I haven’t talked a lot about the rugrats lately.  (Let’s not mention that I haven’t talked a whole lot about ANYTHING lately, shall we?)  So I figured I should probably try to make up for that.

Harry is back at school (at last!) after being off for the month of October.  There were some nice things about him being around (he keeps Liam busy) and some not so nice things about him being around (he gets Liam all wound up and hyper).  All in all, I’d say I was pretty happy to see him return to school.  Even though it’s all half days this week.  Stupid parent/teacher conferences.  Of course, we had ours before the break so these half day things are pretty freakin’ useless to us.

His birthday is next Tuesday.  TUESDAY.  And you know how old he’ll be?  TEN.  10.  Double digits. Lord help me.  I have a pre-teen.

Of course, that knowledge couldn’t have possibly escaped me because lately?  He’s been ACTING like a pre-teen.

However, I do enjoy some of his interests lately so there’s that.  Ever since our Disney Extravaganza in August, he’s been enamored of all things Disney just as much as we have.  He has gone from watching Nickelodeon with it’s plentiful showings of Spongebob and iCarly, to watching the Disney Channel and now it’s Wizards of Waverly Place, Jonas, Suite Life on Deck and Phineas and Ferb.   And, dare I say it?  I enjoy it.  He’s also discovered the chocolate-covered crack that is “High School Musical” and I’m only a little ashamed to admit that I currently have 3 “HSM” songs on my iPod.  Along with one by Miley Cyrus.  Oh and that song that all the kids of the Disney Channel sang together that makes me almost feel a little weepy when I hear it.

*cough*

Anyhow.  Where was I?

Liam, meanwhile, is a full fledged preschooler.  Which is impressive, considering he is neither a) potty trained or b) in preschool.  But he’s talking so much more and it’s actually getting a little easier to reason with him.  Which is to say that instead of having the consistency of a block of lead, it’s more like a block of asphalt.  Still stubborn as heck, but if you’re lucky and you try hard/long enough, you might get through.  He still doesn’t eat much, though I am consistently surprised by what he WILL eat.  And sometimes, letting him pick out what he wants to eat is enormously helpful.  This is a kid that likes to be in charge.  Even if you’re really the one in charge but he feels like he’s in charge.  Not an easy feat to pull off, but with enough practice, I’m getting the hang of it.

But, yeah, still not potty trained.

And then there’s Evie.  If Liam is a preschooler, then Evie is a toddler.  She is now the one that is into everything the moment you turn your back.  It figures, now that Liam has reached the point where I can trust him in a room by himself for five minutes, Evie is the one who can’t be trusted.  SIGH.  Her hair is growing and I’m delighted by it’s fluffy/curly consistency.  I’m still not sure if I’d classify her hair as curly (as it is mostly straight on top, where she still doesn’t have a whole lot yet), but in the right condition, the curls are just out of this world.  She’s a sweety, and loves to sit on laps.  Which, sadly, is counter-active to my knitting needs.  But, if there’s anything I’ve learned the last couple of years, it’s that sometimes you have to just go with the flow.  Unlike Liam, she eats very well and is definitely developing her own set of preferences. I have no idea if she’ll be a girly girl, but for now, she’s at the mercy of my whims.  And my whims say she’s a girly girl.  She does seem different than either of the boys were. But that could very well just be her personality.  And, for what it’s worth, I adore her personality.  It’s so fun to watch these kids come into their own, discover themselves and assert their preferences.

Like right now?  She’s dancing around the living room in a diaper while music from “Wall-E” plays.   She loves music and she absolutely ADORES dancing.  Girl’s got rhythm.

So that’s what’s up with the kidlets these days.  And, can I just say, I’m so looking forward to Christmas with them this year.  It should be a total blast.  Evie already loses her mind when she sees Christmas trees in the store.  Just wait till she sees one in our living room!

(On the other hand, maybe I CAN wait… I’m not looking forward to whatever havoc these kids wreck on the tree this year.)

Blah blah blah, story of my life. I can hear you all snoring already.  But really it has been not just a busy weekend, but a busy couple of weeks.  Kile was home on vacation for the last two weeks.  And my productivity, particularly when it applies to this blog, just DROPS when he’s home.  I can knit no matter what but for some reason, things need to be quiet, calm and normal for me to blog.

