Vacation!

So... I haven't written in a while. Are you still here? Hanging with me? It's been hard for me to blog because--well, no. Just no. My life is 27 kinds of crazy right now, but... seriously, isn't it always? I have no excuse. I'm glad we're together again, friends.

My heart is so full of things to share with you that I hardly know where to start. But for tonight, my head is also full of decongestants--not the mention the congestants that were already there (Blogger is trying to tell me that's not a word, but what else would you call it? Get with it, Blogger.)--so we're going to keep it light. Let's go with vacation pictures.

About two weeks ago, our family had a chance to take a company cruise. My hubby is self-employed, so we took our family, all of our employees, and a "plus one" for each of the employees. It was lots of fun! I'll try to give you the highlights...

First of all, let me tell you that I was a bit apprehensive about this cruise. We left out of Baltimore and traveled to the Bahamas. If you are even marginally familiar with geography (which is my level of mastery of that particular subject), you know that "Baltimore" and "Bahamas" are not exactly neighbors. This meant lots of time at sea. With three kids. One of whom is Roo. Yeah, just tell me your heart isn't already beating a little faster just from reading that. We had 3 days (out of 7) that were entirely at sea--no ports of call. But I have to say, it went surprisingly well. For one thing, those days afforded good opportunities for naptime... for Roo and his mama. Also, cruise ships have this wonderful childcare program where you can drop your children off and they entertain them and keep them safe and all that while you... pretty much do whatever you want. To be honest, they were only in there for about 2 hours a day (and less than that for Lamb, who wasn't wild about the whole deal), but it was a nice break--for them and for us.

One of my favorite things about cruising is the food--or really, the food service. I mean, the food is delicious and all, but no one at home does this for my kids...

Another waiter one morning brought out our breakfast, then asked if he could help cut up the boys' pancakes so that Mr. Fantastic and I could eat. Ummmm... YES PLEASE! And is it wrong for me to kiss you?

And of course, let's acknowledge that the food is fantastic...

This is "best French toast", which is crusted in Frosted Flakes. And then drenched with syrup. Duh.

Oh, I have to show you this--this is one of my favorite pictures...

This is actually from the first day of the cruise. Roo was already so worn out, he fell asleep sitting up during an informational session in one of the showrooms.

It was adorable. You know how people will post pictures of their kids falling asleep in random places, like in their high chair or passed out on the floor or something like that? That has never been my kids. EVER. I couldn't believe that he would fall asleep sitting up, with people walking around and talking and laughing... but he did. One minute he was chasing the big kids through the aisles, the next he just climbed up next to Mr. Fantastic and ZONKED. I love this kid!

Another advantage of the multiple "at sea" days: time for homework.

Yes, this picture is of Monkey, but I have to tell you... it was Lamb who really had to devote time to her studies. Third grade is no joke, friends. She had work to do. Sister cranked out close to an hour of homework every day, not to mention that she spent tons of time getting stuff done before we even left so she would have less to do on vacation!

So our first stop was Port Canaveral, Florida. And here's an interesting story... if you are a Facebook fan, you likely saw my post about Roo needing a fingernail removed. Yep, a fingernail. My digits are tingling just thinking about it. Anyway, he had developed an infection in his finger a few weeks before our trip, and it just wouldn't go away. I kept putting Neosporin on it, and it wasn't terrible looking (I even had a pharmacist look at it, and he said it wasn't bad enough to warrant a doctor visit.), so we decided to just wait it out a little longer. Unfortunately, on the ship it got much worse. Mr. Fantastic finally took him to the infirmary on the ship, and the doctor said we needed to take him to the ER at our next port (Florida) to have the nail removed. Fun times. (Spoiler alert: Mr. Fantastic took him, the doctor there decided it didn't need to be removed. He prescribed a stronger ointment--to be given 3 times a day--and an antibiotic--to be given FOUR times a day. On vacation. Right. Oh, and he recommended that we soak it for THIRTY MINUTES AT A TIME three times a day. Did this guy even LOOK at that child?!?)

Anyway, while Mr. Fantastic and Roo were off on their own little adventure, I took the kids to the beach. Ah, the beach in Florida. Doesn't that sound lovely? OK, honestly, it was lovely. But it was not especially warm. I think the high that day was 60. So we didn't do any swimming, but we had lots of fun just playing on the beach.

