Enchanted Car Wash

The kids finished school last Friday and are now enjoying one of their long breaks. They are ready for the time away from school, and I am ready for time away from having five lunches (I eat too!) ready by 7:04 each morning. It also means that maybe, just maybe, I will have a few minutes to write over the next few weeks.

Since the last time I wrote, we have taken three trips, celebrated two birthdays, and survived two holidays. Not bad. There is much to say, but I will keep it simple and start with last weekend.

November marked our ten year anniversary of living in Wilmington. It's been a great ten years, but it has also been a hectic ten years, and there are lot of Wilmington events and traditions that we never made time to enjoy. One of those traditions is seeing the lights of Enchanted Airlie at Airlie Gardens, and this year we finally made time to go. (And I even planned far enough ahead to get tickets!)

I really enjoyed seeing Enchanted Airlie, and I am pretty sure the kids enjoyed it, even if mean old Mom would not let them buy snacks.

After Enchanted Airlie, we stopped at the Barnes and Noble Cafe for cookies and cupcakes. (See, Mom isn't so mean after all!) On the way home from our evening o' fun, the gas light came on in the van. We realized we had never seen the gas light in our current van, and when it came on, a message popped up on the GPS asking if we would like it to direct us to the closest gas station. Jeff  and I were discussing how handy this feature was, when a certain boy child, who will not be named, became very concerned. His concern, in turn, led a certain little sister to get agitated. Within 30 seconds, I am pretty sure all but one of our children were convinced that there was impending doom and we might die at any moment because the car was low on gas. This was clearly the kind of thing my little worriers would lose sleep over. So we decided to head to a gas station, even though it was a bit out of the way.

One of our many recent adventures was a trip to Richmond, Virginia last weekend where we got to see my brother Alex and a whole lot of snow. That also met a lot of salt on the road, so while we were at the gas station, we decided to go through the automatic car wash.

I am certain my children have been through an automatic car wash before. I can recall being in there before with the same boy child fretting that the sign said to lower antennas and I had NOT lowered the antenna. I am certain he feared this also meant impending doom and death. But despite my memories of that prior near brush with death in the automatic car wash, they apparently had no such memories. And they found the automatic car wash to AMAZING. As in the most spectacular thing they have seen since Legoland in September. And we went to Disney World three days after Legoland.

They were enthralled the entire time we were in the car wash. They went to bed talking about the car wash. They woke up talking about the car wash. I am pretty sure that if Santa fails to come through, I can just take them to the car wash on Christmas Day, and all will be well with the world. So next year, I suppose, we should skip Enchanted Airlie and head to the car wash. Or maybe we'll just do both again.

Asheboro

I love to travel. It doesn't have to be any big deal or to anywhere fancy. I just love any opportunity to explore a new place. Apparently, my love for adventuring has passed on to my children, and the other night one of them was lamenting at dinner that, "It's been over a year since we left the state!" How criminal. I reminded this child that while it was within North Carolina, we did travel to Asheboro over spring break. This child loved that trip, but that wasn't good enough.

So here is a little about the trip that doesn't count.

North Carolina has a really nice zoo. All of the billboards even advertise it as the world's largest zoo. And our passes to the local aquarium get us into the zoo for free. However, we had never carved out time to take the kids there. I wasn't able to take off a lot of time over spring break, but I was able to take a few days, which sounded like the perfect opportunity to explore the zoo.

In addition to having an aquarium pass, we have a museum pass that we planned to use to get into a nearby science museum. I had an easy, inexpensive little mini-break all planned out. But then the weather refused to cooperate. I hate when that happens. And the stress of trying to figure out another plan may have led to me having a little breakdown while sitting in our minivan in the Harris Teeter parking lot on the way out of town. I may have mentioned something about needing a vacation to plan a vacation. But it was a gorgeous day, and the driver of our vehicle (mercifully, not me) made an executive decision to head directly to the zoo. It was a good decision. The forecast was for torrential rain the next afternoon, and we opted to see half the zoo on Day 1 and the other half on Day 2.

We live about 3.5 hours from the zoo, and we stopped halfway for lunch at Arby's. Miraculously, this was our only stop (at least that I can recall six months later) and we made it to the zoo by early afternoon. When we arrived at the zoo, we were presented with the dilemma of going in through the entrance in the North American exhibit or the entrance in the African exhibit. We opted for North America, which was closest.

