California Trip - Day 2

Wednesday - May 16th, 2007

Sir drove until 2am after we left Lynnwood. By then he was starting to get tired. He had been watching for a truck stop since we wanted to get a little pillow for Dolly's neck, but by the time he woke me up to talk to him, he still hadn't found anything promising. Finally we spotted a Walmart Supercenter and to our delight it was open 24 hours. While Sir stayed with the kids I ran inside and found a pillow among other stuff and re-emerged to find Sir starting to wonder if I had fallen asleep in the pillow isle.

Since he wasn't quite as tired after the Walmart stop, Sir kept driving until we stopped to get him something to drink and a snack in Kelso. While we were there I nursed PC so he wouldn't wake up later when it was more inconvenient for us. By the time PC was finished, Sir was awake enough to keep going and after a while I dozed off to sleep again. At 4am. he couldn't drive any more and I took over the wheel. I was absolutely delighted to get to drive into the sunrise and since it only got lighter outside after I took over, it was a lot easier to stay awake than I had originally anticipated.

The kids started waking up around quarter to 7 and when they started getting restless I started looking for a rest stop. I didn't want them to disturb Sir any more than necessary. We stopped at Gettings Creek just outside of Eugene where I got the kids dressed before letting them stretch their legs a little. It was sunny and about 45 degrees. Dolly started out riding her scooter a bit before losing interest and joining PC in a game of ball. We watched a robin hop around and saw him swallow a worm (major highlight for my daughter). Then Sir woke up, washed up a little and played a bit of ball with us before we hit the road again. Of course, I completely forgot to take any pictures while we were stopped.

Sir drove to Roseburgh where we ate breakfast at at Denny's. The kids were starting to get tired of traveling and were restless during breakfast. Once breakfast was over, I called my parents to let them know when we thought we'd be getting in based on where we were at the time. We headed out again and I had to get some rest. The kids were still fussy, but they soon fell asleep and I started to un-stress enough to doze off for a while.

Just before we got to Grants Pass, we started thinking about lunch. I had packed sandwich supplies, but wanted to grab some lunch meat to put on them. Once we found the Fred Myers in Grants Pass, I ran in for some allergy/sinus medication and the lunch meat while Sir stayed in the car with the kids. Next time somebody needs to tell me how vast a Fred Myer store is. I'd never been in one and ended up trekking across it in four different directions to find the few things I was looking for. Consequently I ran into two irresistible sun hats that would be perfect for keeping my kids from getting fried in the California sunshine. When I finally emerged from Fred Myer, the kids were both awake and we decided to try to get as far as we could before we had to stop for lunch.

Somewhere after Grant's Pass and before the California border, Sir and I traded off again. I know this because I was the one who drove across the CA border and remember looking for a place to stop for lunch. It was getting late for lunch and the kids were fast reaching their limits, so we stopped at the first rest area inside California and had our picnic lunch. Sir took the kids down to look at the river that ran along side the rest area and they loved it. Dolly made about four trips to the washroom before finally using it, but at least she did.

While I packed up our lunch stuff, the kids and Sir kicked the ball around before discovering the water faucet next to the parking lot. It wasn't until just before we left that I remembered the camera, but at least I got a couple pictures. I had changed the kids into cooler clothes since it was already 80 degrees and it was barely 1pm, so we just dried them off a little before loading them back into the car. It would be a lot warmer at our destination and it wouldn't take very long before they would be nice and dry again.

After lunch, the kids fell asleep and our next stop wasn't until we reached Weed. We needed to get enough gas to get to our destination where we could fill up at at more reasonable price. We reached Redding around 4:30 and after missing an exit, we turned around and found our way to the jewelery shop where we had purchased our wedding rings. My ring needed to be repaired in order to keep it under warranty and we thought that we might as well see about having it done by the people we bought it from. I'm glad we did because the quote we got was less than half of the amount I was quoted in Bellingham a few months earlier. We left my ring and headed for the ranch.

Dolly and PC woke up as we got to Cottonwood and because we were so close to our destination, it was easy to keep them happy. Dolly loved the bumpy dirt road and just as we got to the main gate, we ran into my dad on his way to work. We stopped and said hello through rolled down windows before continuing on. It was 89 degrees and after 5pm. I was really glad we didn't get there any earlier since I can only imagine how hot it must have been at noon! We actually pulled into the driveway just after 5:30 glad to have finally made it.

Liz, her boyfriend C, and my mom were the only ones at the ranch when we got there, but the kids didn't care. They were too happy to get out and see all the dogs, cats, cows and horses that were all over the place. To our surprise my family had collected the cows earlier that day so Sir and I were able to walk through and see our cows that we were hoping to sell later in the week. Dolly started out very excited to see all the cows, but then turned absolutely terrified when she realized how big a cow really was. She clung to Sir and switched between laughter and whimpering until she noticed that "the cow has a pink nose!" She thought that was the silliest thing and forgot to be afraid of the cows after that. Liz and C had run the horses into the yard by then, so Sir took Dolly out to see them too. She wasn't afraid because they were kindof like cows, and she really enjoyed petting "mommy's horse".