 

Lamb decided to do a little photo project...

 

That's my girl! She was so proud of herself!

The next day we were in the Bahamas

Again, lovely to be out of the great Midwest, but not the weather one might expect in the Bahamas. Another day at the beach, another high in the low 60s. But this time, we were in the water. Yep, we froooooooooooze!

But it was so worth it. Because we weren't alone in the water--we were with dolphins!

(Yep, just 4 of us. Lucky for us, Gram--my mother-in-law--works for my hubby and was on the cruise with us. She volunteered to take Roo for the day so that we could enjoy the dolphin encounter with the big kids!)

Oh, Little Miss Lamb is very into dolphins right now, and I thought she was going to absolutely BURST with excitement. We had tons of fun doing this encounter!

And then... we just wanted to get warm.

There's nothing quite like a good cup of hot chocolate when you're on vacation... on the beach... in the Bahamas...

Next up: our third and final stop, also in the Bahamas. In a cruel twist of fate, this was the warmest day of our trip... and we weren't at the beach. At this stop, our whole crew (11 of us) did an excursion together, and we visited a botanical garden. It was a little bit of a bummer to be away from the ocean on the nicest day, but the place we visited was beautiful.

They have a labyrinth there, which was not at all what I expected. It was actually just a big slab of... something... with a path printed on it. The idea is that you walk the path slowly while meditating/praying/thinking/humming, and as you journey to the center you also find your "center."

Our family took a different approach: Run as fast as you can, making sure to be loud enough that everyone on the island knows exactly what you're doing.

After the botanical garden, we had a chance to do a little shopping on the island, and there was a courtyard with live music. I took Lamb and Roo out to teach them the electric slide...

Then Roo decided (as always) to dance to his own beat...

But the real magic happened back on the ship that afternoon. We went up by the pool (which was actually covered with a retractable dome roof! Is that cool or what?!?) after Roo's nap. I set him down, thinking he would run to Daddy. Instead he did this...

I love this video. Seriously love it. Do you know that at this time last year, that kid couldn't walk? Check him out, people. This boy is amazing.

So that pretty much sums it up, but let me give you a few other random shots that I enjoy...

Wake up, Monkey!

 

"Seriously, Mom? Do you see this girl behind me? THIS is why I refuse to grow hair. Bed head. I don't have time to deal with that. I have places to go and people to see."

And don't forget the super-cool towel animals that you find in your room each night...

 

There should be 6. I have no idea why I only have pictures of 3. But still. VERY cool. It's such a little thing, but one of my favorite parts of cruising. :-)

It was a great week--I'm so glad we had the family time.

Come back tomorrow for more pictures, but not of vacation this time..................

Go West, Day 14: Happy Birthday & other matters

I know, another late post. These last two have not been nearly as fun to write as the first ones!

By the time we left the campground--making sure to say goodbye to our new friends first--it was a little bit late, but we didn't have far to go, just 4-5 hours until we were home.

Everyone was in pretty good spirits at this point. The kids played and watched movies, Mr. Fantastic and I started dreaming about what our new, totally redone basement might look like (when we're done, not that day! ha!), and I think everyone was looking forward to sleeping in their own beds that night.

Oh, and one other thing. It was my birthday. Not exactly the best of circumstances for celebration, but hey--a few months ago I got a surprise trip to Florida (I still haven't gotten to blog about that... one day...), so I can't complain. My parents called to tell me happy birthday and said that we would have cake at my mother-in-law's that night. Sounds like a plan to me!

So all-in-all it was going well. And then we got home. And we saw it all for ourselves. It was... overwhelming. I wish I had pictures of the basement, but it just didn't occur to me to take any. A lot of stuff had been moved upstairs (And did I mention the bags of stuff that my parents took home to wash and dry for us? I can't remember... but they did.), but there were still piles and piles and piles of stuff in the basement. All of the carpet was out, and the drywall had been cut out in a few spots--though always low to the ground. Whew. OK. Here we are.