Many people had shared with me how large the zoo was, but it hadn't quite registered until I got there. Many parts of it look more like a nature preserve than a zoo, and it is filled with spacious outdoor areas where animals can actually roam. Five of us absolutely loved it, and the usual suspect spent the entire afternoon whining about how much walking was involved. We all did our best to ignore Usual Suspect since there was way too much fun to be had. And despite the zoo being so large, the exhibits were structured to allow us to get very close to some of the animals.

 

 

This guy kinda snuck up and was suddenly RIGHT THERE.

And Mike's highlight of the day was when a brown bear turned and I ended up with a picture of the brown bear's bum. Good stuff to an eight-year-old boy!

After checking out the animal exhibits on the North American side, we took the zoo tram back to the entrance. Thank goodness for the zoo tram. I think we would have all been feeling like the Usual Suspect if we had tried to make the mile-plus walk back to the entrance at that point. Once we were back near the entrance, the kids explored the playground and other hands -on areas. One of the kids' favorite spots was a man made creek and waterfall that they were allowed to play in. It was a fun and wet way to end that days' zoo adventure.

 

After walking around all afternoon, we were starving. We checked in at our hotel and then went looking for food. There were a lot of chain restaurants near our hotel, but we bravely checked Yelp for other recommendations. We ended up at a little Mexican restaurant that, quite frankly, looked rather sketchy on the outside, but was nicely decorated inside and had very friendly staff. The food was amazing, and the kids ate everything, including five baskets of chips. Whew.

We were greeted by highly overcast skies on the morning of Day 2, and we made sure to arrive at the African entrance of the zoo as soon as it opened. As spacious as the North American side had been, the African side took space to a whole new level. Many of the animals were in a safari area that was large enough you could take a bus tour of it. There was a walking path all along one side of it, and with the animals being spread out over so many acres, I was nervous about not being able to see them clearly. That was clearly not an issue for this ostrich who decided to come over and say hello. 

And the highlight of the day, if not the entire trip, for Mike was getting to watch the elephants use the bathroom. Not pretty, but definitely impressive.

It started raining on us around the time we were finishing our tour of the African side, so we quickly made it back to the tram station. We ended up having to wait a really long time for a tram, but thankfully we were under a cover and stayed dry. And the heavy rains didn't arrive until right after we boarded a tram.

We went back to our hotel to dry off then decided to head out to explore. Asheboro is pretty small, but they had a mall. After the kids spent over three hours in the tiny mall in Jacksonville, NC back in December, I had no doubts they we would find something to do there. The Asheboro mall wasn't large either, but it included a video arcade. That happened to have free play of classic video games like Ms. Pacman and Galaga they day we were there. And that, of course, was the highlight of Leon's trip. 

We ended the day with a simple dinner at the hotel - the kids had Lunchables and the grown ups ate Chinese take out from the mall. The kids and I then went swimming. And that night we slept - the really satisfied, deep sleep that comes after two days of walking in the fresh air. Our little vacation may not have counted as an official vacation to the kids, but it was very enjoyable and a great way to explore another part of North Carolina.

 

Swimmers

This summer, everyone in our family learned new things. I learned that jury duty is not all bad. (I had somehow made it to this point in my life without ever being summoned.) Jewel learned that it is okay to sometimes each sandwiches. She went to camp and they (gasp!) served Chick-Fil-A sandwiches one day. And she bravely tried eating it, bun and all. And discovered that this bread stuff is pretty tasty.  Only one more child to convince that it is okay to eat bread...

But, far more importantly, this summer the three stooges finally learned how to swim. This is something that has always been important to me. My mom took me to swimming lessons from the time I was itty-bitty, and I can't remember ever not being able to swim. I love to swim, and I wanted them to share that love they way they share my love of books. (Even Natalia is starting to like books, but that is a story for another day.) And living on a peninsula between the ocean and a river, water is a way of life in Wilmington. There are beach trips and pool parties and boat rides. Even if my kids didn't end up sharing my love for swimming, I wanted to at least feel comfortable that if they ever fell into water, they could get themselves to the surface and to safety.