We visited with my mom, looked through the cows and got a tour of the house before it was time to get going. It was meeting night, and we wanted to make it out for meeting. Since we didn't have enough time to eat supper, we made arrangements to meet my family for pizza after meeting. Then we headed in to the meeting room and had just enough time to slip a skirt on Dolly before meeting started.

The kids were hot, tired, hungry and restless, so keeping them quiet during meeting was a bit of a handful, but we managed. After meeting we said hello to everybody and then took our leave for the pizza parlour. Mom, Liz and C showed up about ten minutes after we got there, and since we had ordered pizza as soon as we had arrived, it didn't take long before dinner was served. Dolly fell in love with Aunt Liz and PC really hit it off with my mom.

When dinner was over, we followed my mom to her new office in town where she showed us around. She had to grab some stuff for a class the next day and it was on our way to the cottage where we would be staying anyway. Once we'd seen the office, we drove a few minutes more to the cottage where we carried our sleeping babies in, unloaded the car, set up the playpen, changed the kids into pajamas (without waking them - I was proud of myself for that), took showers, and finally crashed in a monstrous king sized bed in utter exhaustion just after midnight. We were glad to have made it safely to our destination and glad to have a place so comfortable to stop.

California Trip - Day 1

Tuesday - May 15th, 2007

Cleaning the house and packing for our week-long trip went relatively smoothly even if I never did get the house perfectly clean before we left. Tuesday morning the kids and I went with Sir on his way to work as far as the car rental place. From there Sir went to work in our old vehicle while we took the rental and did our last minute shopping on our way home.

Sir actually had a doctor's appointment he had to go to before going to work, but he was also planning on working a half day and would be home around 3ish. He got to work a little later than he had hoped so he wasn't able to get off until 3:30, but a half hour delay was do-able. Around 2pm he got to thinking about the rental paperwork he'd glanced over before taking his leave of us, and thought he remembered seeing something about driving out of BC. He got a hold of me and had me double check the paperwork.

Sure enough, there was a little clause lost among the paragraphs in the rental agreement that said that unless we had specific written permission we couldn't drive the rental outside of BC, Alberta and Washington state. This was frustrating because when we were looking around for a rental place Sir had actually called the main office for the company we rented from and specifically asked about renting a vehicle to drive in the states. They had told us it would be fine and so we had decided to rent from them.

The next thing I did was call the actual rental location we had picked the car up from as if I was interested in renting from them to see if they'd provide a vehicle that could be driven to California. I discovered that yes, it was possible.... but for an additional fee. Overall it was cheaper to just pay the extra fees than to return the car and try to find one from a rental place that didn't have all kinds of conditions. But we still needed to get our little slip of written permission.

I told Sir what I had found out and he called them saying that he had rented a vehicle from them and then discovered the exceptions. He wanted to make arrangements to get the extended permission. They were fine with that, but told us that the vehicle they had rented out to us was due for maintenance and was not allowed to travel past a certain mileage that we would exceed on our trip. This meant that we had to return the rental we had (that I had already started loading with our luggage) and exchange it for another.

So, Sir got home at 4 (the rental place was closing at 5), I had unloaded the car and he rushed off to get one we would be allowed to drive to California. So much for our grand plans of actually getting on our way by 4-4:30ish! We finally crossed the border around 6:30pm. A little stressed (at least I was) and really on our way!

Our first stop was supposed to be for dinner with Sir's younger sister L. and her husband, but we ended up stopping at Doc and Bashful's to pick up a battery charger that we had ordered and had mailed to their house, a grocery store where I grabbed an energy drink for Sir and some tissues that I had forgotten to pack, and a little gas station/restaurant for Dolly to go potty (or get a new diaper since we didn't make it in time). We finally got to D&L's around 9:30. They must have been starving and I felt terribly guilty for making them have such a late supper.

In spite of the late timing, the meal was absolutely scrumptious. They did barbecued pork chops with homemade barbecue sauce (Sir insisted I get the recipe :)), barbecued skewers of zucchini and mushrooms, the most delicious baked potatoes I've ever had (I think she did some kind of twice-baked thing to them, but they were good - creamy insides and slathered in cheese), a beautiful garden salad and ice cream for dessert!

Dolly was in 7th heaven. She had been looking forward to our trip to California for weeks on end and part of the anticipation was stopping at Uncle D and Aunt L's house. They're pretty close to the very top of her 'favorite people' list and she wasn't disappointed at all. After supper the kids played with D&L while we relaxed a little, visited with them and enjoyed our little ones' excitement and happiness over tea (At least I had tea... I don't remember if Sir had anything or not).

Finally our little people had reached their limits and we changed them into pajamas, repacked the trunk a bit, said 'good bye' and started out at quarter to midnight for our drive through the night. The kids were asleep in ten minutes and Sir and I enjoyed a few minutes of peace and quiet together before I had to get some sleep myself. We had hoped to get more sleep before our trip, but there was always something else to do still so we never did get 'rested up' before we left. I needed to be able to drive when Sir reached his limit and if we could manage actually getting sleep while the other drove we wouldn't have to pull over and sleep away precious kid-quiet hours of the night!

