very unusual! So I had to think back and see what I had done that was different. I should sell this information for one *billion* dollars, but you guys are my friends so I will tell you the secret for free.

While in the shower, realize that you are almost out of shampoo. Open the bottle, add a little water to the half-teaspoon of shampoo that is in there, swirl it around, and pour it onto your head. It's not enough to lather much, but it's shampoo so your hair is clean, right?
Get out of the shower, dry off, get dressed, and then get distracted before you even get a comb through it.
Twenty minutes before you are supposed to be somewhere that is fifteen minutes away, run some leave-in conditioner through your hair, add a little water, and hope for the best.
Have the best hair day of your life; enjoy the compliments!

I really don't get it, LOL. I didn't think it looked all that special but apparently I was having a good hair day for a change. I'll take it!

Weight Loss Wednesday - Week 1

2011-01-19T07:08:00.003-06:00

Wow, I can't believe it has been a whole week already.

I did terrible with my goals this week. I ate cookies instead of fruit. I bought fruit, but every time I went to have a piece, it had already been vultured by the other 5 people who live here (ha ha!) I guess I need to buy it in bigger quantities. Or find a better hiding spot. (Just kidding ... mostly!)

I took the elevator at school last night (I was almost late for my first class.) I didn't go to Taekwondo class or the free fit class on Monday. I didn't play anything on the Wii and I didn't eat breakfast, ever.

I did make sure that we were eating healthy dinners almost every night. Everything cooked from scratch and plenty of veggies. My favorite meal by far this week was the meatloaf we had last night. No potatoes which was a little sad, but we lived without them. :)

So, at Thanksgiving, I weighed xy8.0 (the y is for one higher number than it is right now.) Last week the scale said xx5.8 and my goal was to see xx5.0 this morning. I didn't have much hope after my failed goal attempts, but was thrilled to see xx2.4 when I stepped on the scale a few minutes ago. A total loss, since Thanksgiving, of over 15 pounds. :)

Goal for today: climb the stairs at school today. Up and down. For both classes. Go to Taekwondo class.

Goal for next Wednesday: xx1.9 which is half of a pound.

Garden Planning and Books

2011-01-14T08:40:00.006-06:00

The snow is bright and thick on the ground outside, but I can't help but think about spring. I'm planning, just like I planned last year (haha), to build some raised beds and plant lots of veggies for the family to use. I have enough cedar planks to build either 3 or 4 beds (can't remember) and I have the equipment I need to preserve any excess veggies. Typical for me to plan the beginning and the end but leave the middle (where all the work is actually done) in limbo.

This year, my parents are planning on coming to help me with the middle part which I am SO grateful for. I don't know why I can't seem to just do it myself; I'm an independent person after all. But for some reason I feel like I get to a building block and just get stuck.

A book that I've been reading lately has given me a lot of great ideas for things we could do with our yard. It's called The Backyard Homestead: Produce all the food you need on just a quarter acre! and it's on sale at Amazon for $11. Another one that is on the list of books I'd like to read is One Magic Square: The Easy, Organic Way to Grow Your Own Food on a 3-Foot Square. It has good reviews and I like the idea of having someone else make up the garden plans. I'm just not good at that!

My newest gardening book is called Mini Farming: Self-Sufficiency on 1/4 Acre. It takes the backyard homestead one step further and shows how one could actually profit from what they can grow on just 1/4 acre of land. Our lot isn't that big, but I am enjoying reading it and dreaming of what I could do (if someone was there to help with the middle part, haha!)

Unfortunately, our village will not allow any livestock, so my grand scheme of keeping a couple of hens for eggs and meat just isn't going to work out. It's ok if the neighbors across the street have 5 huge, loud hound dogs, but Heaven forbid I have a couple of hens that would actually be beneficial to both our family and the soil. Anyway ... that's out.

In the mean time, I could be capitalizing on our cherry tree, pear tree, and the huge space we have available for growing things. Although I'm not a huge fan of where we live right now, we do have an amazing yard, and I've been really negligent in using it to its full advantage. The soil is very clay-heavy, which is why I decided last year to raise the beds and add my own good soil instead. I hope it works this year and that I can keep up with the maintenance!

Weight Loss Wednesday - Week 0

2011-01-12T09:00:00.003-06:00

Okay. I'm not a New Year Resolutions kind of person. My life isn't perfect by any means, but it's my thinking that I don't need a 'day on the calendar' to get me motivated to do something. If I didn't do it the other 364 days of the year, there is nothing special about January 1st that is going to make me change it now, know what I mean?

Anyway, the fact is that I am very overweight. I know this. I've known it for years. I have tried various things to try to fix it over the last few years, but all of them halfheartedly with little success.

Apparently, my own body has decided that it's time to get serious about losing some weight. Somehow, since Thanksgiving, I've lost 12 pounds. The only thing I changed was the amount of eating out I was doing. I took the kids out to lunch the other day and it had been so long since we went out that they actually thanked me for giving them such a special treat. It made it a really nice outing that everyone appreciated for what it was - a treat.

Today, I came across this entry on the blog of a member of a message board to which I belong. I was inspired to join her weight loss journey, although I don't think I am quite up to posting the whole number that I see on the scale. I think I'll just post the last two numbers, for instance xx0.0. Maybe eventually I will feel comfortable enough to share the whole thing.

I'm not going to "diet." I think that word has so many negative connotations that if I even start using it then I am signing myself up to fail. So I just want to make a few lifestyle changes that will benefit both myself as well as my family. Hopefully I'll have some success. Guess we'll find out next Wednesday when I post about this again.

Some goals for me during this adventure:

Eat at least one piece of fruit every day.
Get back to providing two vegetables with dinner every night.
Go to Taekwondo on Monday and Wednesday nights.
Attend the free fit class at Taekwondo on Monday nights with the girls, who already go (this is a really challenging fit class that does a lot of exercises from the 'plank' position. To be honest, I've never tried it because I'm afraid I'll have a heart attack while doing it!)
Play on the Wii twice a week. Doesn't have to be strenuous but it has to be something that isn't a sit-and-play game. The kids would love to play Wii Fit or Just Dance with me so this will be fun, I think.
Climb the stairs at school, even when I don't want to do it and my backpack is really heavy.
Incorporate a fun family outing once a month that involves physical activity, like bowling, ice skating, or just walking around the neighborhood.

So, what did the scale say this morning?
xx5.8

I would like to see xx5.0 next Wednesday. I think that is a reasonable short term goal.

Daydreaming of Someplace Warm

2011-01-11T14:01:00.004-06:00

On cold winter days, I like to daydream that I'm somewhere else. Don't get me wrong - I love the beauty of the new snow. As long as I don't have to shovel it, I don't even mind driving in it. I did however, shovel snow today, so I feel that I'm entitled to this daydream.

I'm at the beach. I'm laying in the sand, close enough to the water that the waves are washing up over my feet. I've got a novel and a cooler full of bottles of ice-cold water. Even though I'm at the beach, no sand ever gets in my bottle of water or caked around the lid of it. I have liberally applied sunscreen, so no worries. Plus, in my daydreams the sun is wonderfully warm but not hot enough to burn. And the water is right around 80 degrees. Hey - it's a dream, right? And while we're dreaming, my kids are somewhere else and I'm the only one on the beach. And I look fabulous; maybe I'm even wearing a bikini. Maybe not. ;) And my hair is straight and it moves around when I toss my head. You know, like on those ridiculous shampoo commercials.

I wile away the day reading and swimming and tanning (with lots of sunscreen and no worries about skin health.) I put on snorkeling gear and spend hours exploring on and under the water, marveling at the abundance of life in the ocean. Coming out of the water, I lay back on the sand and feel the warm sun dry my skin. There are no sand fleas, no annoying sea gulls; there is only me. And that motorboat.

Wait, motorboat? What? Wait, where am I? That's not a motorboat - That's the neighbor's snowblower. Dang. Back to reality.

Merry Christmas!

2010-12-26T22:11:00.002-06:00

This year, we traveled south to Missouri to visit my parents' farm for Christmas. My brother and sister-in-law and their two adorable daughters were coming as well. We arranged with Santa Claus, on Facebook of all places, to come to our house when we got home instead of on Christmas Eve, and prepared the kids for the change.

They took it really well! I like to think that the prospect of spending a week with Grandma and Papa, Uncle Brian and Aunt Amy, and two cousins whom they rarely see trumped the materialism of a traditional Christmas morning. They're pretty great kids if I do say so myself.

The kids were sent on a treasure hunt using our Garmin Handheld GPS Navigator. Between all of us, we have three of them that we use for geocaching. The younger kids found treasures that were closer to the house and easier to find, while the older two kids had clues leading them to more clues, eventually leading them to a treasure box full of little gifts and candies which was hidden under a tree root at the big pond in the sheep pasture. We had a good time, not only finding the treasure but also exploring the pond area.

The girls found a turtle shell that had been gnawed by an animal of some kind, as well as various rocks, tree nuts, animal tracks, pretty leaves, and other bits of nature that only a kid truly knows how to treasure. I'm glad they can still see the beauty in the natural world and I hope they will continue to do so forever.

John Denver said it best in his poem, Alfie the Christmas Tree, which you can see him recite here on YouTube.

"...You see, life is a very special kind of thing
Not just for a chosen few
But for each and every living, breathing thing
Not just me and you

So when you're at Christmas prayers this year
Alfie asked me if I'd ask you
Say a prayer for the wind and the water and the wood
And those who live there too."

Me and You Friday - 12/10

2010-12-11T19:33:00.003-06:00

Yesterday was "Me and You Day" with Matthew. I guess it sounds a little weird to dedicate a day as such, but Matthew is the kind of kid who likes to associate each day with something.

Weekends are when the girls are out of school.
Monday is Matthew and Daddy day, when he gets Tyler all to himself until the girls get home, and it's his Taekwondo day.
Tuesday is a short day at his school while I am in class.
Wednesday is a short day at his school while I study. It's also Taekwondo day.
Thursday is his long day at his school while I am in class and lab.
Friday is Me and You day.

He just needs to know what day it is (and with that comes What Time Is It? and Where Are We?) to keep himself centered. I bet he would like a calendar that he could mark the days with a big X to have a visual cue. Hmm ... maybe Santa will bring him something like that!

Anyway, yesterday was Me and You day. We headed down to Grammy's neck of the woods for lunch and then he and I went shopping together. He picked out some great little gifts for his sisters. Mancala for Hannah, Connect 4 x 4 for Clara, and Color Fillz for Rebecca.

And he picked out a coloring book for himself, ha ha. I colored with him for a while, and then he colored in that book the entire rest of the day, breaking only for supper! He was still coloring when it was time for lights out and when I got up in the moring, he was sitting in bed coloring again! He was dedicated, that is for sure. There are only a few pages left in the book that aren't colored but the desire to color has finally worn off.

Christmas Crackers

2010-12-11T16:16:00.002-06:00

When I was a very little girl, about 5 years old, my family lived in a town called Morton-in-Marsh in England. My dad was stationed at the Air Force base nearby. I don't remember much about England, but I do remember making brass rubbings at Westminster Abbey and I remember our next door neighbors, Mr. and Mrs. Lewis.

Mr. Lewis was an elderly gentleman who was (as I remember) soft-spoken. He wore cardigan sweaters and had a book about birds and their eggs that he used to let me look at when we would visit. We would sit together and look at the bird egg book and talk.

Anyway, one year Mr. and Mrs. Lewis invited us to Christmas. On the table were these Christmas crackers, which I had not seen before. Traditionally, two people each grasp one end and pull the cracker apart. With a POP, it cracks open and little trinkets and a paper hat are revealed. The person who ends up with the larger portion of the cracker will have good luck.

This year, I'm thinking of ordering some of these Christmas Crackers from Amazon. I think it would be a fun way of introducing my own kids to this fun English tradition.

I really think they would get a kick out of them!

Christmas Countdown - 12/1

2010-12-01T08:04:00.003-06:00

Day 1!