Starting the day of his third birthday, there have been three separate incidents where Mike walked into water over his head and just stood there. Frozen. He never flailed or visibly panicked. He just shut down. Underwater. So there has been a lot of work to do to ensure he can survive in the water. Leon and Natalia, thankfully, have a little more sense than their brother, but they still aren't natural swimmers. (Jewel turned into quite the swimmer a couple of years ago, so thankfully, she is no longer a concern in the water.)

I've dutifully taken the kids to swimming lessons every summer, and by last summer, all three stooges could swim IF they were in a pool and IF someone reminded them what to do. It was a start. Unfortunately, life happened and by the time I got around to signing them up for swimming lessons this year, the first session we could get them into was in August. So that meant swimming all summer without lessons. Thankfully, we do most of our swimming at my parents' neighborhood pool that has plenty of shallow areas and a lifeguard on duty.

However, back in July, Leon and Mike were invited to a swim party. They started out swimming in the shallow end, but soon wanted to join all the other kids jumping off the diving board. Of course I said they could go, but that doesn't mean I wasn't dangerously close to having a heart attack while I watched them.

I think they know their limitations, because they started off jumping directly toward the ladder. The first time he hit the water, Mike got himself to the surface, he started moving his arms and legs, and he didn't actually go anywhere. His "freestyle" seemed to turn out an awful lot like treading water. Thankfully, he managed to eventually put it in gear and get himself to the side. (The whole time this was happened, I was dutifully biting my tongue to avoid yelling out encouragement and embarrassing him in front of his friends.) Leon, thankfully, jumped right in and had no issues.

The most amazing thing for me to see, though, was how much their confidence grew that afternoon. And how much better they got at swimming. Since that afternoon where I let them just be kids and figure it out, they've been swimming a ton. And when swimming lessons rolled around this year, they did great. Natalia is always competitive with her siblings, so she tried hard in swimming lessons too, and before I knew it, she was flying in to the 8-foot water right along with her brothers.

So now, of course, the trick is to continue to give them the freedom to (safely) grow their confidence as they try other new things that I might find a wee bit scary. As their mother, I reserve the right to continue to quietly have a heart attack on the side. But maybe even I will learn that they are usually just fine.

Birthday Girl

(For simplicity as I write this, I am referring to Oldest Girl as Jewel since that is the name she uses at home. My apologies if you know her by one of her approximately 12 other names.) 

This little one...

...recently turned 11. To celebrate her birthday, she decided to have a pool party with her besties. My parents have a really nice neighborhood pool near their house here, so we had a perfect location. (My parents primarily live in Ohio, so yes, we were going to throw a party when the parents were out of town. Woohoo!) I emailed the moms of the four invitees, and amazingly there was a date near Jewel's birthday when all four girls were available. We just needed nice weather. This summer has been a mix of extremely hot, humid days and thunderstorms. Neither one is great for swimming, because yes, it can be too hot to swim. We've experienced it. We've also postponed a birthday party due to a hurricane, so there is tropical weather to contend with in late August, too.

Not that it usually has much accuracy around here, but I started checking the forecast ten days out from the party. And I checked it daily. I just couldn't help myself. The weather fluctuated between abysmal (severe thunderstorms all day and a tropical system looming) to very promising. Thankfully, the morning of her party was gorgeous. And it was supposed to stay that way through the early afternoon before "tropical storm-ish" (yes, that is what the weather forecast said. Really) arrived in the evening. I realized we were going to be able to get in the party as planned.

Jewel's party was scheduled from 11:00 - 3:00, and the full plan was for everyone to meet at my parents' house, head out to lunch as a group, and then go back for swimming, ice cream sundaes, and presents. Jewel and I planned to head over early to decorate, and Jeff and the other kids would join us closer to the start of the party. We had planned to leave at 10:00 and, amazingly, by 9:45 we were ready to go. We had the many, many bags of things we needed loaded into the car and we were even dressed and looking semi-presentable. (The good part about having the party not at our house - less cleaning and yard work. The bad part about having the party not at our house - we actually had to plan ahead and take everything over. I'm more of a "grab things as you think of them" person when it comes to entertaining, so this was a bit of a challenge for me.) I walked outside and all but spun around in the sunshine while I waited for Jewel to join me. At the last second I grabbed a magazine to read since we would probably have extra time before the guests arrived.