I won't go into the rest of the details of the evening, except to say this... By the time we went up to my mother-in-law's house (she lives two doors down from us, so we walked), Mr. Fantastic was completely overwhelmed. Seeing the basement, starting to unpack, dealing with three kids who were glad to be home and a little slap happy... and then the added bonus of going up to my mother-in-law's to find a nice, clean dog--very excited to have her owners back--who felt the need to go roll in a rotten egg that she found outside somewhere. So he got to give the dog a bath. Not exactly on his to-do list.

My birthday celebration... was a bust. Blah.

(But I still got Florida.)

So that was the end of our great western adventure. Just to bring you up to speed...

• My mother-in-law's foot is, in fact, broken. And a few days later, my mom broke her leg. We are a non-stop barrel of laughs around here, folks.
• It took a few days, but we got everything emptied out of our basement. It is now all in our garage.
• A couple days after we got home, my parents kept the kids overnight (before my mom broke her leg). Mr. Fantastic and I were able to get a lot of basement work done, but more importantly, we went out for dinner at The Cheesecake Factory for a REAL birthday celebration. Yeah, baby!
• We are now in the middle of picking out wall colors, flooring, and the like for our "new" basement. We are trying to decide whether to go all out and get new furniture as well. Decisions, decisions.
• And yes, we do want to head west again next year. So we'll get to do this whole series again 12 months from now... hopefully without the flooding...

Thanks for reliving it all with me. ;-) See you soon.

Go West, Day 12 & 13: Eastward, Ho

Happy Monday! Thanks for sticking with me. I know I left you hanging on Friday, and now I've made you wait half the day for the next update. But I'm here!

Let's start with Monkey. I still have a hard time wrapping my brain around this, but... he woke up the next morning 100% FINE. No pain, no swelling, no discoloration. NOTHING. I know that many of you think that I was probably overreacting to the situation in the first place, but I just have to say... you had to see it. It was truly awful. And maybe I am being dramatic, but I honestly, completely, and totally believe that God healed that little boy's wrist. Because there is no way it went from the way it was at 10 PM on Wednesday night to the way it was at 8 AM on Thursday morning. Just thinking about it brings tears to my eyes.

But as for our trip, it was officially over. I couldn't imagine going home after a month, having my hubby working all hours to get caught up from a month off of work, and trying to deal with the basement myself. And even though we had talked about heading home over the course of several days, Mr. Fantastic was just too distracted to really enjoy himself... so we just headed home.

We were a pretty somber family. We were all disappointed that we didn't make it to our "big" destination of Yellowstone, but I think we were all even more upset to miss out on the time with our friends. Mr. Fantastic was preoccupied with the basement, and my mind kept replaying the whole wrist incident and making my stomach turn. What a crew.

Fortunately, the grown-ups were able to rouse ourselves from our funk around late morning and try to cheer up the kiddos. We read together and played and watched movies (well, the kids did), and just generally tried to make it as fun as we could.

We had hoped to make it halfway home the first night, then split the other half up, allowing ourselves some time to relax and play at a campground the second day/night. After a while, that started to seem unrealistic, but we decided to just play it by ear and not make any reservations.

Around 8:00 that night, we started looking for a campground... and then Roo fell asleep... and then the big kids started watching a movie... and Mr. Fantastic said he was feeling pretty awake and wanted to keep driving. We eventually just had the kids lay down and go to sleep, and we kept going. Finally, around midnight or 1 AM (he told me later, because I was already asleep), he pulled into a truck stop and we just slept there for the night. We made great progress, much farther than we thought we would get. (I have no idea where we stopped, somewhere in Iowa, I think.)

And then we woke up the next morning and started up again. Actually, Mr. Fantastic woke up and started driving while everyone else was still asleep.

Slowly the rest of us joined him. That day was a little more cheerful. Even though none of us wanted to miss our trip, the idea of getting home was starting to become appealing.

But first, just a little more fun. We decided to book a campground that night, somewhere far enough that we wouldn't have a super-long drive the next day, but short enough that we could get there in time to enjoy our afternoon.

I'm so glad we did. This was probably the nicest campground we found, other than the state park in Colorado. The sites were beautiful and wooded, the pool was nice, the owners were friendly, and there were LOTS of people around. (All of the other campgrounds were busy, but nobody really seemed to hang around much.)