The girls woke up so excited to see a note in the pocket of Day 1 of the stocking. They were even more excited to feel a heavy box inside! Oh the joy of being able to actually open it before school! The note said:

Pancakes for
breakfast
AND
check back
later!

You would have thought I handed them each a $20 bill and took them to the candy store! They danced around and sang a little pancake song like they'd never had pancakes before today.

Can't wait to see them when they realize they're getting hot chocolate later!

Random Tuesday Thoughts - 11/30/10

2010-11-30T22:54:00.003-06:00

Even when you keep the game moving at a pretty fast speed, Monopoly is just one of those games that takes hours and hours to play. You'd think it would be easy to beat your 10, 9, and 7 year old daughters at the game, but they have way more money and properties than I do and Tyler is already bankrupt. We had to put everything in envelopes and call it a night; hopefully we can pick up where we left off sometime this week.
I don't know how I am going to get everything done this week. It's just too much and I am only one person and can only be in one place at a time.
My cats can finally come within a few feet of each other without hissing and growling. We've had them both for over a year now...
If I was smart, I would only have 6 bowls, 6 plates, 6 cups, 6 sets of silverware, 2 pans, 2 mixing bowls, and one serving dish. Then my kitchen wouldn't get so trashed. I should get rid of the rest of it.
It's not even officially winter yet and I'm already tired of the cold weather.
I finally found the three girls I spent so much time babysitting when I was a teenager and young adult. So, so much time; loved them to pieces. I feel like spending so much time taking care of them taught me how to be a mother in so many ways. The youngest one still had her umbilical cord when I started babysitting her. You can't imagine my elation at connecting with the middle one, only to find that she has no memory of me at all. Still - it's good to know they are ok.
I found 8 rolls of Scotch tape in a box in the basement. Tape in this house is like gold. I bet I could get the girls to do extra chores in exchange for pieces of tape.

Christmas Countdown Starts Tomorrow!

2010-11-30T13:48:00.004-06:00

Hooray for December!

We've got our "Advent Calendar" up and I've got a list of activities for December ready to go. I hesitate to call it an Advent calendar since the way we celebrate really has nothing to do with Advent at all. In fact, Advent, always begins on the fourth Sunday before December 25th. In 2010, that would have been last Sunday, November 28th.

Instead, we typically use our calendar as a Christmas Countdown, starting on December 1st and ending on Christmas day. A couple of years ago I found a really cute stocking calendar. It's big and has pockets on the outside and room on the inside to put stuff.

So I'm trying to decide which activity to put in tomorrow's pocket from my list, because I really don't like it to be just a candy/sweet treat every day. However, our schedule tomorrow is ... busy ... to say the least:

Kids home from school - 2:45 p.m.
Ty home from work - 3:30 p.m.
Matthew Tae Kwondo - 3:45 - 4:45 p.m.
Dinner - 5:15 - 5:45 p.m.
Hannah Girl Scouts - 6:00 - 8:00 p.m.
Kids in bed - 8:30 p.m.

That doesn't leave much time for an actual activity in which everyone can participate.

Maybe we can have hot chocolate with our dinner. Oooh - maybe while the girls are in school, I could make those plastic stirring spoons dipped in chocolate that they can stir their cocoa with. And I could add little marshmallows! Ok, this is shaping up into something fun. I found a great hot chocolate recipe last year on www.allrecipes.com:

Rich 'N Thick Hot Chocolate

Ingredients

1 cup water
2 (1 ounce) squares BAKER'S Unsweetened Baking Chocolate
1/2 cup sugar
3 cups milk
1 teaspoon vanilla

Directions

Place water and chocolate in heavy medium saucepan; cook on low heat until chocolate is completely melted and mixture is well blended, stirring constantly with wire whisk. Add sugar; mix well.
Bring to boil on medium-high heat. Boil 3 min., stirring constantly. Gradually add milk, stirring with wire whisk until well blended. Stir in vanilla. Reduce heat to medium.
Cook until mixture is heated through, stirring occasionally.

Yes, I think this will do!

Me and You Friday

2010-11-19T11:05:00.004-06:00

Today is Mommy and Matthew Day, otherwise known as Me and You Day! I love that I don't have school on Fridays and that we have established this time together. He looks forward to it as much as I do!

The girls have an early dismissal from school today, so we get to share part of our day with them as well. Here they are, coming in the door just a few minutes ago!

This morning we played and played with trains. We built a huge track on the floor and mixed in some ZhuZhu pet houses as tunnels and bridges. We had a good time and Matthew was a happy boy. Here is a part of the big track we built.

Hannah and Clara are happily making cookies and Rebecca and Matthew are playing with the train track. Hannah is leaving for a weekend Girl Scout camp later today so I'm glad to get a little extra time with her this afternoon.

Lazy day, but we're having fun!

12 of 12 November, 2010

2010-11-12T21:01:00.008-06:00

Twelve pictures taken on the 12th day of the month.

11:52 a.m. Daisy

11:57 a.m. Lily

11:59 a.m. Matthew playing with his "Lego" trains.

12:29 p.m. Letters to Santa from Clara and Rebecca

1:20 p.m. Picnic lunch with Matthew at the playground. It was 75* and beautifully sunny today!

1:58 p.m. Matthew finally finishes lunch and is ready to play.

2:17 p.m. Sliding makes Matthew laugh. :)

2:23 p.m. How did I get so lucky?

8:15 p.m. Clara and Hannah hanging out together, doing crafts after dinner.

8:15 p.m. One of the little purses that Hannah has been crocheting. The changing colors is new, and by the time she is done there will be a ruffle at the top.

8:16 p.m. Watching the washer fill to make sure it doesn't overflow. One of these days we will fix the faulty part but will I ever be able to trust it again?

9:03 p.m. "Take a picture of me, Mommy!" Sure thing, Becca-Cutie!

Pomegranate

2010-11-12T08:49:00.003-06:00

When I was a kid, somewhere around 8 or 9 years old, we lived in North Carolina in a small house in an elderly neighborhood. We kept ourselves busy, played outside almost all day, and roamed the neighborhood freely. Those were the days; I wish my own kids had the same freedoms. Times have changed or something and it just doesn't feel safe to let them roam as much as we did. Don't get me wrong - they do their share of outside playing! But they stay pretty close to home.

Anyway, when I was a kid in N.C., the old gentleman who lived across the street had a pomegranate tree. I don't remember how we came across the first one, whether he gave it to us to try, or if we had one from the grocery store, or what. But somehow I was introduced to the pomegranate around that same time.

Now, we were strongly discouraged from bothering him and asking for a pomegranate from his tree. Probably because we knocked every week asking if they were ripe yet. As a kid, I doubt that I had any idea that pomegranates ripen in the fall, so we probably did pester him all summer long.

I do have memories of climbing his fence and picking his pomegranates, though. I guess when you're a kid and you're not allowed to knock in his door, the next logical way of getting one is to pick it yourself. Funny how that doesn't seem as appealing of an option now that I have kids of my own. ;)

At least once or twice I must have managed to get one that was ripe, because I can remember managing to hack into it somehow and pluck out the seeds one by one and savoring them. I've always been a sour candy kind of person, preferring Now and Laters over chocolate bars, so the tartness of a pomegranate seed is right up my alley. That one pomegranate would last the whole day, it seemed, and I can only imagine the mess my hands, face, and clothes were when I came in at the end of the day!

So, now that I am grown and have children about the same age that I was when I first discovered this delectable fruit, I thought I'd introduce it to them as well. Can I just say that there is something way different about buying a pomegranate from the store, keeping it in the fridge, and then cutting it open with a knife?! It just isn't the same as tearing into one that you just plucked off of a tree, warmed by the sun and eaten with dirty fingers as you wander the neighborhood looking for a playmate.

Nevertheless, two kids love the seeds and two hate them. No grey area when it comes to pomegranate seeds, I guess.

I feel like I should go rub my hands in the dirt before I eat them!

Mommy and Matthew Friday - How It Came About

2010-11-12T08:08:00.004-06:00

Mommy and Matthew Day - otherwise known as Me and You Day.

Since starting classes a couple of years ago, the kids have definitely noticed that my time with them has been reduced. When I first started, Hannah really struggled with having me gone. She came right out and asked me why taking care of her and the other kids wasn't enough and wanted to know why I was 'leaving them.' It took some explaining and some time to get used to the change, but now I am glad to say that she is proud of me and sees me as an educational role model.

Anyway, Matthew was only 2 when I started back to school, so he has been hit the hardest with my absence. A couple of semesters ago, I ended up with classes all 5 days of the week, and 5 days at the school's childcare proved just too much for Matthew, who has some sensory issues, to bear. By Saturday, he was a stressed out bundle of nerves and we would have to spend the whole weekend just calming him down - only to have it start back again on Monday. Since that semester, I have made absolute certain that I have at least one full day during the week with Matthew - just me and him.

This semester, Me and You day has been on Friday. And he's had the added bonus of Matthew and Daddy day on Monday since Ty is off of work on Mondays. It's been a great semester having a whole day to spend together while the girls are in school. It's nice to have that time with him! Now ... I just need to come up with a way of having that kind of time with each of the girls as well.

6/28/2009 - Decision Time

2010-07-20T16:09:00.002-05:00

6/28-6/29/09

I woke up in the morning expecting to have significant pain from the sunburn. I was surprised that it didn't hurt at all. In fact, the skin on my legs was rather numb and had these tiny purple pin-prick sized dots all over, mixed in with the lobster-red of the burn. They felt swollen and tight.

Got the kids dressed and ready to go downstairs for breakfast, all the time wondering what I should do. After hanging out in the room for a while, I finally had to make the tough call of heading home. I was really scared that I was going to get really sick from this bad sunburn, and I didn't know what I would do with the kids if I had to go to the hospital or something.

Canceling the rest of my trip was one of the hardest things I had done in a long, long time. I struggled with feeling like I was failing. I was really disappointed because I had plans with several friends on the next jag of the trip. And I went through ALL that trouble to get a passport. For nothing. It was hard.

Before I checked out of the hotel, I called all of the campgrounds to cancel my reservations and get refunds since it was all pre-paid. I let my friends know what had happened. I cried. I thought about the Statue of Liberty tickets we wouldn't get to use. Prince Edward Island and Anne of Green Gables. Maine. All the missed time with the kids and having to somehow save face with my friends and family.

And then, we went home. We stopped in Cleveland overnight and we were home by the next night. And just like that, it was over.

My legs stayed numb for almost 3 weeks. I didn't get sick. I didn't get giant blisters, even. But I did peel like crazy. I still wonder (a year later now) if I made the right decision. I know if I had stayed and gotten sick it would have been a nightmare. The kids were excited to get home. They loved seeing Daddy and sleeping in their beds and playing with their toys.

I would do it again! I would at least try again anyway. Maybe next time we will bring spray-on sunscreen and I will pay closer attention to what I am doing!

6/27/09 - Atlantic Ocean, Here We Come!

2010-06-12T19:38:00.004-05:00

6/27 - Virginia Beach (it's been a while but I want to finish last year's trip update so I can start thinking about this summer!)

After such a long, tiring drive the day before, we slept in late and then got ready to hit the beach! I had brought along a container full of little sand toys, shovels, buckets, and a new snorkel set for each of them. We gathered everything together and set out after breakfast.

It was a beautiful day and the sun was nice and hot, so I made sure to generously apply sunscreen to the kids so they wouldn't get a nasty burn. I thought it was awesome that you could rent beach 'furniture' so I got us settled onto a set of loungers with an umbrella and we hit the beach running.

No pictures of the trip to the beach - I was not about to try to keep track of 4 kids AND my expensive camera all by myself!

The kids played tirelessly for hours. Even Matthew got into it and almost put his hands in the sand. Almost, but not quite. He was very happy with a shovel and bucket. And he was happy to have water shoes on his feet as well.

