Fun with Grandparents

We've been spending lots of time with the grandparents. We've mostly been staying at Grandpa Dave's house, and making day trips over to see Grandma Gini. It's a little tricky to balance time with divorced grandparents who live on opposite sides of the same town. Sleeping in one place seems to help Julia feel a little more stable. She's started throwing a tantrum now and then, and I don't know if it is because of the instability of moving or just because she is at the age when that sort of thing starts. I have also noticed that the general public likes to offer advice that doesn't really apply while she's flipping out. We were out to lunch today and Julia was melting down because she was hungry and a little tired. The woman behind me kept pointedly suggesting that she just wanted to run about a bit. I took her outside to let her fuss where I didn't feel so scrutinized, and put her down to see if indeed she did want to run about. She really flipped out, and cried to be held. When we came back in, the woman continued to suggest that she just needed to run about, and I finally just had to blatantly ignore the woman and her advice. (Julia eventually settled down with some crayons and food.) 

Julia was really fighting me on the car seat too, crying and fussing and wailing. I tried turning the car seat to face forward and like magic, the fussing stopped.  Not sure why, but we're sure happy to have a better passenger. (She's well within the age and weight limits for forward facing, but new data suggests that rear facing up to age two is a good idea. I can't imagine cramming her long legs into a rear facing seat for another year!)

We spent Memorial Day weekend at Gini's boyfriend's beach cabin on Samish Island. Julia LOVED the beach. She spent hours playing in the sand and rocks, and she was really curious about all the bikes and trikes and baby-4-wheelers that lived next door. She also LOVED all the dogs that came and went up and down the beach. We took lots of walks in the stroller and ate lots of steamed oysters. It was a lovely couple days. 

Gardening at Grandma Gini's

playing piano with Grandma Gini

Red rainboots at Grandpa Dave's

Fun in the car seat

Julia loved the beach!

itty bitty crab shell

Examining shells

Julia coveted the neighbor kid's trike

glorious sunset

On day two I realized the necessity for sun hats and sunscreen!

relaxing

Julia mastered climbing into chairs

With lots of Dave's family

Checking out the rocks

Visiting with Great Grandma Olive. Julia was a terror. 

Fun with a rocking horse

Going South

We've made it back to the grand old state of Washington, but the trip was eventful, as usual! Our bush flight was an hour and a half late picking us up, and then we had a head wind that made an hour's flight last two hours. On the flight, Julia threw up on me several times. With no room to move an elbow, I couldn't do anything but let her throw up. We arrived in Anchorage and Bill the pilot offered to give us a ride to the airport so we didn't have to wait for a taxi. He's got seven kids, and his van (which he converted to run on vegetable oil) was knee deep in the trash of a thousand road trips. He blasted along the roads and got us to the airport in excellent time. At the airport, I had a high stress moment while the employees looked over my documents. Two days ago, I was cleaning out my wallet for the trip when I realized that my driver's license was missing!!! GONE GONE GONE!!!! I have NO memory of using it in Sleetmute, and since our house was totally packed, it wasn't anywhere inside. By sheer incredible luck I had my passport (still with my maiden name), my marriage license showing my name change, my social security card with my new name, and my birth certificate. The customer care woman assured me that these documents would work, but to anticipate that I'd be held up by extra scrutinizing. With all the delays, the extra hours in the schedule were gone, and so I was sweating bullets that we'd miss our flight. Incredibly, there was little scrutinizing, we got through security with no problems, and we made our flight with 20 minutes to spare! I even got to change Julia's diaper and my shirt. We arrived in Seattle at 2 am, and my friend Erin picked us up and took us home for the night. The next day, Grandpa Dave picked us up and took us to Mt Vernon. The day after was my sister Caroline's graduation from Trinity College in Everette. We got to attend the ceremony, meet the new boyfriend Matt, and had a celebratory lunch at Olive Garden. My dad came home with us for the night before getting back on the train to go to my sister Anna's graduation in Minnesota. 

The ice chunks are nearly gone, and boats are out on the water. 

Julia and Kiley were finally getting to be friends. They loved to hang out with the dogs. 

all empty and clean

Saying goodbye to Jane and Gus.

About to board the flight from hell. 

No time for photos along the way, but here we are in Mt Vernon on Friday. 

Sunshine! Green grass! Flowers! Washington feels like sensory overload!

Cows!

Grandpoppa Jack came through town for Caroline's graduation and is leaving for Anna's graduation

Julia picked out Grandpa Dave's hard hat as a favored toy.

Last days in Sleetmute

We've been packing! Yesterday we hauled 500 lbs of boxes down to the post office. Our house is pretty empty. We leave here on Thursday, so 4 days to go. I've packed the baking supplies, so we are reduced to mostly eating from cans and cooking pasta. Julia loves noodles so she's totally fine with that. She and Dave blissfully eat Ramen together while I look on in mild disgust.

Julia helping to haul boxes to the post office.

11:40 pm. Light enough to read a book outside. 

Julia loves to sit next to me on the porch.

A couple nights ago the school went camping out at Blueberry Hill, a bluff that has been dug away for gravel. There's a couple pieces of broken machinery that the kids had a great time playing on. Julia and I declined the opportunity to sleep outside, but we did join them for supper. The kids all seemed to have a good time, even if it was pretty cold during the night!

Julia's new favorite toy is the swiffer sweeper mop. She got her hands on it one day while I was cleaning and hasn't let it go since. I took off half of the handle after several near misses to my laptop. She has a great time pushing it around. 

her shirt should say "cleaning makes me happy"

It was the first thing she picked up this morning.
She brought it to me and wanted to sit in my lap.
Then she wanted to nurse.  

"No mop while you nurse" said I while trying to remove it.  She burst into tears. 

"No mop while you nurse" I maintained. She flung herself onto the floor and screamed for 10 minutes straight. 

In a lovely example of bad parenting, I gave in and cuddled my baby and a dust mop while she nursed.
Not a high point in my career as a mother.