Vacationing with Children

Vacationing Before Children:

Pack a small bag of clothing and toiletries. 

Leave. 

Check into hotel. 

Shower. 

Sleep 10 hours.  

Dress yourself. 

Do something enjoyable all day long.  

Vacationing with Children:

Pack a small bag of clothing and toiletries. 

Pack a large bag of clothing for children, including 2-3 outfits per child per day plus every pair of socks and underwear you own. 

Pack laundry detergent and stain remover. 

Pack small medical bag with infant Tylenol, Mylicon, Children's tablets, Benadryl, Desitin, and the good thermometer (because you know full well that by the end of the first night, somebody will have a fever).  

Bring pack and play. 

Pack large bag of sheets, mattress pads, and blankets for aforementioned pack and play. Include 1 stuffed animal per child. 

Pack bag filled with toys, coloring books, crayons, view master, slides, puzzles, die cast cars, and other things they won't want unless you don't pack it. 

Pack a reusable grocery bag filled with non perishable food items for snacks and breakfast. Include at least 2 Sippy cups per child per day. Include child plates, bowls, an utensils. 

Pack cooler with milk, fresh vegetables, and fruit. Pray the hotel has in-room refrigerators. And a microwave. 

Bring collapsible booster seat. 

Bring breastpump. 

Pack bag filled with breast pump accessories and milk bags. Pray again for refrigerator. 

Throw some jackets and shoes into the car. 

Herd small children into the car. 

Leave. 

Stop for coffee. 

Stop for a few potty breaks. 

Stop for fries. 

Check into hotel. 

Beg for refrigerator. 

Herd small children into room. 

Forget to move car from the hotel entrance. 

Get a phone call at 10pm requesting you to move car. 

Move car. 

Attempt to get small children back to sleep after phone call. 

Sleep 5 hours. 

Dress yourself. 

Dress everyone else. 

Feed three people breakfast. 

Redress the kid with orange juice down his shirt. 

Go to Target to buy the baby new shoes, since you forgot to pack him any. 

Also, buy your son a new toothbrush, because you forgot that too. 

Buy a venti anything with a double shot of espresso. 

Go to lunch wherever there's a play area. 

Return to hotel. 

Listen to baby cry for an hour and a half under the guise of "taking a nap."  

Make coffee in room. 

Baby finally falls asleep. 

Read a book peacefully during actual naptime. 

Go to dinner. 

Do something enjoyable for 2 hours. 

Go to bed early. 

True story, friends. 

It takes a few extra steps doing it WITH the kids, but I feel like these are the vacations I'm actually going to cherish for years to come. With all the extra mess and hoopla, I still feel like every headache is so very worth it, something I never could have understood before. I love these troublesome little munchkins. I love the extra steps and the ridiculous packing routine. I love every minute (okay, minus the crying parts). I wouldn't trade it for all the single, actually relaxing vacations in all the world. 

But I still think it's funny ;)

He need a wake up.

Today we had a great morning! The afternoon, not so much. Button went down for his regular nap like the little napping pro that he is. Then it was Dimples' turn. He fell asleep on top of me, which I thought would be fine at the time. I mean, I can just move him later, right? You know where this is headed. As soon as I laid him down, his little eyes popped open. Have you ever seen a horror movie? The kind where you think the monster is dead at the end, only to have the frame pan into its face until all you can see is the monsters closed left eye when it suddenly bursts open in red fury and the background music is suddenly booming in your ears and you know the sequel is coming. That's what it's like to watch your baby wake up. Watching them sleep is great. "Oh, so sweet! What a little angel!" Then they wake up and, no matter how hard you try to suppress or deny it, your heart pounds a little in your throat and you feel a sudden, though admittedly fleeting, total panic. Anyway, so then he wouldn't go back to sleep. For two hours. I fought, I cried, I sang, I rocked, I bounced, I nursed, I replaced his pacifier ninety seven thousand times. Nothing. Then Button woke up because of all the crying and whining and pleading, and it was just a mess.

Finally, FINALLY I get dimples to sleep. A good sleep. A strong sleep. A sleep full of promise and good fruit. Until he starts screaming. I fly into the bedroom, beside myself and full of angst. I burst through the door, only to see my three year old, standing on the bottom crib rail with his fingers mischievously close to Dimples' face. Upon my frenzied arrival he immediately announces, "He need a wake up." Then leaves while the baby, and their mother, cry.

Sir Runsalot came home in the midst of all this hassle and tears, and apparently I gave him a look. A look that told him my entire tale of woe in a mere instant. His response? He immediately disappeared into the recesses of the house. I felt betrayed. Or maybe I would have, except that I was so preoccupied with trying to get the implacable baby to sleep I didn't have time. Five minutes later, I smell Eucalyptus. What the what? Then I hear music. Then Sir Runsalot comes marching into the battlezone to announce that my Spa is waiting and that I have thirty minutes to soak in our now overly full, wonderfully hot bathtub.

Oh, my husband, you know just how to make me pleasant again.

Apparently Button Knows Addition?

Sometimes I attempt to teach my 3 year old things. It's usually well after everyone else's 3 year olds are doing the same thing, and I suddenly remember that there's more to raising a child than force feeding them meals and building super awesome lego pirate ships. Somehow or other he's learned all the things I figure one ought to know by 3, though, so apparently fly-by-the-seat-of-your-pants style teaching just works around here!

Anyway, so today I decide to teach Button addition. He's got counting down. Yesterday he surprised me by counting all the way to 30, instead of twentyten, so I suppose I was inspired by that. I figured I would simply introduce the IDEA of addition (that adding more things means you have more of them; combining two numbers gives you a new, bigger number, blah blah blah). I thought it out. I planned a strategy. We've counted piles of legos and put them together before, so this shouldn't be too hard, right? I talked myself into it, secretly fretting that I'll never be able to communicate such a complex idea to his little mind and he'll be doomed to math failure the rest of his life.

I decided the best way to introduce this would be with the chalk board. He likes the chalk board. It's the only way I ever got him to write a letter! Apparently sitting down with a pencil is asking a LOT of an active little boy... I probably should have assumed that, but I digress. So I wipe off the chalk board and begin. I draw one star and ask him how many stars there are. He counts, and tells me, "Five." I realize he's counting POINTS on the star, not the star itself. I convince him there's one WHOLE star, but am thinking this is already not going too well. I draw another star and ask the same question. "Ten", he answers. Shoot, he's counting points again AND already added the points on the two stars. He's a bit ahead of me, I think, but we move on. I reiterate that we're only counting whole stars, and when he says "two" I rejoice at our progress.

I decide at this point to abandon the stars and just write 1+2. I ask him "How many is 1 plus 2?"
"Three!" he answers happliy. Lucky guess.
"1 plus 3?" I ask.
"Four!" he exults, with his head cocked nearly upside down.
We get all the way to "1+9," with him answering correctly each time before I figure he's probably just counting.

"Alright," I say, and go back to drawing out stars. I draw two stars with a 2 next to them, then below that I draw four stars with a 4 next to them. I know I've got him now, but I figure I can use the bigger numbers to teach the concept. "How many are two stars plus four stars?"

"Six," he replies after looking over my star scribbles.

"Go play," I concede. No point in teaching him what he already knows.