What a prima donna.

Last week was especially fun though.  My parents belong to this timeshare thing and were spending a few days up in Tahoe with some friends.  They had the condo for four days but were only going to be staying for three.  They asked us if we wanted to come up and stay the extra night there.  Sure!  That would be fun!  We planned to stop there, drop off our stuff, say hi and goodbye to my parents and then go to Apple Hill for the day.   We haven’t been over there since Evie has been born and it always is such a nice way to start off the fall and holiday season.  It never feels quite like Autumn until we’ve been to Apple Hill.

It was a cool and damp sort of day but it ended up being the perfect day to go.  We’ve been in October before when the temperatures were in the 90s and it’s just not near as pleasant.  And also, we discovered that visiting during the week is the PERFECT way to do it.  Sure, maybe not as much is open.  But everything we wanted to do was available and there were very few crowds to deal with.  Shoot, we were able to park right outside the door of Larsen Apple Barn and got personal attention from the employees and a GREAT deal on a monster box of apples.  Bonus!  We tasted wine at Lava Cap, had lunch at Hilltop and enjoyed some truly picturesque scenery.  All in all, it was a BEAUTIFUL day.

And it was so nice to only have to drive back to Tahoe instead of all the way home.  The condo was located on the edge of Zephyr Cove, just a couple blocks from the casinos at South Lake Tahoe.  And I was reminded of just how much I enjoy the mountains.  Towering trees growing up out of parking lots and alpine architecture and pine needles and fireplaces and… ahhh.

We had dinner at Dennys since Kile had a coupon.  We also rented “Year One” at a Redbox (God Bless, Redbox) and watched that with Harry after tucking the little ones into bed.  We munched on popcorn, drank wine (us, not Harry) and relaxed in front of the fire.  It was wonderful.  We could have spent a week there, EASY.

There was a great kitchen too, and Kile made us breakfast the next morning before we packed up to leave.  Before heading back to town, we stopped by Taylor Creek just west of South Lake Tahoe.  We’d heard that there were salmon spawning there and wanted to go check it out.  It took us a while to find it at first but once we found it, it was SO worth it.  There were quite a few people there, including several busses full of school children on a field trip.  There were signs everywhere warning of bears because, obviously, there’s a salmon buffet going on!

You could practically reach out and touch the fish, if you wanted to.  We all learned a lot too, which is always nice.  I’m so glad we stopped.  There was a nice walk back to the information center too.  Nothing beats Lake Tahoe in the Fall.  Just trust me.

We headed back home, stopping at In n’ Out for lunch (of course!).  Good burgers aside, it was almost disappointing to be back home.  We had a great time and I hope we get to do it again sometime.

But yes, last week’s little trip was yet another reason I haven’t been around to post on the blog very much.  I will TRY to be better.  But if Life intervenes, I’m going to side with Life.  You understand.

So it’s Monday.  Again.  The bright side is that it’s the last day of August.  Don’t let the door hit you in the rear on your way out, August.  I’m onto to bigger and better (and cooler) things.

Still, as happy as I am to see August end, I wouldn’t have minded another day or two of weekend.  It was a busy one around here and busy weekends always seem to be over way too soon.

Kile got paid on Friday night and since he gets paid once a month (the joys of being a state employee), we do the bulk of our shopping for the month when he gets paid.  Unfortunately, this stresses Kile out since he doesn’t like to spend money, no matter how necessary, and when he gets stressed he gets crabby.  And when he gets crabby, it rubs off on me.   Still, I did a pretty good job of deflecting his crabbiness all weekend.  And if I had remembered to take my thyroid pills yesterday, I probably would have been able to deflect it yesterday as well.

Alas, I did not take my pill and alas, I did not deflect.  By the end of the day, I was tired and I just absorbed it.  And when I absorb a bad mood off of someone… well it ain’t pretty.  And it’s not fun.  But the upshot is that I took my pill FIRST THING this morning.  I wasn’t interested in having another down day today.  It’s a Monday and I need all the help I can get!

