On Saturday we had our block party. My mom is the emergency preparedness coordinator for the ward, and the theme for the month of July was “get to know your neighbors.” So she planned a block party. It was a great success.
My mom helped watch Clarissa while Abe blew up the balloons and I was helping a friend:
It started off with a water fight. Abe blew up 600 water balloons. It was his wildest dream come true.
Then we had a craft in the backyard. The kids decorated chef’s hats and made washi tape bracelets.
Then we had a picnic. It rained, but people stuck around and had fun anyway.
The girls LOVED Pauline’s LDS jokes.
By that point, I was wilting in the heat and ready to put Clarissa down.
Before the block party, the only thing of note that happened was a neighbor posted on Facebook that her husband was an alcoholic and was leaving her. She wrote that she was crying. I grabbed a box of tissues and headed to her house. Carolyn Blosil, the RS president, was already there. We stayed for an hour visiting. I felt so bad for my friend. I couldn’t imagine the pain she was in.
When I came home, I felt more grateful for Abe than ever. Marriage is such a crap shoot, and even though I did absolutely nothing to deserve it, I just won the lottery.
After the kids were all down for the night, Abe and I watched, Me Before You. It was a sweet chick flick. We don’t do the chick flick genre often, but after that I wondered why. It was so delightful.
On Friday morning the kids had their swim lessons with Aubrey.
Ammon and Clarissa played on Aubrey’s play set while the girls took their lesson first.
The many faces of Clarissa:
The joyful face of Ammon:
Then I spent the rest of the day working on a giant cobb salad for a dinner with Betsy, Micah, Pippa, and Precious–Abe’s work friend that I met in Mexico this January. I know it’s crazy to spend hours on a salad, but honestly, there are so many parts!
My mom watched Ammon while I cooked. She took these pictures:
And then she also remembered to take a picture of the girls with Pippa!
Betsy brought Christina Tosi’s corn cookies, which were absolutely amazing.
Everyone had a great time visiting, and I think the party was a success.
On Thursday I let the kids play with Annabelle. I had banned them from all of the neighborhood kids because hand foot and mouth disease was going around, but Annabelle’s family had been steering clear of the infected families for a while and we figured she was safe. They played almost all day together:
Clarissa also discovered the grapes in the fridge. Seeing her sneak the grapes from the fridge reminded me of Lydia who used to do the exact same thing at her age:
I made a shrimp creole for dinner. Abe has been very stressed at work this week, but he got to go golfing with his fellow managers for most of the day and absolutely loved that.
On Wednesday evening we got together with Brittany and her girls and the Kahlers to swim at the Orem Fitness Center. It was fun to get together with our neighbors…except when I stood up to talk to Abe, and my breast popped out of my swimsuit. Oops. Also, Abe lost his glasses in the pool for a minute.
I guess those two incidents constituted most of our excitement. It was a pretty low-key day. I spent a lot of the day just enjoying the kids. I love it when I can take time to appreciate them. That made the day wonderful for me.
On Tuesday I spent Clarissa’s nap back-blogging while Ammon watched TV and the girls played outside. We didn’t bring electronics for the kids on our trip, so I justified the TV marathon by the fact that he didn’t have a minute of screen time for nine straight days.
Then when Clarissa woke up, we headed over to Blair’s clubhouse and played in her pool. She brought a giant crocodile that the kids loved. Ammon kept yelling, “THREE, TWO, ONE…” — and then flipping backwards off of it into the water. In the meantime, James, a boy after my own heart, sat right next to Blair quietly eating apple jacks with his feet dipped neatly in the pool. Blair and I could not get over how different our two year old boys are.
Blair and I had a great time chatting, and before we knew it, it was 5:30! I had to bribe the kids out of the pool with ice cream, so we didn’t get home until almost six. Abe made a spaghetti dinner, and steamed some of our garden zucchini. Our zucchini went nuts while we were out of town. The vegetables are as big as baseball bats and there are a ton of them.