We spent the afternoon at the pool, then built a campfire (now that we were out of the "danger zone") to cook dinner.

After dinner, Daddy and the big kids went for a walk... and came back with friends! They met some sweet little girls with twins Lamb's age. They stayed and played with us until almost midnight! We played board games, made s'mores, and got out TONS of glow bracelets and accessories that I had planned to spread out through the rest of our trip. It was such a very nice way to end our trip.

Good night all. Tomorrow, we'll be home sweet home...

Go West, Day 11: And then... an unexpected turn

I started my journaling for this day in the morning. Although much had changed by the end of the day, I decided to leave what I had originally written, because… well, the contrast between my expectations and reality is laughable. Now. The stars indicate the end of my original journaling, where I have picked up now to finish telling you about our day. (I still wrote it as if I were writing on that day, just for the sake of consistency.)

I’ve taken over 2800 pictures so far. That is a ridiculous number, especially considering that we’re not even halfway done yet. I really thought I would average about 100 photos per day, but obviously I underestimated myself. Oy vey.

Today got off to a bit of a rough start. After showering and getting dressed, Mr. Fantastic picked up his phone and found a text from his mom: “Do you still have crutches at your house?” That doesn’t sound good. Apparently the dry spell that Colorado has been suffering through has not carried through to Ohio. There it has been raining for almost 2 weeks straight. This morning my mother-in-law was walking our dog, and she slipped and fell. She thinks it is just sprained, but she wants some extra help getting around. We are feeling terribly guilty that she is at home, taking responsibility for our house, our pets, and our business… and now with a pretty bad sprain, from the sounds of it. And we’re here on vacation. I’m thankful to have my parents close by and know that they can step in and help.

**********

My wonderful husband indulged me so much in Colorado. Everything we did in Colorado Springs, we did because *I* wanted to do it. And now today, he and the kids are accompanying me to another place they would never otherwise visit: MOPS headquarters!

 

I joined my first MOPS group when Lamb was just six months old. I had no idea what it was or whether it would be what I was looking for, but it has been a MAJOR part of my life ever since. Even now, when I am not technically in a MOPS group (the moms’ group at my church is independent, not a MOPS group), it is a ministry about which I am passionate and in which I want to remain involved. I was so thankful for the time I could spend talking so some of the women there and making good contacts. Exciting things were discussed, not all things I am ready to share here. But be praying, my friends. I have some hopes and dreams for the foundations that were laid this morning.

Sooooooooooooooo… after our time with the lovely ladies of MOPS, we were ready for lunch AND we were armed with a lunch recommendation from some of the women we had just left: Casa Bonita.

 

Have you ever heard of this place? I had not, but I guess it’s a little bit famous. (I’m not sure how many of you are “South Park” watchers—I haven’t seen an episode since college, and even then I never actually watched it, just saw bits and pieces of it when other people were watching it—but apparently there’s a whole episode about it.) It’s a Mexican restaurant, although you don’t really go there for the food. You go for the experience. I really… I am hesitant to try to describe this place to you, because I feel like I won’t do it justice. Really. It is indescribable. But I’ll give it a shot.

Here’s the big draw:

 

Cliff-diving. Every 15 minutes, there’s a cliff diving show! Inside the restaurant! Sometimes it’s just a “straight” diving show, sometimes they mix in some comedy (like a guy in a gorilla suit). Either way, the kids love it!

 

 

But they do so much more with the kids, too. There was a piñata…

 

…and Black Bart’s Cave (a “haunted house” type of experience)…

…a game room (a la Chuck E. Cheese, complete with tickets and prizes)...

(Roo LOVED this throwing game. If you know him, you know that this is RIGHT up his alley.)

 

...and lots of other opportunities for fun.



 

But even that isn’t all. In addition to the main seating area around the waterfall, there’s a mine room…

(Yeah, I didn't get any pictures of the actual seating in that room... but here's the mine car...)

…a castle room…

 

…and many others that I didn’t capture “on film.” One had a stage for magic shows. Which reminds me, we also saw a small puppet show while we were there. This place was bursting with things for kids to do. We had to DRAG our crew out of there!