We got in the car, buckled up, and then I went to start the car. I discovered it had a dead battery. Really dead. After 4 or 5 attempts to start the car, I grabbed Jeff who confirmed, yup, dead battery. So I assessed the situation. The rest of the family was not yet ready to go. Also, in order to get everyone to lunch, we needed both vehicles since we had 10 people to transport. Hmmm. I decided the best course of action was to do SOMETHING, so Jewel and I took off to decorate as planned.

While driving, options started running through my head. Back at our house, Jeff was doing the same thing. When Jewel and I arrived at my parents' house, we unloaded the car, put away the cold stuff for the sundaes, and started decorating. Jeff and I had a couple of phone discussions throughout this process. He had one plan. I had another. By the time the balloons were blown up and the streamers hung, we had agreed on a new plan. I stuck a note on the front door in case any guests arrived before we returned, and Jewel and I took off again.

We went home and grabbed Jeff and the siblings. The new plan included stopping by Taco Bell to buy them a 12 pack of tacos (and a bag of burritos. The kids have definitely started really EATING). That way they could chill out at the house while I took the other girls to lunch. The Taco Bell stop made me nervous because you never know how quickly you will get food there, but thankfully, we were pretty quick.

Of course by the time we got to the house, a guest was waiting for us. Thankfully everyone is good friends, and it was no big deal. Jewel enjoyed having a friend help her finish setting up the sundae bar for the party and the craft station where they planned to decorate beach balls.

The party itself was great. The only challenge was the girls had so much fun at lunch that we were there FOREVER, and we needed a little more time for the party. (Because four hours wasn't enough!) Thankfully I was able to get in touch with all of the parents, and everyone was allowed to stay a little longer. I was even able to corral everyone for a picture. (Shoving juice boxes in their hands helped. And it's not like we tried for anything silly like actually getting everyone to look at the camera.)

So we made it through another year AND another birthday party. Not bad.

Crashing to a Close

With just three early mornings left, the school year is crashing to a close. Over the last month we've made it through:

Book Character Day

The Fourth Grade Spelling Bee

 

 Earning New Belts in Karate

Fun Day (Field Day)

Dance Recitals (Hmm. I really need to get some photos of oldest child in her costumes, too.)

Blueberry Picking with Grandparents (not a school activity, but happened during the end-of-school crazies)

Colonial Day

Random Birthday Parties

And Kindergarten Graduation (even though we haven't graduated yet)

Amazingly, this time has not involved in major illnesses or injuries. But it's not for a lack of trying. Natalia in particular, seems to have a need to create chaos and drama when she is nervous. When Mike gets nervous, he becomes overly helpful. It can be a bit much, but I really won't complain when an eight-year-old decides to pack lunches for himself and his siblings. It may all be packaged goods from Costco, but at least he uses the organic Go Go Squeeze...

But not Natalia. She is something special when she is nervous. The emotional roller coaster is something to behold. And the day of her dance recital, she took the nervous fun to a whole new level. It began when I looked down at the grocery store that morning and noticed her hands were pink. And not just a little red. Bright, opaque pink like the child had coated her hands in Pepto-Bismol. Except they were dry. I foolishly asked what happened and which point she went into evasive mode. Now keep in mind the girls aren't allowed to wear nail polish for the dance recital because it is distracting, and the child looks like she is wearing pink gloves. So when we got home, I made her scrub her hands. Nothing changed. So I scrubbed her hands. Nope. Still nothing changed. So I got out nail polish remover and ran it over he hands. That helped. A bit. So after much alternating between nail polish remover and soap, the crazy pink was gone, and her hands were the normal pink of having just been overly scrubbed.

After that fun, I needed some time alone to stuff my face with brownies, and so when she asked if she could play in the garage, I agreed.

