My vacation

2-16-10

Of course, when you go on vacation, you need a vacation to recover. I am quite tired this morning. I slept pretty well, considering how little I feel like I slept this weekend, but more on that in a minute.

We got up to the compound around 1 in the morning Friday. Yes, it was late, and yes, I was beat, but overall, the trip was pretty good. Bobby slept a lot, and Dax was zoned, but I was pretty proud at how prepped I was. I had snacks, drinks, and everything to keep them happy. I even managed to pack the car, and aside from me putting stuff on the wrong side, I did an excellent job! Yay me!

Luna did quite well on her first really long car trip. I was impressed. There were a couple of puppy moments, but overall, she and Lycos just slept. It was great!

The good news was all of us crashed out hard. We slept in a smidge, and everyone was bright eyed and bushy tailed Friday morning. It was just Grandma and Grandpa, so it was nice to have the minor crowd at first.

I introduced Luna to Johnny and Shorty, and in a scene that reminded me of Love Potion #9, I watched my poor wussy puppy run for her life as the two resident dogs chased her around the house. I did not expect this, and was not really prepared. I had Bobby with me, and I was in this long skirt and sandals. I had to run after them, hoping Bobby would not freak out at me bailing on him. I found Luna under Grandma’s car, and it had scared the shit out of her, literally. She came out when I got there and promptly hid under my skirt. It was really cute. Shorty was not a threat. She is just as her name indicates, a little dog, and Lycos doesn’t like her in the least bit. Lycos chased her off pretty quickly, and proceeded to yell at her the rest of the weekend. Johnny, on the other hand, is a big dopey Boxer. He has very little teeth left and is really a sweetheart. After the initial meeting, Luna and Johnny ended up being the best of friends. They played and played the whole weekend. It was super cute.

Luna did have some house training issues on the first day. She peed and pooed in the house, which was bad. But after that, she seemed much better. She had no issues running around the property and never wandered off. She was having some listening issues, and she kept stealing random things in the house to chew on. She also would get up to eat food on the counters. But there were enough of us around that she was scolded quickly.

During the day on Friday we didn’t do much. We went to the grocery store for supplies and played at the house. It was a little rainy out, so we mostly stayed inside. It was probably good, though, since it was the first day.

Jenni came up Friday night and we got to visit for a couple hours while everyone watched a movie in the other room. It was awesome! Uncle Andy showed up and Aunt Lyn got home from work so we now had a full house.

The funniest thing of Friday, though, had to be the fact that we were unfortunately right in our prediction. Ken’s cousin, Sandy, has problems. She has two little kids, one who is 3 months older than Dax and one who is 15 months old. Both are cute kids. Sandy is married to this guy who is a sweetheart, but is really just a big kid (that we also suspect has some kind of Autism). Anyhoo, they are now separated, with Liam (the 3 year old) living with his dad, and Sandy barely able to handle her daughter, Libby. She has left both kids with her mom and dad on more than one occasion for long periods of time. This is bad since both of them are not in the best health to begin with, and then they have to take care of two little kids? The prediction was that since we were coming up, she would find out, and she would try to make arrangements for the kids to all play together since they could then bond. Of course, this would then end up being something where she would drop off the kids, and bail, leaving us in charge of her children. My other prediction was that it would turn into Mammoth all over again and I would be left watching all the kids while everyone else had fun.

These all came true.

They came up on Saturday and luckily the kids all had a blast. They played on the deck and with 4 kids, 3 dogs (Shorty was not out there) and mass chaos, there were no problems at all. No joke. No collisions, no crying, no injuries for a few hours. It was awesome! I loved watching them have so much fun.

Now, I wasn’t by myself the whole time. Grandma was out there for a little bit, and Liam and Libby’s grandparents were there, Grandpa George watching the kids with me, and Grandma Ann watching Libby, sometimes inside, sometimes out. But it was a situation where everyone else was in the library playing Wii. Ken came out a few times to see if I needed anything, but what I really needed was for people to engage. I loved that everyone was having so much fun with the Wii (more on that later), but what I really wanted was to stop having this happen. I don’t go on vacation to be the baby sitter. And it is one thing with my own kids. Really, they are old enough that I almost don’t have to watch them like I used to. They are on their own and really handle themselves fine. But I wasn’t just helping them with everything. I was also watching a puppy. Luna had to be watched. Lycos did, too, since she was so grouchy. Then, I was kind of watching Liam, and at a couple points, Libby, too. The occasional pop ins to see if I needed something only enforced the idea that yes, I needed to be out there, but I don’t want to be catered to. I want the family who doesn’t see the boys much to come out and spend time with these kids, and I want people to not assume that I have to do everything. I hate that, and to be honest, I am pretty sure that is one of the things that has caused me to be on meds.