After dinner I took Lydia to her harp lesson, and I am ashamed to admit, I slept through it. I kept waking up periodically to take notes, but I could not keep my eyes open for the most part.
Then we came home, put the kids to bed, and Abe and I watched half of Guardians of the Galaxy. I thought it was one of the stupidest movies I have ever seen in my life. Abe, on the other hand, thought it was great.
On Monday the girls had great music practices and then I cleaned the inside of the car while Lydia babysat Clarissa on the front lawn.
After that I put Clarissa to bed and worked on laundry and post-trip clean-up while the girls played outside and Ammon watched TV.
When Clarissa woke up, we went to the eye doctor to get her eyes checked out. She will need a stent like Lydia did, and the doctor also thinks she might be cross eyed like Mary. Poor Clarissa! The doctor did a full eye exam on her because she was higher risk as a sibling of someone with glasses, so we were there for a long time. Praise be, Ammon slept through the whole thing in his stroller. I would have been out of my mind had he been awake.
Then we drove through Chick Fil A for dinner and I got Lydia a Dairy Queen to pass the time since all of the kids were asleep except for her. After we got home, we fed all of the kids, read to them, and put them to bed.
Abe and I then took a walk to Menchie’s. On the way we ran into so many people: Steve Young, Jon Bishop, and, when we got to Menchie’s, we ran into Mary’s piano teacher and his family. After our ice cream, we walked home and looked at the clock. It was 10:30pm! Time flies with Abe.
On Sunday we drove home from Las Vegas. We arrived in Orem around 5pm.
On this trip we listened to a lot of audiobooks. On Sunday we listened to Sarah, Plain, and Tall, Skylark, and Caleb’s story. Over the course of the trip we also listened to Number the Stars, How to Train Your Dragon #1, Rabbit Ears – the Moses books, Rabbit Ears– (some of the Beatrix Potter stories, but I can’t remember which ones), Rabbit Ears — How the Leopard got its Stripes, The Tailor of Gloucester and Amazing Grace. We listened to How to Train Your Dragon twice because it was the best audiobook we have ever listened to. The narrator was the most entertaining we have ever heard, and the story is rollicking. Although I have to say that Meryl Streep’s reading of The Tailor of Gloucester had my mouth open in awe. Her voices, inflection, and narration are breathtaking.
We also listened to a lot of music. We listened to TONS of Raffi, an Israeli world music CD, Jack Johnson’s Curious George CD, The Greatest Showman, and random favorite songs on Pandora and YouTube. Among these are: Sara Bareilles’ “Be Brave,” Imagine Dragons’ “Thunder,” the Piano Guys, “Amazing Grace/Fight Song,” and Alex Boye’s “Lemonaid.” We also listen to the Piano Guys generally, whatever Christian radio stations we could find, and, when it was really late at night and Abe was in charge, random pop music from the radio.
When we got home, my mom had prepared a lovely dinner and the house was spotless. We bathed all of the kids, ate dinner, let them play in the yard and pick tomatoes, and put them all to bed. Then Abe and I took the car to wash and vacuum it out. Our own end-of-the-day shower was much appreciated after the long trip.
On Saturday we broke camp and then drove to La Jolla.
Our empty campsite. We forgot to take a picture with our tent.
We ate breakfast at Sugar and Scribe. Abe got lemon curd pancakes, I got a Sligo scramble, and the kids got french toast fingers. Then we headed to the beach.
We played on the beach for a bit before Abe took Ammon, Mary, and Lydia to the tide pools to explore. Right when the got back, the tide started coming in and drenched Clarissa, who was playing happily in the sand until that moment. Luckily I was right there and grabbed her, but she was startled and sad at being so unexpectedly soaked. I put her in her carrier and we walked over to the Children’s Cove to look at a seal swimming nearby.