Side note: Most garages in Wilmington are teetering mazes of Christmas decorations and outgrown clothes and all the stuff that doesn't fit in a house that you can't quite part with. Garages don't actually hold vehicles or lawn equipment or anything I associated with garages when I lived in the Midwest. Our garage had hit teetering maze-level in the late winter, at which point I did a massive purge, and it was clean and spacious again. For about a week. And then it slowly began refilling itself. We are not at teetering maze-level again, but it's not exactly empty either, so while it's not a super dangerous death trap, it's not the greatest place for a kid to play either. (Which, I'm sure, is the major attraction.)

After about ten minutes, I went out to check on her. That's when I found her riding her brother's new bicycle around the piles of stuff on the floor. Of course her brother's bike did not yet have training wheels, and she has never ridden a bike without training wheels, and she was complaining about how difficult it was to ride. And she was wearing a long, flowing sundress. And no shoes. She was a broken arm waiting to happen, but miraculously she got off the bike in one piece.

Thankfully, the Natalia-related special events have come to a close and she is (somehow) going to be heading to first grade next year. Now we just need to make it through three field trips tomorrow, and a couple of class parties on Wednesday and Thursday. We can do this. And fingers are crossed that we continue to stay accident free.

Fire Pit

There's just something about a good fire. Something relaxing. Something soothing. I find it hard not to be around a fire, whether it's in a fire place, in a fire pit, or it's a bonfire, without stopping and just watching the fire. It's so easy for me to be fully present and in the moment.

Jeff and I give each other traditional anniversary gifts each year. The traditional gift for the sixth anniversary is iron, and for our sixth anniversary I got Jeff an iron fire pit. The thing was a behemoth that was loaded into my car at Lowe's by two workers, and it remained in my car until Jeff and I wrangled it out. Jeff and I somehow managed to get it to the backyard, and it sat there untouched for many, many years. The kids were too young, and we never made time to use it.

But then last summer we went to my grandmother's house, and she has a build a bonfire in her backyard. And the kids LOVED it. We had a fantastic time around the bonfire.

And we realized that if the kids could handle an open fire in a backyard, they could probably be respectful of a fire in a nice, controlled fire pit. Still, building a fire in the yard isn't something we make time for every day. We enjoyed a fire on Thanksgiving. And that's been about it.

I was a grumpy pants all weekend. I wasn't fun to be around, and the things I did weren't turning out quite right. Nothing seriously wrong, but nothing going smoothly like it does when I can feel myself on the right path. But then Jeff suggested a fire this afternoon. I went along with it, even though it didn't make sense. I had a million things I wanted to do. It wasn't what I had planned. But it sounded...nice.

And so we all headed outside around 4:30 this afternoon, and Jeff lit in a fire in our fire pit. A funny thing happened. Once I got out there I relaxed and read. I also discovered that while our front yard is looking quite lovely, I hadn't touched the back yard yet this spring. So when I asked the kids if they wanted to eat dinner outside and they excitedly said yes, I found myself actually wanting to weed the patio (we have pavers and the weeds love to grow between them). I weeded the patio, and we ate, and I definitely made time to watch the fire. And I felt a wonderful calm come over me. So although I didn't do all the things that I planned to do (that I couldn't have crammed into a few hours on a Sunday afternoon anyway), I still feel ready for the week. It's amazing what a little bit of calm can do.

 

 

(Yes, even this crew, this close to the fire pit, can help me relax.)

That There Clark's An RV

This weekend Nati asked if we could go to an RV show. Late last week we'd had a deep family discussion regarding whether or not campers and RVs have bathrooms. We have never been camping in any form, and I don't know what prompted the discussion, but it was fresh in her mind when we were out driving on Saturday morning. Thankfully, she is finally reading which, in typical Natalia fashion, she is using against us. As we were driving, she spotted an outdoor RV show which had large signs announcing free admission. The word "admission" was lost on her, but my little bargain shopper knows the word "free" and she began campaigning to go.

I happen to be off work this week while the kids are on spring break, so we actually have time for random adventures. And so we headed to the RV show on Sunday afternoon. 

When we arrived, I learned one of the selling points for Natalia was a bouncy house, so we immediately went to that. It, like the show, was free, and she was very proud of herself for finding such a great outing. Interestingly, within five minutes, Ree was asking to actually look at the RVs, and Natalia was actually willing to look too. Well, she was willing to look as long as we promised to come back to the bouncy house before we left.