I talked to Ken about this that night, and he I think finally understood what I was talking about. He has the tendency to disappear when we are at the compound and it was one thing when it was just he and I, but now he is partially responsible for 4 lifeforms that we brought with us. I explained it to him calmer than normal (Thank you Effexor) and it seemed to sink in.

Sunday was 1000% better.

Ken talked to the family and they all agreed that they all needed to step up more. It wasn’t my job to not be included and only handle the kid’s table. And they all didn’t just go through the motions. There were games played. Adventure walks taken. Cakes decorated. It was what Grandma’s house needed to be, with everyone not just “watching the kids”, but enjoying the kids. Plus, it allowed me to play with the grownups. I got to partake in the Wii tournament we seemed to be in the middle of. I went to bed Sunday night (aside from Dax issues), much happier about the dynamic.

We brought up our Wii. Andy had wanted to see the Fit, and Ken and I wanted to make sure we did our exercises on vacation. Plus, that thing is quite small, so it isn’t a big deal to bring it along!

We showed everyone the Fit activities, and they loved it. Plus, we played just the sports disc at first which had tennis in which 4 of us could play at once. So we ended up cycling out, taking turns being part of teams and playing a damn lot of tennis. It was so much fun! By Sunday, we had also discovered that there was multi player options on the Fit, allowing us to compete against one another on some of the activities including the Ski Jump and Slalom. It seemed appropriate since it was the winter Olympics. LOL! It was a great activity for all of us, including the boys who not only like watching, but they played, too. Dax not as much, but he just liked watching the games. Andy also had gotten them a new game. Toy Story, which is a replica of the ride at Disney’s California Adventure. So you can shoot pies at targets and stuff like that, which they both really enjoyed. Wii was the center of the weekend, but it was one of the most interactive we had been as a family in a long time. Plus, we all worked out so much, we are all still sore today!

Sunday morning was also Christmas Morning! Since we had not gone up for Christmas, there were presents for us and the kids. So the boys got to open up their stuff and it gave them some fun things to do on that day. It was really cool!

On Saturday, we also went on a shopping trip. Andy, Ken and the boys and I went into town to get Libby a present. We had gotten one for Liam, but forgot to pick the one up for Libby. We hit up their K-Mart, which never fails to have wonderful sales. The K-Mart here sucks beans, but for some reason, I always find wonderful, cheap stuff at this K-Mart. I got a sweatshirt that has headphones and an attachment that are a part of it so I can listen to my iPod on the sweatshirt. Plus, it is super cute. We didn’t find everything we needed, so we headed over to Target, which is a half an hour away. We picked up lunch and ate on the way. At Target, we got way more then planned, including a bunch of the little stuffed animals that Dax loves. We also met up with Scotty there. We didn’t get back to the house till 2ish, but it was a wonderful outing.

As for the lack of sleep, a lot of it was due to poor Dax. On Saturday night, he just couldn’t get comfortable. On Sunday night, it was worse. He had gotten a little cold while there, which got him all stuffy. Plus, after consuming like 3 bananas that day, he was all backed up. Sunday night, I was so tired, yet this kid kept getting up. It sucked. I know he was just uncomfortable, but I just wanted sleep. He finally fell asleep, but he was still up at what seemed like the crack of dawn Monday. When he told me he had to poop, I knew it was a good thing and that the apple juice (AKA liquid draino for kids) had kicked in. Yay! He and I ended up getting up, letting poor Ken and Bobby catch up on some Z’s.

The trip home started a little rough with Bobby asking questions that were the equivalent of, “Are we there yet?” He was also concerned that Uncle Andy was no longer behind us, since Andy was following us out on his way home. We kept explaining to Bobby that Andy was going to drive up beside us before he got off on his exit, but Bobby was not convinced.

Dax also decided he was hungry and thirsty every 15 seconds. He did not feel we understood and he repeated himself 1000 times.