After exploring the many rooms of seating and fun, we were astounded at how big the place really was. On our way out, we asked a waitress how many people the restaurant can seat. Turns out, it’s over A THOUSAND! She said that on busy days, they serve over 17,000 people! Is that astounding or what?!? I later read an interesting blog post about Casa Bonita, where the author talks about waiting an HOUR to be seated as if that’s a common occurrence. I’m glad we were there at 1 PM on a Wednesday!

When we finally got back to the campground, Roo and Mr. Fantastic snuggled up for just a quick nap while the big kids and I got everything ready to go to the beach. This was my second bummer of the day—I was hoping to run over and visit a friend who just moved to Denver from our hometown, but we had been promising and promising the kids time at the beach, and I couldn’t hold them off any longer… and Mr. Fantastic didn’t seem too keen on taking all three of them to the beach by himself. My friend and I tentatively planned to have coffee after bedtime, and our family headed down for some beach time.

 

I don’t have a whole lot of pictures from the beach today. Do you know why? Because I was too busy enjoying the beach. At the risk of sounding corny, that afternoon felt almost magical. Roo was a little unsure of the water at first, but before I knew it he was sitting in the water saying, “Kick! Kick!” and thrusting his little feet all around. The big kids made friends with a sweet little boy named Robert, who had a raft, and they all had a ball climbing in and out of it and pulling each other around. And we played in the sand and we played in the water and we just relaxed and loved being together.

When Roo and Monkey decided to take a break from the water, I walked with them over to our beach chairs (and the large amount of gear we had toted out) to supervise the building of a sand castle. And then my phone rang. And I knew what I was going to hear.

Earlier in the day, I had gotten onto Facebook on my phone, and saw a few people complaining about water in their basements. Although we have never had a flooding issue in our house (two exceptions: once when we were building the house 10 years ago, which we resolved; once last year when our septic backed up, so not a rain issue), I got an uneasy feeling about it. I got online again a few hours later, while Roo and my hubby were napping, and saw that a tornado watch was in effect for our hometown area. With my mother-in-law (who lives just two houses down from us) injured, I knew I couldn’t ask her to check our basement, so I thought about calling my dad—but then I couldn’t justify asking him to drive in possible tornado conditions just to satisfy some silly gut feeling with no real basis. I decided I would wait until Mr. Fantastic was up and ask him to call our maintenance guy (my hubby owns rental properties) and see if he would just swing by and check it out to give me some peace of mind. But when he did wake up, he was still a little groggy and grumpy, so I decided to let it go until later… and then we were at the beach and I didn’t want to bother him with it…

And then suddenly I was standing at the beach chairs, talking to Robert’s dad, and my phone rang. And I knew. I picked it up and saw my mother-in-law’s phone number. And I knew.

“I’m so glad you’re answering the phone,” she said. “I don’t have good news.”

Our basement was flooded. Our FINISHED basement—as in, the toy room, the living room (with the TV), our game room (with a pool table), and a full bathroom—was flooded. The whole thing. She had called my parents and told them that she was worried about it because of all the rain, and they came out to check it. My dad had gone into our storage room in the back (the only unfinished space) and found that the sump pump wasn’t working. He was able to get it running, and it started pumping the water out, but the damage was done.

Fortunately, we have a fabulous family. My parents, my brother, and two of my nephews started hauling stuff out. My mother-in-law called a cleanup/restoration company we use through my hubby’s business, and they came right out to get all of the carpets out and cut out any drywall that got wet. My mom and dad, we later found out, even took him several (6 or more) garbage bags full of toys and photos and other random stuff, to dry it out—and in the case of the toys, wash and bleach them, just in case there was any sewer water mixed in. They worked hard to get things under control for us. I know they were hoping that we would be able to just continue on our trip.

Mr. Fantastic came up then, and I handed him the phone so that he could hear it all first-hand. When he got off, we both went through the same range of emotions… from “this is horrible” to “it’s just stuff” to “what on earth are we going to do?” We debated about packing up and leaving right then, driving through the night. We talked about continuing our trip, at least for a few days. But we kept coming back to the reality that Mr. Fantastic was likely to be SLAMMED at work after taking a month off. How could we possibly deal with all of the things we would be facing at home if he had a month of making up to do?