Hannah took to the water like a fish and I had to keep making her come back closer to where I was monitoring. Clara also took to the water really well and was really great about staying within my designated area. She also made about a thousand friends in the first 10 minutes. Rebecca stayed close to shore, alternating between swimming, finding shells, and playing in the sand. Matthew stayed glued to my side, and no encouraging him to have a little independence would help. That's ok, though - better to have him constantly on my legs than to have him constantly running off!

Clara found the first little hermit-type crab. She dug him up with her toes in the water. It wasn't long before we were all digging them up, and it wasn't long after that until Hannah decided she was terrified of them. And, since kids are the way they are, it was hard work to get the others to stop tormenting Hannah by showing her the little crabs and pretending they were going to put them on her or something.

Hannah, having a moderately rough time by this point, suffered a devastating loss when she took her brand new snorkel set to the water's edge to rinse it. The waves pulled her mask and snorkel right out of her hand and just like *that* they were gone, swallowed by the sea. Oh, did she cry! Her heart was broken. I am so thankful that the other girls offered to share with her before I could even ask them. It was sweet to see them so sympathetic to her, especially after the crab teasing we had just been through. Maybe they were trying to make it up to her, or maybe they really will just band together when they can see that one is really suffering. I hope so with all my heart!

Six hours later and it's way past time for lunch. The kids are tired, I'm tired, and it's time to go. So we start drying off, wiping off sand, etc. And I start to notice something strange. My legs! They are stinging. They don't look weird at all, but they sure feel different. Hmm, must just be the salt water drying on my skin. It couldn't be sunburn because I had been so careful. I had slathered up the kids. I had slathered up my face. My arms. My neck, shoulders, chest. I had even worn a large t-shirt to get extra coverage because my skin is so fair. But ... OH NO! I never put sunscreen on my legs! The kids were so anxious to get to the water that I just forgot! I had exposed my most delicate skin to 6 hours of brutal sun on Virginia Beach with no protection! My legs hadn't seen that much sun in literally YEARS!

Worried, I gathered up all our stuff, stopped by Chick-Fil-A for lunch (yum - we don't have this restaurant in Chicago!) and headed back to the hotel. I could feel my legs, burning and hot. How in the world did I not notice before we were getting ready to go that I was getting burned? I guess I was busy and distracted keeping track of the kids and just had not noticed. Argh!

Back in our hotel room, I surveyed the damage. Not good; not good at all!

I got the kids into showers and washed off fairly quickly, and settled them in front of the tv for a bit. I know that is terrible but I had to cool off my legs somehow. I took my turn in the shower and lingered under the cool water. Now normally, I am in and out of the shower in 10 minutes, tops. But this time, I stayed in for a long time. When I got out, I was sure glad I had brought a bottle of aloe on the trip, just in case. I was able to sleep comfortably in the wonderful hotel bed.

6/26 - Virginia Beach, VA instead of the Outer Banks of NC

2009-10-27T12:31:00.004-05:00

6/26 - continued.

So, after having ice cream at the gas station and surfing the net for a local hotel, I finally gave up and decided that a slight change in plans would be ok. We would drive north to Virgina Beach and stay at a hotel nearby instead of pitching a tent here on the Outer Banks. I was disappointed but I was afraid of having another yucky campground experience and to be honest, the last few nights at the Hampton Inn had me spoiled. It was my birthday and I wanted to be comfortable. So I made the reservation and was instantly relieved. That's a bad sign for the rest of the trip, if you ask me.

I explained to the kids about the change in plans and they didn't care one way or the other, as long as they still go to play at the beach. So I packed them all up into the van, called the campground to cancel (I think they probably had it figured out by this time - it was nearly 10 p.m.) and we headed out for another 2 1/2 hours of driving. All the way back north along the dunes of the Outer Banks. Through Nags Head and through Kitty Hawk. So much for seeing the Wright Brothers Museum or eating at the Top Dog Cafe. But that's ok - we have great things planned and there would be fun things to do in Virgina Beach as well.

What a long day - definitely our longest day in the car so far. The kids slept for this last stretch and the car was very quiet. It was hard to stay awake myself. That is, until we started trying to get through Norfolk, VA. Wow - crazy! And it was so dark and the roads were confusing. I got lost several times in a seedy part of town. Kept stopping at the same gas station to look at the map and find my way out. I couldn't get out and ask for directions and leave the kids in the car. It was so late, the place was just so ... scary. I don't want to be politically incorrect so I will only say that there was an air of desperation and I was very tense. And I don't scare easily.

So I finally got it figured out (just as our van was being approached by a dirty looking man in the parking lot) and made it onto the right stretch of interstate. You know how in a major city all of the roads twist and curve and interchange, and if you get in the wrong lane in traffic sometimes you just can't get over before you've already missed your exit? That is what kept happening to me.

On a side note, Norfolk looked like an interesting place. We went through several tunnels ... or maybe it was the same tunnel over and over again ... I can't remember. It would be neat to see it in the daylight. I wonder if it would be less intimidating.

So, at almost 1 a.m. (getting lost loses time!) I pulled into our hotel. Exhausted. Carrying a sleeping boy and nothing else. The only thing we brought in were the blankets the kids like to sleep with. The room was absolutely beautiful. It had two big, fluffy queen sized beds and a pull out sofa bed. A huge flat screen tv and a huge area of floor space where the kids could sit and play. And it even had a kitchenette! I almost wonder if we got upgraded or something - I didn't ask.

I just tumbled into bed ... it was so late ... and a bed never felt so good!!

6/26 - The Outer Banks, NC

2009-10-27T11:44:00.002-05:00

6/26 - This day was one of the special days I was looking forward to from the beginning of our trip. Not only was it the day we were going to the see the Atlantic Ocean, it was also my 35th birthday. I planned this segment of the trip carefully so that we would be at the Ocean on my birthday.

We got everything packed away from the hotel and I got all of our laundry done before we left. I had been doing a pretty good job keeping up with laundry all along, if I do say so myself. Funny how much easier laundry is when you are only washing, folding, and drying about 10 sets of clothes over and over again. I should make note of that for home when we get back.

We drove for about 2 hours and stopped at a historical house called Ayr Mount. There is a charge to actually go inside the house and take a tour, but I'm too cheap for that. Instead, I had planned to just walk the mile-long Poet's Walk, a mulched trail that winds around the property and through the woods along the creek. It was very pretty, but very hot. The kids didn't like it much at all - they thought it was boring. I reminded them that it was my birthday and this is what I wanted to do and asked them to suck it up and pretend to have a good time for my sake.

Becky started to pretend she was a tour guide and was calling off interesting things to see along the way. It was SO funny - I wish I had been able to record it in some way. At one part she pointed out an area where "at least 500 people have been killed by a T-Rex. Trust me, you don't want to leave the path, ladies and gentlemen!" I had a good time listening to her and we laughed a lot.

I do have a couple of pictures of this but they're on the other computer - will have to add them later.

I had also planned a stop at the Borders bookstore in Chapel Hill, NC. It seemed straight forward enough, but I just could not find the place! We drove up and down and up and down the main road over and over again. I finally found it after stopping at a Trader Joe's to ask for directions (and to buy some yummy snacks!) but it took about an hour and a half longer than I had expected. And then the time we spent in the bookstore ... well I'm sure you know how that goes! We were way behind schedule.

How in the world did I leave Borders with $80 less than I started with and not even manage to get a single book for myself?! I didn't even have time to look at the grown up books - let alone pick one out. So, the kids were happy, I was on the way to the Atlantic so I was definitely happy even without a new book. I estimated that we would be at the campground on the Outer Banks by about 8:00 p.m., a little disappointed that it would be getting dark. But, we were planning on staying here for 3 or 4 days so it would be ok.

So we drove. And we drove and drove. East and east and farther east! It started to get quite swampy and there weren't very many towns or buildings or people. We really needed to stop and eat dinner but I just wasn't going to stop at any of the shanty towns we passed - they were all very scary looking with the bars on all the windows and doors and scary looking people loitering about. So I passed out some snacks that I had in the car and we made do with what we had.

Finally, we turn down the road that will take us past Nags Head and south down the length of the islands to our campground in Kinnakeet, a small fishing village quite a way south of Nags Head ... 40 miles south in fact. The little I could see was breathtaking. The sun was setting and the road just stretched and stretched ahead of us. The dunes are high between the ocean and the road, so you can't actually see much of the water, but I could sure smell it!

So, we get to the place where I thought the campground was and started looking for it. It's already 9 p.m. It's pitch black, and there is a big storm rolling in. The Outer Banks are already really windy, but this night - I couldn't imagine trying to set up a tent in the pitch black and the wind.

I started to have a little pity party, to be honest. It was my birthday. I didn't get to play in the ocean with the kids on my birthday like I wanted. The kids have been asking all day for cake or ice cream or just something to celebrate my birthday. We've been in the car forever and we're tired. And the mosquitos were out, too. And I still had to get a tent up in this violent wind and darkness!

I stopped to get gas at the only gas station for miles and found out we were actually still 12 miles away from our campground. That was depressing. The speed limit was only 40-45 miles per hour, so it had already taken a long time to get where we were and I was tired.

So, at the gas station, I noticed that they sold ice cream. And they had free wi-fi - perfect. I bought ice cream for the kids and let them sing to me. And while they were eating, I googled hotels in the area. Nothing. For miles. I googled the KOA that was right down the street that I had passed on when planning because of price, but which looked really really nice which made me regret passing them up for this no-name campground still 12 miles away. Nothing available. So I googled hotels farther north, near Nags Head. Nothing available. Farther south - nothing. West - nothing.

So I started looking more closely at the map. Where could we go that would have hotel space available (I guess I had already decided I wasn't setting up the tent that night) but still had a nice beach nearby?

6/25/09 - Emerald City

2009-07-03T07:43:00.008-05:00

6/25 - After our experience with digging for diamonds on AR earlier in the trip, the kids weren't really looking forward to our emerald excursion today. I almost just skipped it after our disappointing campground experience in the emerald mine area last night, but my mom called and convinced us to at least try it.

I'm so glad she did! We had so much fun at Emerald Hollow Mine. For $5 each, we each got a seat at the sluice table and we also got a big bucket of dirt from the mine that was included in the admission price. Now, I don't know if the buckets were "enhanced" or not, but we found all sorts of pretty rocks. And not teeny, tiny ones either.

I have NO idea why I didn't dress the kids in the "old" clothes that I had bought for them when we were digging for diamonds. What was I thinking? We got plenty dirty, and this red dirt really doesn't wash out. Cheap souvenier, I guess. Ask Tyler sometime about the red dirt that he brought home from vacation as a kid. ;)

Anyway, sluicing was easy. The kids would use a provided hand shovel to scoop some dirt into their screening box.

Then, they'd set their screen into the stream of water and wash the dirt away with their hands and the provided scrub brushes.

Then, following sluicing ettiquite, they'd lift their screens on an angle to see what was left. Even Matthew did some sluicing. He had a lot of fun getting the dirt, washing it, and pulling out the pretty rocks.

Becky's "I'm supposed to smile but I'm really sick of your camera" smile.

The kids really had a great time since they were actually finding stuff this time.

Clockwise from bottom left: Quartz, Rose Quartz, Smokey Quartz

Clockwise from bottom left, with a penny for scale: Green Aventurine, Blue Aventurine, 6 small Garnets, Ruby, Emerald, Sapphire. The small stones on the far right are all Sapphires.

Clockwise from left: Amythest, Mica, and something else. Not sure what it is but the rocks are pretty shades of brown. The Mica crumbles into sparkly flakes, and the dirt at this place in Hiddenite is all glittery with crumbled Mica. It's very pretty in the sunlight.

These are all sapphires. We had run out of our free dirt (ha ha) so we bought 2 more buckets. The man who sold them to us told me not to toss anything at all aside since some of these things really just look like rocks and nothing else. So I kept everything in my screen and when the man came around again he picked all of these out as sapphires. I did some research and he is right, but these rocks are obviously not gem-cutting grade. It would be neat to polish them somehow, although I read that tumbling them isn't going to be the best way of doing it.