ANYHOW… Saturday was our monthly B.O.O.S.T. (Big Ol’ Obnoxious Shopping Trip) at Walmart.  We actually went to Kohl’s first to look for shoes for Harry.  That child’s feet are growing at alarming rates.  He’s almost out of kid sizes!  We weren’t able to find anything though and as Kile was crabby, we decided it was best to just move on.  We had lunch at Chili’s before heading over to Walmart and that was nice.  We don’t eat out at sit down restaurants that much anymore.

The grocery shopping went pretty well and I think we remembered almost everything on our list.  Which is impressive because we had a LOT of stuff on our list.  We chinzed on our shopping last month because of the trip to Florida, so we were pretty much out of pretty much everything.  It was not a small trip and it was not cheap.  But at least now we have everything we need for the month, for the most part.  Perhaps maybe now lunchtime won’t be a source of stress around here!  It’s hard to find food to give the little ones when you have just graham crackers and granola bars.  Even moreso when one of your wee ones is as picky as Liam is.

Believe it or not, this all took up the better part of the day on Saturday.  We were wiped out come Saturday night!

Sunday brought more shopping through.  We headed over to Legends to do some more shopping for shoes.  On the way, Kile stopped at In n’ Out and we grabbed some burgers and fries to go.  We ate at one of the picnic tables at Legends which was really a fabulous idea.   Or it would have been fabulous if it hadn’t been so windy.  Until Subway opens up over there, there just aren’t a lot of options for quick, cheap dining.  That would be my only complaint about it.   Otherwise, Legends is awesome.

We finally found Harry some shoes at the Sketchers store there.  We also got the little ones some croc-style shoes that were on a fantastic sale.  After that we checked out the Carter’s outlet store.  We were hoping to find some clothes for Liam since we never seem to have enough clothes for the poor kid these days.  But we did get him and Evie their Christmas jammies.  So one present down, many to go!

But our shopping was not done there!  We headed over to Michael’s where I had some specific things to look for: a container for my cloth diaper laundry detergent, some knitting notions, and a scrapbook for our Disney vacation memorabilia.  Sam’s Club was next and we had some very specific things to get there.  Including chips and snacks for Harry’s lunches, frozen stuff for the deep freeze, etc and so forth.  Luckily, we thought ahead and had a cooler in the back of the van.  We packed the frozen stuff in there before heading over to Whole Foods.

Yep, we weren’t done yet.  We ALWAYS have to go to Whole Foods!   We got some fruit, some cheese, some laundry stuff for me… and we got a pizza for dinner!  Which meant:  it was time to go home.  At last.

The pizza was awesome.  But of course it was!  And it was the perfect dinner because were all beyond tired.

Like I said, last night was kind of hard emotionally for me and I entirely blame the lack of thyroid medication yesterday.  I really do need to stay on top of taking those pills.  At the very least.

And now I feel like I need another weekend to recover from my weekend.  OY.

So what did you do this weekend? Did you spend as much money as we did?  Because I’m starting to see why Kile was so crabby about it.  UGH.

In a word? Don’t.

We made it back from our big Disney Extravaganza yesterday. Well.
Today, actually. If you wanna get technical. And I do. The kids did
great on vacation. But traveling was hard on all of us.

I’m going to save the warm and fuzzy details for my warm and fuzzy
posts about the trip. This post is for the Traveling. Which was
neither warm nor fuzzy. And may have included me having a nervous
breakdown in the Denver airport.

Going out was… interesting. I mean, all in all, it was pretty
smooth considering. But we weren’t used to traveling at that point
and the whole business just had us frayed before we even got on the
plane, I think. We left fairly early on Wednesday morning. Kile’s
co-worker who lives near us came by and rode with us in the van down
to the airport where we unloaded our junk and the carseats and she
took the van to work with plans to leave it at our house on her way
home from work, picking up her car which was parked there. Make
sense? Everyone with me so far? Good?