Finally, we just sat down, watched the kids play, and just… sat.

But we knew that we couldn’t go on with the trip. We would be preoccupied, and we needed for Mr. Fantastic to be able to help at home, not to be overwhelmed with work AND the basement all at once. In just a few days, we were slated to meet up with some of our BFFs in Yellowstone, and we would all make the trip home together. So many plans, suddenly out the window.

Lamb took it the hardest. She and her sweet friend Hannah, part of the family we were supposed to meet in Yellowstone, are two peas in a pod. More than any destination or site or activity on this trip, she was excited to spend almost two full weeks with Hannah, whom she typically gets to see just every couple of months. But we finally got her—and Monkey, who was less emotional but still tremendously disappointed—settled down and distracted, and we all just sat rather quietly on the beach, watching Roo push a truck all over God’s creation.

It was 8:00 before we finally packed up and left the beach. Our plans for a beach-side dinner—and my plans for a late-night coffee—were gone. We decided to grab a pizza and sit outside the RV, enjoying our last night in Colorado.

The boys got in the truck first. Lamb and I stopped to wash her feet off, and were lagging behind a bit. As we walked up to the truck, Monkey stood inside with his hand out the window, calling out, “Tickets, please! I need your tickets, ladies!” We giggled and slapped his hand and pretended to give him our tickets.

But if you know 6-year-old boys, you know that a joke that is funny the first time, just gets funnier the more you tell it. So he continued as Lamb got in the truck. He continued as I loaded the last few things in the back. He continued as I walked up to my door. “Tickets, please! I need your ticket, madam!” I gave him “five” and said, “There’s my ticket!” And I got in the truck. I didn’t hear, as I sat down, him saying, “No, wait, Mommy. How about this? ‘I need your credit card, please, Madam!” So I got in the truck. And I closed the door.

But it didn’t close. It bounced. It bounced because Monkey had reached his hand out through the window of the back seat, around the side, and INTO the opening of the front door as I climbed in. I didn’t know his hand was there. He didn’t know I was closing the door. Until it bounced.

I was out of that truck and pulling him out of the seat faster than you could believe. I held him and whispered to him and kissed his hand and stroked his hair. The “mommy guilt” of cutting our trip short combined with the actual guilt of hurting my child (yes, I know, unintentionally), and I was a wreck. We sat and cried together.

The RV park was about a quarter-mile from the beach, so I sat Monkey on my lap as we drove back to our site. I watched his fingers turn purple, and the tips gray, and my stomach turned. When we got out of the truck, I showed them to Mr. Fantastic and he said, “Let’s get some ice on your fingers, buddy.”

And Monkey said, “No, it’s not my fingers that got hurt, Daddy. It’s here.” And he held his wrist. His WRIST got shut in the door, and his FINGERS were purple and gray. Oh God, I whispered. Oh God, oh God, please don’t let it be broken.

I could FEEL the blood draining from my face. My hubby saw it too, and he said, “Let’s just get some ice on it, Honey.” He and the big kids stayed outside, tending to Monkey, while I fed Roo and put him to bed… and then sat crying… and crying… and crying.

My dear, wonderful hubby had apparently had the presence of mind to order a pizza at some point in all of the confusion. He came in to tell me he was going to pick it up, and of course to give me a big hug. What would I do without that man? I went out to sit with the big kids while we waited, and my sweet Monkey had his right hand sitting on the table, wrapped in ice and an Ace bandage. His tears were gone, but he was quiet. Lamb—who kept running into the RV to get stuffed animals and toys to cheer up her brother—and I entertained Monkey while we waited for our dinner. Eventually it got too dark and buggy, and we moved Roo to the back bedroom so that we could hang out inside the RV. (We later learned that Mr. Fantastic had gotten lost looking for the Pizza Hut.)

So… not quite the ending that we had planned for our trip. We had reservations to cancel, friends to call, and now would we have to start our journey home with a trip to the ER?

I feel a little guilty to leave you here on a Friday, but that's just how it all breaks down. If you don't want to wait until Monday to learn the rest, you'll just have to find me over the weekend. ;-)