The young man who was helping us was very nice. He tossed the following rocks into our screen and said, "Look, you found a Ruby and an Emerald, too!" I think he got a kick out of how excited the kids were about the whole thing. So this one is a Ruby.

And this one is an Emerald.

This is a sapphire with a tiny chip out of the exterior surface. You might be able to see that what is inside is shiny.

6/24/09 - The Beginning of the End?

2009-07-03T06:06:00.007-05:00

6/24 - We left Newport this morning and I won't say we were sorry. Waking up several times to shift to a different rocky spot or to scoot yourself back up after having slid down in the night doesn't lead to a restful night.

This may have caused some of the beginnings of homesickness as well, since I started to hear from Hannah that she missed her bed at home.

Anyway, on our way to Hiddenite, NC, which was only a few hours away, we stopped at the Catawba Science Center in Hickory, NC. We had a great time! The center was just big enough to keep the kids busy, but small enough that they weren't overwhelmed.

When I told them where we were going, they were so excited! They brought in notebooks and pencils so that they could take notes on their research.

The first exhibit we saw was a mock riverbed. Along one wall were tanks with fish and snakes, lizards, etc. And along the other wall was a tank where kids could touch turtles.

Clara really loved this until the turtle she was petting nipped her on the finger!

The next exhibit was similar but had a mock ocean instead. There was a tank where the kids could touch small rays in this room. Matthew found an eel that he got a kick out of.

In the next room there were exhibits relating to motion.
Matthew found a car where he could experiment with how the size of the circle you drive on affects how many rotations your tires make if your speed stays constant.

Mostly he just wanted to play with the car, but I think he made amazing strides in his physics knowledge today.

The older girls were really good about reading the information posted about each experiment instead of just playing. Of course, I think that just playing with the stuff is a way to learn also, but I think that Hannah and Clara really got a lot out of it because they were able to read and follow along. Here they are on the "human centrifuge."

Hmmm....
Getting to ride the Teacups at DisneyWorld ... $3000
Getting to ride the Human Centrifuge at Catawba Science Center ... $18
I may have to rethink my love of Disney!

The kids explored lots of motion experiments.

Then we went into the room about space exploration. Clara enjoyed making a dirt devil similar to the ones seen on Mars.

The next section was centered around a swamp theme. The kids really like this part of the science center.

We also saw a baby raccoon, baby skunk, lots of baby alligators, snakes, bats, birds, fish, possum and more. It was pretty neat.

The last part focused on the effects of force on motion. They had a set of chairs where you could use a rope pulley system to pull your chair up into the air. There was a bike you could ride to try to power different things. There was a lot more - the kids and I had a great time.

How hard does one have to roll a golf ball on a track to get it to the end of this set of hills?

Lastly, we found a chair designed to help you feel the difference in spinning speed if you have your arms and legs out compared to if you pull them close to your body. Well, Matthew didn't get that part but he did love to spin in the chair!

Clara, though, told me that this must be why ice skaters hold their arms close to their bodies when they spin, so that they could go faster. DisneyWorld never taught her anything like that!

We left the Science Center refreshed and with some neat things to talk about in the car on our way to the campground in Hiddenite.

When we got to the campground, things kind of fell apart. This was not a KOA campground, and while they did have a pool and a little petting zoo in easy viewing distance, I could not find the office to check in. We went around the camp several times in the van and finally I pulled to a stop in front of the bath house to get out and look around. I thought maybe the office was in the same building since it looked like it had several rooms. The kids stayed in the car with the a/c. I can't blame them.

I walked into the bathroom just out of curiosity and I honestly don't think I have ever been more disgusted. The walls didn't come all the way down to the ground - they were like the walls of a stall? Well, like an old bath house, I guess. And no door to the room - just an entryway that turned once for privacy like some public bathrooms are that you find in stores or restaurants. So, there was absolutely NO way to even begin to keep out flies and other bugs. I opened the door to one of the toilet stalls and there were at least 30 flies inside and that is not an exaggeration. The toilets had black mildew/mold growing all along the bottoms and up the bottom part of the commode. It was just so, so gross.

So I left the bathroom and went across to the "laundry" room. Everything in this room was covered in a layer of thick dust, and there were huge cobwebs in the corners of the room which were also covered in dust. The window was propped open by a big hardcover book, also covered in dust. Now, maybe dust just coats stuff here faster than I'm used to, but nothing in this room looked like it had been used in a month or more. There was a checker board on the table and several paperback books, newspapers, magazines, etc. I didn't even go inside the room.

I started heading back to the car (it was right there - I could see it the whole time I was gone), thinking that there was just no way we could stay there. You couldn't pay me to sit on one of those toilets, let alone let one of the kids. But I had already made a reservation and I wanted to make sure that I wasn't going to be charged for not staying, so I needed to find the office!

An old man dressed in nothing but shorts approached me, so I asked him if he knew where the office was, and he had to think for a minute. Then he pointed me towards a man on a lawnmower and told me that this man was the owner and he should be able to help me. So I asked the lawnmower-man where the office was and he pointed me towards a mobile home down the road a ways.

We pulled up to the trailer and lawnmower-man met us there, saying he thought his wife was home to help us but that she was out in the camp. I told him that we had reservations but that I was concerned about the bathrooms and that we weren't going to be able to stay. I felt bad, because I'm sure they needed our money. And I'm not normally a wimp in this way - I mean we had a lousy site at Newport but at least the bathrooms were clean there.

Luckily this man was very understanding and even told me that they've been concerned with the bathrooms for a while, too, but haven't been able to come up with a suitable (and I think he meant affordable) solution. I hope they are able to fix them sometime soon - it looked like a relatively nice place otherwise. They had lots of RV campers there and their rates were great.

Here's something that I don't understand about (some) people who live in the country. If you were working on a job, say ... fixing your fence, and you had your lumber and other supplies loaded in the back of your truck, and then your truck broke down along the way, why would you just leave the truck right there for the next 20 or 30 years and not even bother to unload the lumber and stuff from the back of it?! We passed a truck on the side of the dirt road leading to the campground that was clearly *old* considering the model of it, the amount of rust, and the fact that it had brush growing all around it and a tree growing through the engine. And yet it was still carrying its old and decaying load of lumber.

I just don't understand. I saw all sorts of things like this in both Tennessee and North Carolina. I saw a carport that had long ago collapsed onto what looked like 2 cars from the 70's. I think if I was a vintage car collector/restorer, I would just drive around the country roads in Tennessee and offer to buy the junk ones that are just sitting outside of people's barns. I can't tell you how many cool, old, discarded cars I saw just rusting to nothingness on people's property. I guess car restorers probably want ones that are in better shape, though. Still - what a waste.

Anyway, I called my mom and asked for help finding a hotel for the night. I'm so glad that she and my dad had offered us, earlier that day, a stay in a hotel for my birthday which was coming up soon. At the time, I had told them that I'd take a rain check in case we needed it later in the trip, but once I saw the bathrooms at this place, I new we needed the hotel now instead of later.

Mom helped us find a nice Hampton Inn nearby. It was a real luxury to take showers and not having to try to keep your clothes dry while you're putting them on in a wet shower stall afterwards. Or keep your son from yanking open the shower curtain while you're standing inside naked. And sleeping in a real bed was definitely a treat!! So thank you so much, you guys!

6/23/09 - Down Day in Newport, TN

2009-06-25T22:14:00.005-05:00

6/23 - We took this day off of driving around and sight seeing. The kids and I swam at the pool for almost 4 hours (sorry no pics - not taking the camera to the pool!) with a short break in the middle to eat peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, crackers, and as a super treat, ice cold grape soda from the vending machine near the pool deck.

Here are some pics of our campsite at Newport. In this one you can see that I was finally able to make a fire. I tried the night before but the air and ground were just too moist and it wouldn't stay lit. It was very discouraging. But on this night we made hamburgers and veggie packets over the fire.

You can see the campsite slope and the mud, sticks and rocks. We did try to clear our spot before we set the tarp down and put the tent up, but it's just impossible and the mud was thick and gooey. It slopes down into this open grassy area where the kids loved to play and catch butterflies and fireflies, and to watch all of the bunnies in the mornings.

Becky is a firefly magnet. At one point she had caught about 10 of them and they were crawling up and down her arms. I remember that I used to love fireflies when I was a kid, too. My mom used to give us empty spice jars to put them in. They were perfect since they had the plastic lids with the sprinkle holes in them so the poor things could breathe.

Again - not the ideal campsite but we made it through 3 nights and were no worse for the wear. I won't even guess how many Daddy Long Leg spiders we brought back with us from this one - I did my best to shake them all off the rainfly and the tent before folding it all up. There were a lot of them, though - so maybe we'll be in for a surprise the next time we get the tent out.

The moisture and heat, the slant of the site, the mud, and the extremely rocky and uncomfortable ground made for a rough 3 nights at this campground. We were all glad to pack up our tent when it was time to leave.

6/22/09 - Great Smokey Mountain National Park

2009-06-25T18:57:00.005-05:00

We headed towards the Great Smokey Mountain National Park to see the sites we really came to this area to see. I had thought while planning that I might take the kids to Dollywood or to Dollywood's Splash Country waterpark, but it was so expensive, so hot, and there was rain in the forcast. So we (and by "we" I mean "I" since the kids don't even know what Dollywood is) decided to spend the rest of the day driving through the Great Smokey Mountain National Park and walking the 1.2 mile paved trail to see Laurel Falls.

This is what it looks like when you go through a tunnel, hold up your camera (not looking through it so you have no idea what it focuses on) and don't check your settings at all before hitting the shutter. Kind of a neat picture, I think.

The view is just breathtaking.

We got out and started along the trail to see Laurel Falls which is the most popular waterfall to see at the park. It is 1.2 miles each way and is listed as moderate even though it's a paved trail. We found out soon enough why it is rated moderate, though - it's a pretty steep climb and the path is against the mountainside on one side and is a steep drop off on the other. I made the girls walk right in front of me against the mountain as we were climbing and Matthew was in the stroller. Any time people came around us from behind or past us coming back down, we came to a complete stop against the mountain so that I didn't have to worry about anyone accidentally falling off the cliff.

Here's Becky posing for a picture that Hannah was taking:

We passed the .5 mile marker when several really loud peals of thunder chased us back down and it started to rain. The tree canopy kept us pretty dry but by the time we got back to the car it was really pouring, so we headed back out of the park. I had visions of our tent being washed down the slope by a mud and rock landslide so I wanted to get back to make sure everything was ok. It went a lot faster going down than it did going up!

The rain didn't last long, so I stopped on the way out to snap this photo. I love how you can see the mist rising from the mountain in this one.

I will admit that I was feeling a little defeated by the 2nd night in Newport. The heat and humidity was just so stifling and it had been several days of this heat without a break. The heat was bad enough, but in Newport, you could literally see the moisture hanging in the air and the leaves on the trees were actually dripping water, even though it never did actually rain at the campground.

I couldn't even get my campfire to stay lit and that was like the straw that broke the camel's back for me and I called my mom to whine. (blush!)

6/22/09 - Everything We Didn't Do In Gatlinburg, TN

2009-06-25T18:32:00.008-05:00

We arrived at our KOA in Newport, TN in the early evening on the 21st to find that the campground was basically one giant mud puddle due to several days of rain and storms before we arrived. It was ... fun ... setting up the tent and trying to keep everyone out of the mud so that it didn't get all over everything. And even worse, the only site that would fit our tent was on a mild slant, so that when we woke up in the mornings, we would find that our sleeping bags had slid 2-3 feet into a bunch on the downward side of the sloped side.

I had originally planned on meeting up with a friend on Monday, the 22nd, at a playground in Gatlinburg, but somehow we never finished making the plans so we didn't meet up after all. The heat/humidity was just unbearable, so maybe it wasn't a bad thing that the kids weren't going to be running around and getting even hotter. I do keep a case of bottled water in our car, but Becky, especially, tends to really overheat so I have to keep a close eye on her when it's hot outside no matter where we are.