Leon has been sick for nearly two weeks with an icky virus that turned into a sinus infection, so he opted to stay home with Jeff and rest, but the four of us in attendance proceeded to spend over an hour climbing in and out of the various trailers and motor homes on display. 

The kids have an obscenely practical streak, and they quickly determined the best thing for our family was a trailer with a bunk house so that there would be permanent beds for 6 (rather than needing to convert the couch or dining booth). 

And they were happy to discover the large travel trailers all had bathrooms with a toilet and at least a shower. The trailer they declared "ours" and we toured three times included a bathtub too. 

Not that we were even remotely serious about getting one, but I had to admit I could definitely see myself cooking in the kitchen. I had expected a two burner stove and maybe a fridge, and I was pleasantly surprised to discover a three burner stove, an oven, a microwave, a fridge, a freezer, and ample counter space and storage. 

The deal sealer for Mike, of course, was the large flat screen TV. Because what is camping without Cartoon Network?

After the RVs, it was on to the boats! The kids enjoyed looking at them too, but they asked to go see the RVs one last time afterwards. They were smitten.

I have to give Natalia credit. Her random free afternoon was quite enjoyable.

January

Around the first of the year, I set an intention to slow down. The universe got a nice little chuckle out of that and said, "Um, no." Home life went at its usual pace, and admittedly, there's only so much room to slow down when people still need to eat daily and occasionally get clean and wear clean clothes. But everything else sped up. A lot. Despite the madness, we still had a lot of fun, and everyone managed to stay relatively healthy. Phew.

So here's a little from our January:

Our passes to the The Children's Museum of Wilmington were expiring, so we squeezed in one last visit.

The black light reduced Mike to nothing but a pair of socks.

We made it to the 100th day of kindergarten! Where substantially more effort MAY have been invested in "family projects" for her older siblings, youngest child was reduced to wearing a last minute outfit made from a hand-me-down shirt from her brothers and leftover puffy paints from her sister's 9th birthday. Thankfully, someone didn't seem to mind.

We saw ice! Outside! And not melting in a drink. The kids deemed this photo-worthy and checked on the frozen drip at the end of the down spout every time they went outside for 48 hours.

Someone had a birthday. She insisted on making her own cupcakes. I was only allowed to turn on the mixer, use the oven, and fill her piping bag with icing.

For Natalia's birthday, in lieu of having a party, she asked to go to Raleigh to go to Marbles Kids Museum and stay in a hotel with a pool. I spent about 13 second debating before realizing that going out of town with 6 people was substantially easier (and possibly cheaper) than hosting a birthday party for a six-year-old.

So January may not have gone as planned (actually, I never had a plan - maybe that was the problem), but at least when it came to my family, I enjoyed the ride. However your year is going, I hope you are enjoying it too!

Slow

We are easing back into regular life. If I had to pick a word to describe what I'd like my 2017 to be like, the word would be "slow." 2016 was just too fast. It was busy. It was crowded. It was a blur. I want to take time to actually enjoy 2017.

So far so good. Things actually started to slow down for us on December 22. That's when we began The Twelve Days of Mom, or the kids' title for my time off work. We had a really nice Christmas and a nice New Year's. In between, we had to deal with quite a bit of real life. Thankfully, we had the time to deal with real life, and we still found time to do things like play outside every day.

The kids' school schedule is helping me ease back into real life. Last Tuesday I headed back to work, and evening activities began, but school doesn't resume until tomorrow. And even Mother Nature is helping us out there. School is on a two hour delay tomorrow due to anticipated wind chills in the single digits.

We'll see how I feel in a week after a week of packing lunches and tracking schedules, but for now, I feel relaxed. I am enjoying the pockets of time, even brief ones, I find to do things like write and color and play games with the kids when I just slow down.

In the middle of December, we made time for a beach break. I was already trying to slow down then!

Some days over break we didn't bother to get dressed. Stomp rockets are more fun in your pajamas.

Someone finally got her own bike. And yes, she rode it outside too.

Game time!

Over break we made time to visit an exotic "new" aquarium with friends.

 Sometimes, it's the little things. I'm pretty sure a trip to Game Stop was one of Leon's favorite moments of break. Mike may have felt differently.

Whatever your plans are for the year, I hope they are fulfilling and enjoyable!