Luckily, we got to Flag City pretty quickly and we fed both of them and got a movie started up. Everyone was happy again and Dax even managed to nap for a while. The drive was pretty good, and even though there was a smidge of traffic, it wasn’t bad. Plus, there are some times when you feel like you will never get to the destination. This trip was the opposite. I was always shocked when we passed landmarks since it felt like we had not been driving for very long.

We got home around 5, and the boys and dogs were able to go outside and play for a while before it got too dark. This allowed Ken and I to go through the luggage, order a pizza and get things in order for bedtime. I was so glad the house was clean when we left. It meant that I felt no stress about the clutter of the bags. In fact, I was able to put away a lot of the stuff already, and even start the laundry. Woo!

I would say it was a good trip. Sure, there were a few issues here and there, but I didn’t feel like I never want to go back. LOL! I enjoyed the visiting time, and the boys were sad to leave which means they were having a blast. This was good in my eyes.

Luna is too smart for her own good, too. She figured out how to open doors. Yie!

Poor Lycos was so stiff from all the fun, she was limping a bit. She turned 10 over the weekend, so my poor birthday dog was really showing her age. However, she proved the old adage wrong by learning a new trick. I was playing with her and a beach ball and when I threw it to her, she would jump up and either bop it with her nose or arms and would “toss” it back to me. It was awesome! We did it several times, and she seemed to love it. I know what I need to invest in!

I took probably 300 pictures while I was there. I am hoping to have time to work on those tonight.

Interesting proposal for me came up at dinner. I guess Grandpa, Andy and maybe Holly are going to Ohio in June to visit a distant cousin of Grandpa’s. She is on Facebook and we are friends with her. Nice lady. Well, since there was a lot of Brenan history comes from Ohio, they are planning on going and doing some cemetery hopping. They will be looking for graves and getting names to work on the genealogy. Ken pointed out that not only would I love the trip (dude, cemetery hopping!), I would take gobs of photos, and would be able to document things better than most. Ken said that Grandma would either come down to LA, or he and the kids could go up and they would hang with the kids while I was gone. It would certainly be an interesting trip, so I will be curious if this actually happens. I know that I would have fun. I don’t know that there are any downsides to this trip aside from just being away from the kids and Ken for a few days. So stay tuned as I find out more details over these next couple months.

Now I just have to concentrate on Bobby’s birthday. I need to send out a couple more invites and look at bounce houses this evening with Ken. I figure I have a week and change to get it together, so I am hoping it works out.

After some net searching and opinions from my peeps, I think I have come up with my new hair style. I have found a cut that I have liked in several different pictures, and a color that even though is a little wild and bold, I figure I am still young and I need to just go for it. The cut is about shoulder length, maybe a smidge shorter. The color is a super red with dark brown streaks. It is pretty funky. I wish I could see what the color would look like with the cut since the cut the color shot is from shows a very short, choppy look, whereas mine is a little more rounded and wavy. But I think it should still be ok. Plus, it was pointed out that this color would be easy enough to cover up if it sucked. I could have it dyed dark brown all over and it would just leave red high lights instead of it being the primary. I will have to print out the pictures and find a good place to go. I think that even though Fantastic Sam’s has not done me wrong, I may go to an actual salon that does more color stuff. Brandy said it wouldn’t be too much based on the place she used to go to, so I now just have to decide on when I will do it. I was going to wait for spring, but with this darker color, I don’t see that I need to wait. We shall see. Either way, I am a combo of excited and nervous about the change.

It is always disappointing when someone you were close to turns out to be horrid. I have gone back and forth with this one person for years, even kidding myself that perhaps despite how we have changed through the years that we would be friends forever. He has hurt me on more than one occasion in his actions and words, but I really in truly wanted to believe that it was always something that we could work through. Instead, after hearing what he did over the weekend to his own mother and other members of his family, I find that I really cannot forgive him. Although the mean things were not directed anywhere near me, and in reality, this will pass with all the parties involved, I worry that at some point it will be an attitude and action that will hit me direct. I refuse to let that even be an option. He will always be a part of my past and I know that I would not be who I am today had I not had him in my life. I am sad that the person I knew and loved is essentially gone forever, and now it is a different person with the same name. Such a shame, really. I hope he is happy in life.

I have been swamped all day, which is cool. It means that my day flew by. I even have a meeting at 1 so my afternoon will go quickly. Then it is off to do my workout and to take the boys over to see their other grandparents. Woo hoo!