We drove around Gatlinburg trying to find something that looked appealing. The truth is that I was too cheap and too hot to pay $10 to park in a lot and then have to walk blocks and blocks in the heat to whatever places we wanted to go. Plus, it was really touristy, and I didn't drive all this way just to see the Ripley's Believe It Or Not Museum. In fact, I didn't drive all this way to see any of this touristy stuff.

Here are just a few of the things we did NOT do in Gatlinburg:

I admit that I took these pictures while I was driving. But in my defense, we were only driving 5 mph and the traffic was wall to wall, stop and go the entire length of the main drag of Gatlinburg. Yuck. I was as surprised that so many people braved the heat to see this stuff as I was surprised that anyone would honestly want to pay money for this kind of entertainment. You can see this stuff anywhere - and the Great Smokey Mountain National Park is only about 5 miles away.

We had better luck in nearby Pigeon Forge. We were able to stop at a candy shop without having to pay to park, so I treated the kids to a couple of pieces of homemade taffy and I had a homemade peanut butter meltaway. It was all delicious!

More from this day in the next post.

6/21/09 - In and Out of Hurricane Mills, TN

2009-06-25T17:46:00.008-05:00

6/21/09 - I woke up early this morning and watched the sky lighten up bit by bit through our tent screen. With no rain on the horizon, we took the rain fly off the tent so that we'd have a better breeze overnight since the heat and humidity were stifling. It did cool off a bit in the night so by morning it was comfortable.

Turns out that early morning diffused tent light is awesome for portraits. Too bad the kids were asleep.

When the kids woke up, we got the tent taken down and everything packed up so that we could head to our next campsite. Along the way, we stopped at the World's Fair Park in Knoxville, TN. This is where the famous Sunsphere is located.

Contrary to an episode of The Simpsons I saw, there are no wigs in sight! I bet you could fit a lot of them inside the sphere, though, if you wanted to.

Seriously, though, it's really neat the way that each gold panel reflects a different part of the park. Very artistic.

There was also a splash fountain at this park where the kids could play. It was a great way to cool off since it was another scorching hot day.

6/20/09 - "I'm Going To Graceland, Graceland ... Memphis, TN"

2009-06-25T07:33:00.007-05:00

Well, not really to Graceland, unlike Paul Simon's song lyrics, but we did make a stop in Memphis, TN today on our way to our campground in Hurricane Mills, TN. Grandma and Papa followed along since Memphis is only a few hours' drive to their home in MO.

The plan was to eat at Rendezvous and then explore the Mud Island River Walk. So we headed to the Rendezvous for lunch. Mmm... barbecue!

Rendezvous is located in an alley just a few blocks from the Mississippi River, so we parked in a garage and walked. I'm sure we looked very touristy with our cameras and maps out, but at least we didn't end up having to pay some guy on the street for directions like the family walking ahead of us.

Anyway, we got in and got a table with no wait even though it was busy. They have a lot of seating - it's deceiving looking at this place from the outside. The menus are right on the table underneath a sheet of glass and they're pretty straight forward - mostly barbecue although you can get a few other things (but why would you?!)

The kids were hungry! Becky, sporting her handmade-with-pipe-cleaners headgear, had her bottle of extra BBQ sauce ready to go.

The food was heavenly! Here is a picture of the barbecue beef brisket that I ordered:

I was going to try to buy a bottle of their famous sauce to bring home to Tyler, but I figured it was just one more thing to try to carry and in a glass bottle no less. So maybe we'll order some online instead when we get home.

When we were done eating, we headed outside towards the river. It was just so hot that we decided that we would skip the River Walk this time, especially since it was getting late and the kids and I had a couple of hours yet to drive to our campground. So we headed back to our car instead.

Along the way, the kids were fascinated by the horse and carriages that were driving by. I messed up my white balance on this shot, so you get to see it in black and white:

Matthew stopped to show us the car he likes to carry in his pocket. He loves this car!

And, one last pic from this day. This just goes to show that it doesn't make any difference at all where you are, kids will always fight over the elevator buttons.

Or maybe it's just my kids.

6/19/09 - Swimming at CDSP

2009-06-25T07:10:00.004-05:00

After lunch, we went to the swimming pool/water park that is on the grounds of Crater of Diamonds State Park. It was really nice - 3 feet max depth, 3 water slides, a zero-entry section, and adequately monitored by life guards which always helps.

While Grandma and I took the kids swimming, Papa went back out to the field to try again to find a diamond. I think he caught the rock-hounding bug!

Anyway, the kids had a great time cooling off in the water. Even Matthew got really brave and actually went into the water instead of just standing at the edge getting his feet wet. The lure was a steering wheel mounted on the structure in the middle of the pool. He played on it almost the entire time, therefore I was there almost the entire time as well.

Becky spent the entire time going down the little water slide on the center structure as well. Up and down, up and down - her energy was boundless.

Hannah and Clara spent a great deal of time going down the bigger water slides nearby, peppered with bouts of wandering around the pool trying to find new playmates and best friends forever even though they never even exchanged names.

We had a great time and stayed till the pool closed at 6 p.m. We went to the local grocery store and picked up some pork cutlets, broccoli, carrots, and BBQ beans for supper. We started a fire the best we could and waited for the wood to burn down into coals so that we could cook the meat and veggie packets.

This was an adventure - it was just so muggy that the wood didn't want to burn at all. It smoked and smoked; we think maybe the wood was a little green as well. Finally we got it to burn to coals but not enough to cook with! So we scavenged the wood that was left in Papa's campfire ring and built another fire behind our coals. We did finally get everything to cook, but it was well after 9 p.m. before we got to eat. It was delicious, though!!

6/19/09 - Digging for Diamonds

2009-06-24T19:39:00.010-05:00

June 19th - we got up early this morning and got ready to fulfill our get-rich-quick scheme of filling our pockets with diamonds at Crater of Diamonds State Park in Murfreesboro, AR. We brought an assortment of tools - shovels, buckets, hammers, chisels, etc. and I bought some "old clothes" at WalMart the day before for the kids so that they wouldn't ruin anything we had packed to wear the rest of the trip. I bought them each a pair of $3 knit shorts and I bought a package of 6 boys' Hanes t-shirts that I could just throw away if they were ruined. I'm probably the only person in the world who doesn't already own "old clothes" for her kids to ruin.

Anyway, we got busy digging! This place is really just a gigantic field of dirt that is periodically plowed. From the email newsletters I get from them occasionally, it seems that about 10 people report findings of diamonds per month. But who knows how many finds go unreported, really, so we felt confident that we had at least a chance of finding a diamond with so many of us digging.

We weren't digging and sifting for long before Clara found something clear and sparkly - she was confident that she'd found a diamond and the rest of us thought it was probably a bit of quartz. It was pretty small but she was happy as could be - and pretty much done digging.

Hannah enjoyed working with the hoe that Papa had brought. It was like being part of a Three Stooges episode; the way she was swinging the handle around made me wonder when someone was going to get hit in the back of the head by it. She also liked that the soil had a very high clay content and did a lot more playing than digging, really. Another thing she really enjoyed was gathering up the biggest stones that she could find - pretty brown ones. I'm sure they had a name but I can't remember what they were called. We gave her a sandwich bag and told her she could keep whatever fit inside it; she eventually started saving smaller rocks so that she could keep more.

Becky did a bit of digging here and there and seemed to have a good time jumping from plow row to plow row and helping whomever appeared to need her expertise at the moment.

Matthew spent most of his time wandering up and down the plowed row, sitting on my leg, and tripping over his own feet.

After a while of digging and screening, we decided to take a bucket of dirt up to the sluicing station and try our hand at panning.

That's my dad standing next to me.

I'll tell you what - there are some people who take rock hounding very seriously. You should see some of their equipment!! One old man had a handmade harness-thing that fit around the back of his neck so that he could carry a 5-gallon bucket of dirt on each end of a broomstick across his shoulders - pack mule style. He wasn't very talkative, even though he was standing right next to us, but we did hear him tell a little boy from another family that he hadn't found any diamonds that day but that he had found plenty of them "recently." I believe him, too - he was a serious prospector.

Another man, on the other side of us, did eventually open up and talk to us quite a bit and even added a few rocks to Hannah's growing collection as they were ones that he was discarding. He had made a set of screens, about 5 or 6 of them in all different mesh and rim sizes, out of old bicycle rims. They worked really well and I could see an advantage to using a round screen compared to the square ones that we had. He did show us once how to wash and swirl, wash and swirl, and we did try! But we weren't very good at it and he laughed with us about it ... or maybe at us ... or maybe both.

Here you can see bicycle-rim man on the left and pack-mule-bucket man on the right. In between them, Clara and I are sifting through the fine bits of gravel that were left in our smallest-meshed screen. My dad, Papa, is behind us washing more gravel.

I'm glad my mom and dad thought to bring their point and shoot camera! I wanted to take pictures but didn't want to get my camera muddy; I probably would have accidentally dunked it in the sluice tank. Thanks, Mom, for taking these pictures for me!

After a while of this, and the fact that Farm Grandma had somehow gotten stuck with the chore of taking care of Becky and Matthew and occasionally the other girls as their interest waxed and waned in sluicing, we put our most promising and prettiest rocks in a little glass vial to be identified. It was really hot, we were ready for lunch, and we had promised to take the kids swimming.

It turned out that the sparkly rock that Clara had found was a chip of glass. We did find some bits of calcite, a piece of quartz and some jasper. And Hannah came out with a bag full of rocks that she thought were pretty; she was very excited just to have a collection of something. Clara came out with a bag of washed gravel from the sluicing station, but we gave it to Papa to take home and look through once it dried out. And it was promptly forgotten.

This post is long enough - I will add the swimming pictures in the next one.

6/18/09 - On Our Way to Murfreesboro, AR

2009-06-24T19:12:00.002-05:00

June 18th - we left Grandma and Papa's house and headed for Crater of Diamonds State Park in Murfreesboro, AR. They followed along in their truck which was really exciting to the kids, who kept checking to make sure they were still back there.

It took us about 8 hours, including potty stops and a lunch break in the WalMart parking lot, to get to the campground. Our site wasn't too bad as far as campgrounds go. It was only $17 per night and it had water and electricity - so not the Waldorf or anything but the ground was pretty soft (sandy) and it didn't rain. The kids and I set up our tent in record time and later had our first official "campfire" meal with my parents - hot dogs and potato salad. We also had toasted marshmallows - yummy!

The kids and I were so tired that we had no trouble sleeping even though it was very hot and humid - not just in our tent but all around. It did cool off some in the night but it was muggy through and through. We had cereal for breakfast and got ready to go digging for diamonds!

6/17/09 - Time at Grandma and Papa's Farm

2009-06-21T09:39:00.003-05:00

We spent the day with my parents today just hanging out and catching up. It was really hot so we tried to go swimming but the pool was closed for a private party. Papa was really nice to go and buy the kids a little inflateable pool for them to play in.

We did go up the path to the house that they are building and climbed the ladders to look around.

It's going to have quite a view!

And So It Begins!

2009-06-17T21:13:00.009-05:00

We left home at about 10:00 a.m. and after only one trip back home to retrieve forgotten items, we managed to get on the road. Here we are in the van:

Along the way, we saw a lot of this kind of scenery:

We stopped halfway to see this monument - can you guess where we were?

Maybe this will help:

Right! The St. Louis Arch!

Here are the kids in front of the arch:

A very nice man with a much nicer camera than mine offered to take our picture together. Considering the Canon 5D with the ultra fancy lens he had hanging around his neck, I had no fear that he'd run off with mine. Plus, he was an old man and I think I could have taken him down if necessary (ha ha!)

"All My Bags Are Packed, I'm Ready To Go..."