The carseats… were a pain. I mean, I know we needed to have them.
But lugging them through the airport was AWFUL. I had the bruises to
show for it too! We hadn’t purchased Evie her own seat (since she can
qualify as a free “lap child”) but were able to score her a seat on
the plane anyhow so we brought her seat on the plane with us. And
that was hard! Pushing a stroller and carrying a carseat along with
the other carry ons was a nightmare, but then having to carry Evie
(having left the stroller at the jetway) and the carseat on the plane?
OMG. There are no words. I’m already starting to block it from my
memory, it was so bad.

And the moment the plane started moving, Evie got upset. And I’m
talking pulling back from the jetway. The stewardess finally told me
as we were taking off that I could take her out of her seat and hold
her. So I did and that chilled her out. So much that she started to
fall asleep so I put her back in her seat and that was all well and
good.

The boys were fine and dandy and other than Liam’s propensity for
kicking the back of Evie’s seat, he did pretty well too. Harry soon
discovered that flying was pretty cool and he liked ordering soda from
the stewardess and getting packets of peanuts and cookies.

We went first to Los Angeles, which seemed counter-intuitive. But
whatever. I saw the Hollywood sign as we were landing and tried to
point it out to Harry but he couldn’t see it. We landed and felt
rather smug for surviving our first (short) flight. We didn’t have to
get off the plane because even though it was stopping, we were riding
the same flight clear through to Orlando. Or so we thought.

While chatting with a fellow passenger, we found out that our plane
was busted. Oh yes. Busted. And at first, we weren’t sure when
they’d be able to find another plane for us to use since fixing the
current one was not going to happen anytime soon. But before I could
properly figure out how to react to this, they found us a plane. And
it was at another gate! Clear across the LAX airport. Soooo… we
unstrapped the carseats and tried to book it as fast as we could to
the other gate. We were following the flight crew and they promised
to get us on board. But at the gate, the agent there was a crabby
wench and made us wait and then snapped at us and was generally rude
to everyone she spoke to. We were finally let on board and scored new
seats and all was well.

The next leg was to Phoenix and was pretty uneventful. We landed. We
took off. Blah blah blah. The kids were getting used to it by now
and this time Evie only had minor complaints. But the flight from
Phoenix to Orlando was a long one and with the bumpy ride over the
gulf (wee!) I wasn’t sure we’d EVER get there! But we did, and landed
just as the sun was going down. The Orlando airport is all kinds of
awesome and we were easily able to find baggage claim. I hung out
there, grabbing our bags, while Kile went and got our rental car. It
was when we got outside baggage claim to get into the car that I had
full understanding of the heat and humidity. And this was after the
sun had gone down. GULP.

We found directions on my iPhone and drove to my parents condo for the
night. The whole toll road thing blows my mind. They really know how
to soak the tourists, don’t they? The whole east coast does that…
do regular residents/commuters find non-toll roads to use? Or how
does that work? Cuz I can’t imagine having to deal with that on a
daily basis. Bah!

Now…

The trip home was something else entirely. I made a decision that we
would check Evie’s carseat. I simply could not comprehend trying to
deal with it again. I had been having intermittent wrist pain all
week long (a result of not knitting? I have no idea.) the carseat
would have been too much. We had more stress than usual since we were
flying Southwest and they don’t have a sweet hookup with Disney like
some of the other airlines. Other people pack up their bags on the
boat and then don’t see them until they land at home. NOT US!

Oh, and we had to get off the boat at the asscrack of dawn. We were
up at 6am, at breakfast at 6:45 and then they made it clear they
wanted us off the boat ASAP. We tried to hang around as long as we
could but ended up on transfer bus around 9am. The trip to the
airport was quick and we were there by 9:30. We got our bags up to
the check in counter only to find out… you can’t check bags if your
flight is more than four hours away from taking off. Our flight was
scheduled at 4:20 so… yeah. We rented one of those Smarte Carte
things, loaded it up (you should have seen it! WHY didn’t I take a
picture??) and headed out. The airport is basically a MALL so we had
no trouble keeping ourselves occupied for a while. Especially once we
found the rest of my family hanging out. NO one had flights that were
leaving anytime soon.

Note to self (and anyone else planning a similar vacation): DO NOT
hesitate to schedule your flight earlier in the day! 12:30/1pm would
have been PERFECT. CURSE YOU, late flight!!