Home

We're home (as of 8:30 this evening). I was going to post one of the very few pictures that we took on the trip, but I'm so tired that I'm falling asleep at my computer while transferring them from the camera to the computer. So, the pictures will have to wait until I get a chance to fill in all the details of our trip.

The kids are bathed and in bed, the car is unloaded (Sir and his Mom are returning it now), and I was actually smart enough before we left to put clean sheets on our bed and not pile it too high with laundry to be folded which means I don't have a whole list of chores to do before I can finally crash.

Sir is the one who had it the hardest since he drove almost the whole way, but the kids kept me busy enough even though they were really good for almost the entire trip.

So, for now, this is just to say we made it safe and sound to and from California and nothing very important went wrong! That said, I'm going to bed because I have two little people who have just been storing energy for the last day and a half and will probably be up bright and early to start wearing it off! Good night.

Found.

As soon as I finished posting my last post, I presented Sir with the same question: Where would you put your flashlight if you were two years old?" He replied with:

Did you try the drawer in the coffee table? Check. Not there.
How about her purse? Nope.
What about her bible case? No.
The diaper bag? Already checked.
Daddy's bible case? (At this one I jumped up to check. She has been known to put things there.) No. Not there either.
Daddy's computer case? (This is another favorite stashing place of our daughter so I started looking.) This is what I found:

Lost.

If you were two years old, were beyond excited about a upcoming trip, had just purchased -almost by yourself- a $2 Canadian Tire flashlight, and couldn't wait to help your mommy pack- WHERE WOULD YOU PUT YOUR NEW FLASHLIGHT????!!!!

This is what I'm trying to find the answer to amidst packing, cleaning and keeping up with my kids. "It's only a $2 flashlight" you say. Yes, this is true. BUT. We just bought a bunch of rechargeable batteries and Sir was using Dolly's new flash light to discharge some faulty ones before charging them properly before our trip, so it's not just the flashlight that's missing. Hopefully Dolly didn't turn the flashlight off before she stashed it, and the whole ordeal won't have been a total waste.

Yesterday I was doing something in the kitchen- I don't even remember what it was now- and I glimpsed out of the corner of my eye, my daughter dashing out of the kitchen with her new flashlight (on) slung over her shoulder by the strap like a purse. At the time I wasn't worried. I'd let her play with it a few times before and always found it afterwards. But by last night I still hadn't found the flashlight. And I'm running out of places to look. I've checked just about EVERY hiding place and stash-spots that Dolly has and have come up empty-handed.

It's not in the fridge.
Not in the half packed suitcases.
Not in ANY of my desk drawers.
Not in the bookshelves.
Not in the toy baskets.
Not in the nursery.
Not on my nightstand.
Not in the piano bench.
Not in the cat stand.
Not under the fish tank.
Not behind the dining room table.
Not in the many half-filled-with-toys grocery bags strewn about the kitchen.
Not in the wagon.
Not in the dishwasher.
Not in the oven.
Not in the kitchen cupboards.
Not in the pantry.
Not behind or underneath the refrigerator.
Not... Not... NOT!

I'm running out of ideas of places to look faster than you think and Dolly doesn't seem to be much help either. The worst part is, we're leaving in about 16 hours and at the rate I'm going on my search, I'll find the flashlight in some odd place three weeks from now!

Ok. That said, I can go back to my search... and maybe I'll manage to get a little more done on the packing at the same time. You can only imagine how focused I am on packing while at the same time I'm racking my brain for possible flashlight hiding places!

10 Months Old.

Here's PC at 10 months.

And here's Dolly at the same age.

PC didn't pass any major milestones in the past month, but he has started to 'talk'. He's discovered his voice and all the different sounds that happen when he does funny things with his mouth. Beside that though, he has his very own language of communication. I'm not sure if he's just recently come up with it, or if I just recently realized that's what he's doing. He 'talks' a lot with his hands. At first I thought he was just doing funny things, but after a while I discovered that the same signal always means the same thing. For example, "Hi" looks like a nazi salaute. And "drink" is VERY DIFFERENT from "up" (for those dumb moms out there who don't see the tiniest change). "Up" is both hands raised straight above his head. "Drink" is diffrent because although the HANDS are in the same position, his HEAD is tipped back like he's looking at the back of his hands. Then there's "come", and "can I have?" and "bye bye" that all have different hand signals as well. His only verbal words are: "Car!" and "Mama!" I think "Daddy" sounds like "DA!", but I haven't tested it enough to be sure. Thankfully, there's Dolly around most of the time, and she can translate the stuff I never see. I'm sure there must be something he's doing when she says, "PC wants a drink." and sure enough, when I give him the sippy cup he drinks like he's parched. Even if he didn't even look thirsty to begin with!

The two pictures below are zoomed out to show the difference in their walking abilities. As you can see, Dolly is standing, but the snow is helping her stay upright while she was so bundled up she could barely breathe! She had been walking for all of two weeks when I took her picture and wasn't too sure of the uneven terrain. PC, on the other hand is in transit for his photo. He'd been walking for almost 8 weeks and is confident in his abilities to get around. You can really tell the difference when you look at their overall posture and the positions of their hands/arms.