2009-06-15T22:48:00.004-05:00

Well, the car is 90% packed up for our trip! I'll try to remember to take a picture in the morning before we leave. I am so glad that it seems like everything we'd hoped to bring (but not much else!) is going to fit in the van.

The first part of our trip will take us to my parents' farm in Missouri where we'll stay for a couple of days. The kids are anxious to see "Farm Grandma" and "Papa" and I'm excited to see them, too!

We won't be tenting it yet - thankfully my parents have an extra bed. I'm sure I'll savor the last few nights of comfortable sleeping.

Wish us luck - it takes about 9 hours to get there from our home near Chicago.

Half Way to Adulthood

2009-06-15T22:33:00.003-05:00

My oldest baby girl, Hannah, turned 9 years old a few days ago. Now a lot of people say that '10' is the big milestone birthday, but I think that '9' is really overlooked.

Think about it. In another 9 years, she will be considered an adult. Old enough to vote. Old enough to go to college ... or not go to college. Old enough to join the military and go fight for her country and for the freedom of its citizens ... if she chooses to do so.

The first 9 years of her life have flown by, which makes me think that these next 9 are going to go just as quickly. So we are celebrating this year - the overlooked 9th birthday - halfway to being 'grown.'

But secretly, I hope that she stays little as long as she can.

I'm Feeling Insecure

2009-06-13T11:08:00.005-05:00

A recent series of less-than-supportive comments (not on this blog but other places) has made me feel insecure about this trip. It's nothing specific, really, just a general "you're crazy for doing this" kind of comments that I can usually skirt past without letting it bother me. But if you hear it enough, it does start to get to you.

And I feel like I'm not allowed to be upset with the kids at all right now. If I get at all frustrated with them, there is always that knowledge, lingering in the background of everyone's mind, that in just a few days I'll be on my own with them for a month straight. And I know that is what people are thinking when I say anything about the kids right now.

So I feel pretty stressed out trying to get everything done and stay organized about it all, without feeling like I can vent about the kids' behavior or any frustrations I am experiencing.

And the more I hear things like, "You'll probably have to come home early" and "That's a long time to be away from home" and "It's really irresponsible and unsafe for you to try to do this without your husband" the more likely I am to dig in my heels even if things get bad and be stubborn about proving everyone wrong. I can see it now: we'll be there in our tent in the middle of hurricanes and thunderstorms, everyone will be cold and wet and miserable, and begging to go home, bitten up by mosquitos and sunburned on the beach, and I won't be able to take them home. But it won't be my fault. I can't let anyone be right about me not being able to do this. ;)

This is what I don't understand: What if I was a single mom? What if I didn't have the option of having anyone else along to help? Would we just be expected to stay home forever and never do anything? Or would we just not be allowed to do the 'adventurous' things without a man? I just don't understand that thought process at all. What if I was a man? Would it be ok to do adventurous things without my wife?

I figure - I have 80 or 90 years, tops, to live on this Earth. Why would I let something as small as having to do something alone keep me from living?!

Three Beautiful Things

2009-06-07T08:43:00.006-05:00

Beautiful Thing Number One:

My daughter, Becky (although she insists on being called Rebecca at school,) just celebrated her 6th birthday. Isn't she cute? I love how little kids look when they're missing their front teeth. Here are the kids singing "Happy Birthday" to Becky in my classic birthday cake shot. I really did put 6 candles on the cake even though the picture makes it look like only 4.

Becky also just graduated from Kindergarten. Why does that tug at my heartstrings so much? I've been through it twice already but I will admit that I cried a little when I watched her sing songs with her class and receive her 'diploma.' I cried at every single one of the kids kindergarten graduations. Just a little. But I'm a self-proclaimed sap, so it should be no big surprise.

I love this picture of my family walking home from Kindergarten graduation. Personalities!!

Tyler - strong head of the family, leading his little brood home, and yet totally oblivious to what is going on behind him. He just *assumes* that they will all follow him home blindly like good little ducklings.

Hannah - first born, leader of the children. She will walk next to Daddy to be sure he doesn't need any help finding the way. She is in constant competition with us to take charge of this family.

Rebecca - refusing to be left out. It's her special day so she should be the one to walk in front! But since she can't get between the two leaders, she will walk one step behind them and look for an opening.

Clara - caring, empathetic. She will take care of the youngest one. Doesn't anyone else see that he is about to run into the road?!

Matthew - bold, daring, stubborn. He will not be restrained! NO - he won't hold Clara's hand or allow her to lead him back to safety!

Me - watching from behind the lens of a camera. For the record, I did run up and get Matthew back on the sidewalk. But not till after I got this shot.

Beautiful Thing Number Two:

Meet our new kitty, Lily. We adopted her from the South Suburban Humane Society on Becky's birthday. She is a family pet, but we did allow Becky to name her. I really like the name she chose.

Beautiful Thing Number Three:

Isn't it the most beautiful thing you've ever seen? See how the gold lettering contrasts so nicely with the dark cover. Marvel at how the sunlight glistens all around it. I think I hear a choir of angels singing!

Sharing Concerns

2009-06-01T18:27:00.005-05:00

I've been talking to friends and family about our trip, and it is interesting to hear what people's main concerns are regarding the trip.

Tyler's Concerns:

Taking the Kids Swimming - a very valid concern and one that I've been pondering since the beginning of this trip planning process. Since I won't have any help, it really would not be safe to take the 4 kids to the pool without a solid plan in place.

I have no problem with having the kids swim 'in shifts'. For instance, two sit out on the side and two swim, and then swap after a set amount of time.
If the pool is really busy, we simply won't go swimming right then.
Setting and enforcing boundaries will be the key to swimming at the beach. I haven't completely tossed out the idea of tying a 30' length of rope to each of their ankles so that I can keep track of all of them at once at the beach. We'll see how it goes - take this one as it comes since I don't know how busy it will be and what I'll feel comfortable letting them do.

Staying Safe in the Tent - another scary but valid concern. I'm glad someone is thinking proactivley about this. I'm putting my head in the sand about it and just *assuming* that there are enough honest and friendly people around the campsites that if I scream then someone will come to my aid. Oh, and I will probably sleep with a claw hammer under my pillow ... and I'm not afraid to use it.

My Mother-In-Law's Concerns:

Getting Lost - I'm not too concerned about this one, actually. Have map ... will travel. I'm pretty good at reading the atlas, and I'm not afraid to ask for directions when needed. If we don't make it to where we are supposed to end up for the night, we'll find someplace else to stay. I'm flexible that way.

Getting Tired - This did cross my mind when planning the trip and it's actually one of the reasons the trip is so long. I had some specific places in mind that I wanted to see and experience, but I didn't want to be in the car for hours and hours each day. Because of this, I specifically made each day's drive an average of 5 hours long, and even that has an activity break in the middle. Most of the time, we'll arrive on one day, stay a second day, and then leave in the early morning of the third day. So I think it'll be ok.

My Mom's Concerns:

Getting Eaten By Bears - I will say that I had originally planned on camping for 2 nights in the boundaries of the Great Smokey Mountain National Park which is kind of in bear territory. I eventually did decide to switch that segment's camping site to a nearby KOA instead. I'll still keep all of the food in the van, but I do think that we'll be safer here instead. As much as I want to say this is a silly concern (just because it sounds funny: "You'll get eaten by bears!" "Ha, ha, ha! You're so silly!") I can't say that because I had the same concern.

My Concerns:

Running Out of Money - This is a huge fear of mine. I am working on building a moderate excess amount just in case something happens and I've either miscalculated or didn't think about something. Kind of like a trip emergency fund. If we get a flat tire it would be nice to just be able to buy a new one.

Losing a Kid - This is a big one, too. I'm not a kid-leash kind of person, but I would consider one of those metal framed back-packs if I thought I could find one that would fit me and one that Matthew would actually like. I tried one once at one of our consignment sales and he freaked out, big time. So I'll just stick with the stroller for now. I did have some cards made that have all of our emergency contact info on them and I'll put one in each kid's pocket in the morning so that if we get separated we'll at least have a chance of finding each other again.

The Car Breaking Down - Considering everything we went through to get it running, I have a fear that it will break down mid trip. Here's where that trip emergency fund comes into play again - if I need to rent a car to get back home, it would be nice to be able to do that. So I'm still selling clothes in order to build up that fund!

The Kids Hating the Trip - It would break my heart if I put all this planning and preparation into this trip for the kids and they are bored and whiny the whole time. I'm trying to add a lot of variety to the trip and I know how much they love to swim, so I'm hoping that they'll be ok. I really feel that this trip could be a great bonding experience for us. A "mom and kid" thing.

Crossing the Border Back into the US from Canada - Ugh. I hope I am able to get my passport either in the mail before I leave or having Tyler overnight it to me somewhere along the way. This is a big, lurking, looming fear.

I'm sure there are more, but these are the ones that come immediately to mind. And I'm sure everything will be fine, but it would be best to have a plan of action for this kind of stuff, I think.

How to Eat a Banana, Matthew Style

2009-05-28T10:11:00.004-05:00

Drag the whole bunch of bananas to your mom and say, "NUH!" loudly to get her attention.
Suffer through being coached on the proper way to ask for things.
Say, "Peas ... have ... NUH!" and be rewarded with a banana - just what you wanted in the first place.
Rock back and forth on your toes and heels, squeeze your hands together, and alternate between screeching excitedly and saying, "Um, um, um!" while taking bites of the air in front of you while you wait for your mom to peel it part way and hand it to you. She's smart - she knows you would never even consider holding a banana without the peel.
Thoroughly enjoy eating half of the banana, saying after bites, "Nuh ... ummy!" and "I ... uv ... nuh!" and wiggling in excitement and taking little jumps.
Watch your dad get a powdered doughnut out of the cabinet.
Say, "Maff-you ... hate ... nuh!" and try to give the half-eaten banana back to your mom.
Turn to your dad, point at the doughnut, and say, "Share ... me!" and try to give the banana back to your dad.
Get frustrated. Tell your dad, frantically, "Give ... that ... me! Want ... eat!" and start to cry.
Throw the banana across the room and scream, "No ... want ... nuh!" and launch yourself into a fit on the floor.
Sit in the naughty chair for 2 minutes for throwing food.
When you are allowed to get up, take the banana from where your mom placed it on the kitchen table.
Make sure no one is looking.
Take a bite and smile. Say, softly, "Maff-you ... ike ... nuh!"
Finish the banana down to the last half-inch, happy again.
Throw the empty peel and the last half-inch nub in the garbage. Your mom knows you never, ever eat the last half-inch of a banana and she is OK with that.

Passport Photos and Paperwork, Oh My!

2009-05-28T09:12:00.009-05:00

Yesterday I got my passport book application out in the mail. I imagine that under normal circumstances, this is kind of no big deal. But because I am a procrastinator and took too long to apply for a copy of my birth certificate, the whole application process was harried and riddled with anxiety.

First, I filled out the application online and printed it. It comes with 4 pages of instructions and rules, all in tiny print. I pored over them several times - what to bring, what to include, how much it will cost, how long it will take, where to send the application, etc.

One of the things on the list of things to bring are 2 color passport photos. Now, I have been known to take a few pictures in my life (ha!) and I really, really thought about tackling this job myself. The requirements are that the picture has to be taken on a white or very light background, be a certain size, and then your head has to be a certain size within the picture and has to be a certain distance away from the sides, etc. So I decided that it would be worth it to just have someone else do it and get it over with.

I looked around the Internet to find a place that does these pictures. Sears charges $15 and no appointment is required. But, man. Fifteen dollars is a lot of money for 2 tiny pictures. So I chose CVS Pharmacy instead. The cost was only $8. BUT - there was a coupon for $2 off. So for $6 I could get my passport pictures in seconds and be done with that part.

So I packed Matthew into the car (without shoes - couldn't find them anywhere so I *assumed* they had been left in the car. Nope.) We drove to the closest CVS that does passport pictures which happens to be in Indiana. We have been to this store plenty of times.