After Kile finally was able to check the bulk of our baggage, we
grabbed lunch at the food court (see? MALL!) and I was finally able
to try the infamous Chik fil-A. I had a chicken sandwich that was
mighty tasty. We browsed around the shops after that, and I was
mighty tempted to buy yet MORE Disney goodies at the Disney store
there. I showed restraint but even now, I’m sorta wishing that I
hadn’t. There was the cutest Tinkerbell coffee mug!

Anyhow, after that we braved security which had a whole bunch of
people from other countries going through. More than usual, I would
say. But by that point, I was so used to people from other countries
and foreign accents that I’m surprised I even noticed. Security was a
lot smoother than in Reno, simply because we were “old pros” at that
point. We found our gate and set up camp near some electrical outlets
so we could charge up our phones some more. We said goodbye to the
remaining family members and it wasn’t long before our flight boarded.
It went a lot smoother for me without the carseat. The bad news is,
it was a very full flight and every seat was taken so there wasn’t
much room to set her down or anything.

We took off a little late because there was some weather in the area.
But nothing awful and we were able to land almost on time in Denver.
Evie didn’t sleep a wink the whole flight and was extremely wriggly.
But we managed.

I have to say right now that I have extremely negative feelings about
the Denver airport. I like Denver. I do not like Denver’s airport.
There is ALWAYS turbulence (but then, there is in Reno too), but more
than that it’s the whole layout of the airport. The wasted space, the
inefficiency, the uselessness of the second floor “waiting” area.
WTF, Denver?

This is where we realized just HOW stupid our flight schedule was. We
were on the last flight from Denver to Las Vegas, which was then
continuing to Reno. And as such, we had to wait. There was a flight
from Philadelphia that had been delayed by weather and as luck would
have it, 30 or so people from that flight were on our Vegas flight.
So… we waited. We already had a 2 1/2 hour layover (and ate at a
restaurant that turned out to be exceedingly expensive). Add on
another hour. On top of tired children and parents and we were just
ready to be home. I didn’t handle it well. I was frustrated. I fell
in the trap of counting up the hours we’d been awake, how many hours
until we could be home. It was overwhelming. Liam and Evie had had
it. Harry was exhausted. I was beyond tired. We were all just DONE.

We finally got on the plane and got up in the air. Evie fell asleep
before we even took off so she was taken care of. I still had to hold
her, which meant my arms fell asleep. But at least she slept. She
woke when we landed in Vegas, but fell asleep as we took off for Reno.
Praise be! Liam slept too, which was great. He had slept most of
the way from Orlando to Denver too so Kile made out pretty well on
that deal. Harry slept on my shoulder the majority of the time. But
as we landed in Reno, he was awake and had the biggest smile I think
I’d seen on him all week. He wanted to be up in his bed so bad and I
couldn’t blame him.

Baggage claim in Reno is notoriously slooooooooow. Harry and I waited
for bags while Kile went out to look for his co-worker who had again
graciously offered to ferry us. That was a small mercy, let me tell
you! We FINALLY got our bags and FINALLY were on our way homeward.
It was after 1am by the time we got home. I could barely see
straight. Evie was interested in a diaper change and then BED. She
was out before she hit the crib mattress. Liam complained for maybe a
minute before dropping off. Harry was dead to the world. It took
Kile and I NO time at all to fall dead asleep.

And that… as they say… is that. We made it there and back in one
piece. That, my friends, is amazing. Flying with toddlers is a pain
unlike anything else. It’s just damn lucky that this whole trip made
it SO WORTH IT. Details to follow!

Yet again, I don’t have long… Just long enough for the boys to ride the Tomorrowland Speedway. But I had to mention that today us our 11th anniversary. Pretty cool to be celebrating on such an amazing vacation, huh?

We haven’t really had a chance to do anything “just us”, but that’s okay. We’ve had a great day with the kids, soaking up one more day in the parks before heading off to the cruise tomorrow.

Still, I couldn’t let this day pass without acknowledging that I’m married to the most awesome man. We complement each other perfectly… And I’m looking forward to many more anniversaries in the future.

And, I have to say, eleven years is a piece of cake when you’re married to your best friend.