A side note about CVS Pharmacy: Did you know that if you plan your shopping carefully, clip coupons from the paper, and use their Extra Bucks program, you can get stuff for literally pennies at CVS? I still have 12 bars of soap and 3 tubes of toothpaste that I bought last year for some insane amount of money, like $0.12 each. Some day, I will get back into shopping at CVS but it's a lot of work and can take a lot of time gathering coupons.

By the way, I did have the presence of mind to call the store first to make sure that they really did sell passport photos, that someone was there to take the picture, and that the machine that printed them was working. And it's a good thing I did, because the first store I called had a faulty machine. See? (tapping temple) Smart.

Anyway, when we get there, no one is at the photo counter. I wait there for a few minutes with my coupon and watch the lady working at the register. I keep thinking that she must see me standing there, why doesn't she call the photo person over to help me? Finally, I ask her if there is someone who can help me and she says that she is it - be right with you!

I tell her I need a passport photo, and she pulls out this rinky-dink point and shoot camera and leads me over to the milk coolers where they have a white screen they can pull down for a background. I'm thinking, "Great. This isn't going to be good." And I was right.

She took a second to pull the previous passport pictures that had just finished printing out of the Kodak machine and they were awful. I got a glance and told her that I was very, very concerned about the darkness of the picture since the requirements are to use a light background. She did show me (again) the white background that she was going to place me in front of, and I told her I understand that the background is white in real life, but that if the pictures come out as brown as the ones I just saw then I know they will be rejected and my application will be sent back.

She assured me that she was familiar with the time sensitive nature of passport applications, and that she would do her best to take a great picture. So, we began the picture taking business. Blech. After a few tries (under the yellow incandescent lights of the store, mind you) I asked her if maybe she could try using the flash on the camera. Would you believe she had the nerve to tell me that she had been using the flash already?!

Right. Despite being the one standing on the receiving end, and despite being really concerned about this picture and therefore really paying a lot of attention to what is happening, I must have somehow missed the blinding glare of a flash going off 3 feet from my face. Right. (Bill Cosby, anyone?)

So I asked her, very sweetly, if she would please check her camera settings and try one more time? Amazingly, she got the flash to go off. She then proceeded to change the mode of the camera between action and macro and landscape modes, trying to get a good shot. I am sure that I was the world's pickiest passport photo customer and she didn't seem to be having a good time at all. Fifteen dollars was starting to sound pretty reasonable, but I persevered because I am stubborn like that.

There were now about 3 people lined up at her register and I could see that she was getting agitated. We looked at the pictures on the Kodak machine and I gritted my teeth and picked out the one that I thought might work. If only I could just adjust the colors/brightness on the Kodak machine for her ... but no. She is adamant that there is no way to do that.

I wandered around the store for a few minutes while the picture printed. I wasn't thrilled with the end result but it had to do because I was bound and determined to get the application out in the mail, and it was already 1:00 p.m. The girls get out of school at 2:30 p.m. and I wanted to get it done before then.

We headed back to IL to our local post office since I had a bunch of packages to mail anyway (those clothes are selling pretty well!) I got all my packages mailed and then pulled out my passport application. Turns out that, even though our local post office is listed as an authorized passport processing center, it isn't. I guess I should have phoned first.

The lady at the counter, honest to goodness, asked me, "Do you want to go ahead and mail all your documents anyway?" I mean, come on now. Seriously?! No, thanks. Thankfully, she was able to tell me where to take my forms to get them processed. It's 1:45 p.m. Yikes!

On we go, to the post office in the next town to get our paperwork processed. Matthew has fallen asleep, now, so I have to carry his dead-weight body and try to sign forms, write checks, seal envelopes ... oh my aching arms! But I'd rather have them aching from carrying him than aching from not having him, so it was ok.

In order to make the best attempt at getting my passport before we leave around June 16th, I overnighted my application, birth certificate, photos, copy of my driver's license, and check to the facility in Philadelphia. I paid to expedite the process. I paid to have the passport overnighted back. My checkbook hates me.

But standing on Prince Edward Island in just a few months and pretending with my children that we are part of Anne-with-an-e's world, full of hope and promises of the future ... well, there's a lot of "scope for the imagination" in that thought.

Birth Certificate and Passport Card

2009-05-26T15:54:00.003-05:00

Since the last part of our trip takes us to Price Edward Island and Nova Scotia in Canada, I needed to get a passport or passport card. And in order to get a passport, you have to have a birth certificate.

After a thorough search for mine, of course it's nowhere to be found. And since I was born on an Air Force Base in Germany, of course it's a little more complicated to get a duplicate.

On April 14th, I sent off my application for a replacement Consular Report of Birth Abroad along with my $35 fee. And I waited. And waited, and waited. I just knew that after our FL trip, I would come home and it would be here waiting for me. But no.

On May 1st, the Department of State cashed my check! It was exciting to see it come through my online bank statement. I didn't think it would take long after cashing my check to get my birth certificate. So I waited some more.

On May 19th, my birth certificate was printed by the Vital Records Section of the Department of State. And it was postmarked on May 22nd.

I know this, because I received it in the mail today, May 26th. Woo hoo!!! It's about time.

I do realize that the range from April 14th to May 26th isn't all that long. Just about 6 weeks, which is what they say to expect on the application. But the question now is this: Will I have enough time to get a passport card? I am thinking that I am going to have to get an actual passport instead and pay to expedite it. I really wasn't planning on spending that much money - the passport card costs $45. A real passport costs $100, and an expedited passport costs $160. I am just thankful that the laws haven't changed for the kids - they will be allowed back into the USA with their birth certificates which I have already packed.

Why didn't I apply for my birth certificate even one month earlier than I did? I knew I should! I even talked about it with my mom. But I put it off and now I'm dealing with the consequences of my actions. And even still, with expedited service, I might not get it in time - I might have to have Tyler overnight it to me someplace when he gets it! Yikes!!!

At least I got the birth certificate, though. I am one step closer. Now I just have to stay on the ball and get my passport application sent out no later than tomorrow!! Stay focused, Jennifer!

A Trial Run

2009-05-25T10:43:00.005-05:00

Yesterday was a really nice day, so the kids and I decided to have a trial run of putting up the tent all by ourselves. Tyler says he wasn't laughing at us as he was looking on, but I have my doubts. We must have been a funny sight, so I can't say I blame him if he smirked a little here and there.

Here's the cast of characters:

a Coleman Stockton 8-person tent
a 12x16 tarp
a rubber mallet
a can of weather-sealing spray
a container of seam sealant

And here are my lovely assistants, left to right:

Matthew, 2
Rebecca, 5
Hannah, 8
Clara, 7

First, we got out the tarp and opened it out. The tent is 9x14 and the tarp is 12x16 so we had to fold it up a little. The breeze made this a little challenging but I got it figured out. Four kids, four corners ... perfect.

Wave 'Hi' to Grandma, kids!!

Next, we opened out the tent and got it spread out over the tarp.

We lost a kid along the way, but that is ok. Three kids on three corners works almost as well as four kids on four corners.

Becky asked at this point, "Do we have to inflate it?" Trying to explain the mechanics of the poles and stakes to a 5 year old can be frustrating. After a few minutes I just said, "Watch and see!"

Then, we got all the poles put together and threaded into the proper sleeves. Getting them pushed through so it was tight was a little scary - I had to have the kids hold them on one side while I pushed them up from the other. I was worried that the poles would somehow come loose and smack one of them in the face, but thankfully that didn't happen and all was well.

Here it is part way up.

Finally, I staked it down and then put on the rainfly. I was also concerned about doing this part with no adult help because the tent is tall and I didn't know if we would be able to get it all the way over without help. But we did! We even did it a second time ... since I put it on backwards the first time!

So now I have no worries about getting this tent up without Tyler while we are on our trip. As long as we're not trying to set it up in heavy winds or pouring rain or in the middle of a hurricane or something, I think we'll be ok. And if we're in the middle of a hurricane, we'll camp out a the Motel 6 right down the road instead. Yet another advantage of not being out in the middle of the wilderness. ;)

The kids couldn't wait to get inside the tent and play.

Look (chuckle, chuckle, snort.) They're laying down, pretending to be asleep. We'll see how excited they are after they've done it for real for a month.

And so, we did it. We were proud! We were happy! We coated the whole thing with water-sealing spray, so that the rain would just roll right off of it, should we encounter any rain on our trip. We let it dry and then took it all down and put it away.

We forgot to seal the seams.

Refilling the Vacation Fund One Shirt at a Time

2009-05-23T08:19:00.006-05:00

I have four children. And they need to have clothes even though they don't actually like wearing them. I learned a few years ago that if I buy quality, name brand clothes and then take care of them, I can resell them for as much and sometimes more than I paid for them. In the wake of this knowledge, I have gone a little crazy buying some of the cutest clothes ever made for kids. I finally realized that this has become an issue in my life, and I regained control of myself. I haven't been inside a Gymboree since right before Christmas, 2008. I am doing well.

Now, in my defense, I never paid full price. I never even paid 50% off - I always tried to wait until the clothes had been marked down to 60% off or more. I watched the sales and used coupons to get the best deals I could. But the truth is that I did overbuy. Every season. So we have an overabundance of these adorable clothes.

Anyway, a couple of years ago some friends and I started a consignment sale where other women who overbuy really adorable, quality, name brand clothes, can resell them when they are done with them to recoup some of the cost, and we keep a percentage of what they sell. It's really fun but it's a lot of hard work. Somehow, though, I hardly ever get my act together long enough to get my own kids' clothes sorted, ironed, tagged, and hung for our sales. Because of this, I have boxes and boxes and boxes of these clothes just waiting to be sold.

Wandering around Disney World with the kids and worrying about whether I would be spending the days afterwards cancelling campground reservations and returning supplies to the store, it occurred to me that if I could just get with it for 2 weeks, I could probably sell enough clothes to go on this trip. I had to make a conscious choice right then - do I want this trip or do I want to keep these clothes? I chose the trip.

I have been buried in a mountain of clothes ever since. Sorting and listing and selling and shipping ... and at $5 for a used shirt and $8 for used jeans, my vacation fund is rapidly refilling. It's refreshing to have some of these clothes gone and out of my house, and as ridiculous as it sounds, it's nice to know that they are going to other people like me, who will take care of them and love them the same way that I did.

Some other things have helped, too. The biggest of which is that "Tinkerbell" left us a sizable gift when we left Disney World for home. Somehow, "she" found out that our van was sick and that the repairs would be expensive. It was so nice of "her" to think of us and help us out like that. It meant so much to us.

Isn't it funny how, when you really feel led to do something, the means of doing so come more freely? I really feel like taking this trip with the kids is something that I am supposed to do this summer. I'm not much of a religious person but I almost feel called to do it; that I need to make this happen. In the time since we've come home from FL, besides the Tinkerbell money and the money from selling the kids' clothes, I have gotten 2 paychecks from the college for the note-taking that I did, checks from family for their cell-phones that are on our contract, several of our bills have been reduced leaving a surplus in our budget, and Tyler has had an abundance of overtime opportunities that have been scarce before this.

The vacation fund is nearly full again and it's only been a couple of weeks. I really feel that I am being 'helped' financially so that we can take this trip. I can't wait to go - I just know we are going to have an amazing time together.

Car and Budget Woes

2009-05-22T08:02:00.015-05:00

Because I am the budget guru in our house, I knew that if I was going to make this summer trip a reality I would have to figure out how much it was going to cost and then somehow save the money in advance. We are a cash-based family, following Dave Ramsey's get-out-of-debt plan for a couple of years now. We really need to buckle down and get back to it - taking these vacations really isn't helping us pay off debt. But we aren't accruing any new debt either, although not too long ago, in our credit-crazed furor, the incidents of April and May would have easily maxed out a credit card.

So, I planned and saved and planned and saved all fall, winter, and spring ... alongside of planning and saving and planning and saving for our then-upcoming FL trip. And I had the money. All of it! Life was good. I even had some money set aside for car repairs since our check engine light had been on and we didn't want to drive it so far (to FL and back) without getting it fixed.

And so the car saga begins. I took the car to several mechanics and had it tested to see what was wrong with it and to get quotes on having it fixed, because I am paranoid that the mechanics are all out to take advantage of me, a woman toting around her 4 kids ... a little frazzled and obviously needing these repairs done quickly because our FL trip, at this point, is only 2 weeks away. (Nothing like waiting till the last minute, right? Story of my life.)

Turns out the intake gasket was bad which messed up the oxygen/gas ratio in the emissions system. Fixing this is a good thing, because our emissions test is coming up in July and we'd like to pass the test so that our plates don't get suspended. While the mechanic we chose to repair this was looking at it, he couldn't help but notice that our oil hadn't been changed for over 7000 miles and that it had never had a tune-up in all the time we had owned the van. So we agreed to have these repairs done as well.

Remember how I said that we have a tendency to wait till the last minute to have work done on the van? Well, we'd known for a long time that the brakes were bad. So once those repairs were done, we got quotes all around town for brakes. Turns out our guy was the cheapest (and nicest ... took to calling me Jenny right from the get-go, ha ha) so we had the brake shoes/pads repaired and the rotors turned.

Remember how I said I'm paranoid about being taken advantage of at the mechanic? I was really worried all this time that he would cut my lines or somehow damage my engine in some way. But it turns out that he was just a nice guy after all. He even threw in a new air filter at no cost. Because apparently, it had needed changed for a long time and he felt bad for me, poor little Jenny and her 4 kids having to walk home from his shop in the rain, and having to walk back to the shop in the rain to pick the van up afterwards. Maybe the whole "woman and her 4 wet, bedraggled children" angle isn't such a bad one to portray. On the other hand, what's a $30 air filter compared to the hundreds and hundreds of dollars I had paid him for the other repairs? Hmm, maybe it's just good marketing on his part instead of sympathy.

Anyway, when he was done with my brakes, he showed me how the front tires were horribly worn on the inside edges. The outside edges of the tires were like new, but when he turned the steering wheel so that I could see the whole tire, it was obvious that we were not going anywhere until we fixed whatever the problem was that was wearing our tires so much and so unevenly. I could even see the wires on some parts of the tires, so I knew we had to make these repairs. So ... 2 new tie rod ends later ... and 2 new tires later ... and a wheel alignment later ... we thought we were good to go.

And then I talked to my brother.

Brian: "Have you checked your transmission fluid?"
Me: "Um, no. Should I?"
Brian: "Yeah, you might want to get that checked. Just because it's such a long way to go - you'd hate to break down on the way. And, by the way, if he didn't put orange antifreeze in your van then he's a crook. Just look inside - if it's green, then you'll know that he doesn't know anything about cars."
Me: "Um, OK. How do I do that?"

Some of you may have later seen my post on Facebook stating that I didn't think the transmission fluid was supposed to be dark brown with bits of stuff floating around in it.

And I can't even tell you how relieved I was to see orange antifreeze in there. Ack! That I may have trusted our only means of transportation to a guy who didn't even know which antifreeze to use, after all my research, was just unfathomable. It was a real load off my mind to see that orange antifreeze, and the sad thing is that I'm not joking. I was really worried!

Sigh. So I took the van to the transmission place that was recommended by my mechanic. Great guy - very concerned about our car and our trip because the van was doing some funky stuff when it shifted around the 45mph mark. The truth is, I had noticed that, but put my head in the sand about it because, honestly, why am I the one in charge of car repairs anyway? When you grow up with your dad and your brother doing all the mechanic stuff, you kind of just assume that your husband will take care of it. I guess it only took me eleven years to figure it out that this isn't going to happen, so I will stop assuming ... because you know what they say about assuming, right?

We decided to drain and refill the transmission fluid and replace the filter and see how it was running at that point. And, voila! Fixed! Which was a good thing because my car repair fund was DEAD. Wiped clean. The van wasn't shifting hard anymore and Joe said that it might be worth trying to take it on the trip after all, but that we should take his card in case we run into problems on the road so that if something happened, he'd be able to find us a transmission repair person who wouldn't completely hose us since it would be obvious we were on vacation and we would basically have to agree to the cost of a transmission repair while out-of-town. Yikes! Our FL vacation was now only a few days away.

So, can anyone see where this is going? Because, honestly, I shouldn't even have to keep typing this story. I don't think it could get any more obvious.

But just in case, I'll keep going. Fast forward to Friday morning. We were up half the night packing but we still managed to get up way early and get on the road by 7:00 a.m. Now that is a miracle in and of itself. Never mind the fact that I was hoping to get on the road by 5:30 a.m. That's OK! It was still way early and we were on our way to Disney World! At this rate, we were hoping to be in Atlanta for the night by dinner-time.

Yep. We were not even on the highway yet when the engine in our van simply stopped propelling us forward. The engine revved! It was trying so hard! But it just wouldn't work, so we coasted ... shocked and devastated ... into the parking lot of a bank, just 15 miles from home. Desperate, Tyler tried revving the engine a little to see if it would magically click into gear, but no such luck.

I knew that if we didn't come up with a plan of action right away, the shock and unfairness of the whole situation would be overwhelming. The kids were already a little panicky. Tyler looked a little panicky. I felt a little panicky. We couldn't let the panic set in!

We knew the first course of action would be to get the car to the transmission guy. Whatever we decided to do about the trip, the car couldn't stay there in the bank parking lot. In fact, it couldn't stay there much longer at all, because I was sure the bank was going to actually open soon and we were not even in a parking spot. Tyler shook himself off and kicked into action. He knew a guy in the area who owns a tow company, so he started to make calls. In the meantime, I started making calls to the transmission shop.

What would we do? I had promised the kids we were going to Disney World. I had scrimped and saved. The rental house was paid for. The tickets were paid for. Meal reservations had been made. The kids were looking awfully panicky, now. Hannah was starting to cry; she doesn't do well with sudden changes in plans.

The real thorn in the whole situation is that there were 6 of us instead of only 4. And we were in a bank parking lot in Indiana. And our van didn't run. So whatever we were going to do, it had to start by being able to actually get someplace to make new plans. So we started making phone calls to cab companies. Did you know that if the taxi has to cross a state line there is a huge surcharge?! Well there is. So we marked "calling a cab to take us home" right off the list.

And then it hit us. Enterprise ... we'll pick you up!

A-ha! Visions of a car all wrapped up in brown paper being driven and delivered to a happy, smiling family floated through our minds. TV commercials at their finest, I tell you. Guess those marketing dollars were well-spent on Enterprise's part. After calling 5 different Enterprise locations in the area, I found one that had a car available that would hold 6 people. Victory! And the rate wasn't even all that bad. Bad enough, though, since it wasn't expected and therefore not in the budget.

And so we get to the part of the story that actually has something to do with this upcoming summer road trip. Because ... can you guess where the money for the rental car came from? And can you guess where the money for the transmission repair came from?

Oh, my poor depleted summer road trip fund. I mourned the loss of it but I knew I had to do the responsible thing, even though it was painful. And so, in the recesses of my mind during the FL trip, I calculated and twisted and turned and wracked my tired mind about how I could possibly save enough money in the month before we were supposed to leave for this long, quality- and quantity-time trip with the kids, just out roughing it in a tent by ourselves for a month (at KOA campgrounds with all the modern amenities of home nearby) and seeing the local sights.

And I formulated a plan.

Firewood and Sleeping Bags

2009-05-21T13:19:00.006-05:00

This morning, Tyler asked me if I had a hacksaw and a hatchet so that I would be able to have firewood. I told him that they sell firewood at the KOA store, to which he replied haughtily, "THAT'S not camping!" He might as well have finished off with a quip starting with, "Back in my day..." and finished it with some well-meaning societal moral about how kids these days don't appreciate the hardships that he had to suffer during his youth. Never mind that we are the same age and that I've explained repeatedly that we are not going camping out in the wilderness. It's a KOA. There's a store, usually an arcade, laundry facilities, bathrooms (with toilet tissue even!) and a swimming pool and playground. The place in Arkansas has an attached water park, for crying out loud. Hardly the same as camping out in the middle of the forest somewhere.

So, anyway, today I went to Dick's Sporting Goods where Matthew and I pondered over sleeping bags and sleeping arrangements. Well ... I pondered and Matthew played with his shoes. But still, it was fun to have someone to bounce ideas off of, especially since he doesn't really say much that's meaningful back. For example, consider this conversation we had while at the store:

Me: Matthew, should we get 2 sleeping bags or 3? We won't be using them zipped up because it will be too hot. So we just need some padded surface area for everyone to actually lay on and we'll bring blankets from home.

Matthew: Yeah!

Me: Maybe we should get this one - see - it's a double sleeping bag. We can unzip them and then we'll automatically have two.

Matthew: I racecar! Vrrrrrr.....

Me: Hmm... but the individual sleeping bags are actually cheaper than buying the one that comes with two. Look at these over here; do you think we should get one red and one green? They're on sale!

Matthew: Go pee potty, now!

Me: Ok, guess we're done!

And so we ended up with one green and one red sleeping bag, lined in flannel. I'll put three kids on one of them (opened out) and myself and another kid on the other one (opened out) and just take comfort in knowing that if it doesn't work out I can always stop and buy another sleeping bag someplace. Because it's not like we are going to be out in the wilderness ... I'm sure there will be a WalMart or something right down the road.

Preparing for a Summer Road Trip

2009-05-20T21:12:00.004-05:00

It won't be long before our youngest child is in school full time and I'll start looking for work. Unless that work involves teaching, which I will fully admit I don't think I would enjoy, I will need to come to terms with the fact that I'll be working over the summers even though the kids are home. The time feels short and I feel some pressure to make the most of the few summers we have left together before they are inundated with babysitters and daycare.

We just got back from a wonderful extended family vacation to sunny FL, but school isn't actually out for them until June 9th, so our summer hasn't even begun yet. While planning for our trip to FL, an idea for a summer road trip with the kids took root and I've been making plans ever since.

I grew up on road trips with my family, camping and fishing and traveling from place to place, so I am fairly confident that I have the knowledge to pull this off, and what I lack in skills right now I think I will be able to learn as I go. Building a campfire and staking a tent ... those are things that you learn quickly when your food and shelter depend on it. Some of the other things, like fishing with the kids ... well, we'll see what happens.

Tyler, unfortunately, won't be able to come on the trip with us as it's a long time to take off of work and, like I said, we just took a family trip so he is saving his remaining time off to use around Christmas. It's always really nice to have him home and around the house for the whole week of Christmas so I don't blame him for that.

I am really looking forward to this bonding time with the kids. We'll be camping at various places on the east coast for nearly a month. We have a couple of nights planned with friends but otherwise, we'll be tenting it. While it has been really fun planning the route and making the reservations across the East coast, I will admit to being nervous about it. And I know Tyler has his concerns as well. I'm really thankful that he is willing to let us do this, even without him, and that he isn't one to try to control me. He knows how much I need my freedom and I am grateful that he doesn't hold a tight leash.

The saving grace is that we'll never be more than about 15 hours from home at the farthest, and actually most of the time we'll be within 8 or 9 hours of home. So if we get tired of it or if something goes wrong, we'll be able to just head home and be here within a day. Besides, it's not like we'll be out in the wild, we'll be at KOA campgrounds almost every night. And they have a swimming pool so that we can cool off and keep busy when needed.

I haven't set a firm date yet, but we'll be leaving sometime around June 16th to head to my parents' farm in MO for a day or two, and they'll be coming with us to our first destination - Diamond Crater National Park in AR and then east to Memphis, TN. As the plans firm up and the supplies are gathered, I'll update here so that those who want to see what we're up to can do so.

I thought I'd start this blog so that our family could keep up with us over the summer while we're gone. If it continues past that, wonderful! If not, that's ok, too.