Then I took Clarissa back to the car while Abe and the kids showered. I drove and picked them up and we headed to The Cottage for lunch. I got a crabcake melted sandwich, which was basically drenched in butter and very delicious. I don’t know what anyone else got because I was in the car with Clarissa the whole time. She was asleep and Abe ran me my food so I could eat in the car without waking her up.
After lunch, we all packed in and drove to Las Vegas. The most notable thing about that drive was a stop at Eddie’s World by Yermo. It looked brand new and was astounding in the middle of the dessert. They had gourmet pizza with a fire oven and lots of food options. Everything was brand new and the people were remarkably friendly.
On Friday we went to Hash House a Go Go again for breakfast before heading over to Balboa Park.
Vince had had an eventful morning wherein his car died right before breakfast, so he slept in the car while we took Kamiyah and our kids through the Japanese Gardens. During the Gardens, Ammon pooped right before Mary also pooped–in her pants. Thankfully I had packed a spare set of undies for her because she had been on the verge of pooping or peeing in her pants the whole trip long.
After the gardens, we parted ways with Vince and Kamiyah and headed to the San Diego Art Museum. I was still on my period, and after Abe and I got separated, I came upon a part of the museum set up for story telling. There were pillows on top of a cushy rug on the floor. I let Clarissa crawl around while Lydia studied the nearby art and I sat menstruating on the pillows imagining what it was like being in a red tent back in the day. The pillows were awesome, but I’m not sure the red tents were.
Then we met up with Abe, who was patiently waiting in the lobby with an out of control Ammon. We then headed over to the Model Train Museum, which was absolutely incredible. It was so much bigger than the model trains we had seen on Monday…but the kids weren’t half as impressed. They were still very interested and eager, but I think their first encounter with a model train blew their minds. This encounter was fun, but it wasn’t as mind blowing.
Then we went over to our favorite fast food restaurant for one last drive through vegetarian meal before we went to Coronado Beach to relax from all the earlier stresses. Coronado Beach was incredible. There were gold flecks in the sand and the water was a great temperature. We felt so happy and relaxed after a couple hours there.
After Coronado Beach we drove back into San Diego for some Pinkberry frozen yogurt, and then headed back to camp.
On Thursday we started the day by heading over to the San Diego Safari Zoo. For the first hour I carried Ammon on my back in the carrier through the zoo while Clarissa sat in the stroller. I can not overstate how delightful it was to have his sweet little commentary running in my ear as we walked.
The Lemur walk where I parted ways with Abe and 3 of 4 kids.The tram
I was of the mind that we should just skip eating in the zoo and eat afterward, but Abe realized that eating, while it seems optional for me, is not an option for the kids. So we ate lunch at a restaurant in front of a stage where people danced a lot of different global dances. After that we did some more exploring. Right about when we got to the lemur walk I started to feel done. I was on my period, the sun was really hot, and all of the walking with my plantar fasciitis was doing me in. So Abe and the kids headed to the zoo tram while I took Clarissa to the car. On the way to the car I stopped at the duck pond. Clarissa was asleep, and I had a wonderful prayer by that peaceful, almost deserted corner of the zoo. I sat there basking in good feelings until Clarissa woke up, and then I headed to the car to change her diaper, feed her, and tidy the car until Abe and the kids showed up.
Then we headed over to Solana Beach to meet up with Vince and Kamiyah, who had driven down from San Diego. I thought Solana Beach would have tide pools for the kids to play in, but it didn’t. Instead, we just ate at a so-so Mexican restaurant right next to a highway-esque road, and then we headed back to the KOA. I felt bad about such a disappointing detour.
At the KOA the kids all played in the playground until it was time to swim.
The actual swimming was a disaster. I was, as stated earlier, on my period, and my tampon was, how shall I say this, er, not working. So it was very uncomfortable for starters. Also, we did not have enough floaties. Kamiyah did not know how to swim and was terrified of the water, but she was also wearing one of our two floaties. Since Kamiyah would not let go of either Abe or me, we gave her floatie to Mary, who was on the verge of drowning. This upset Kamiyah. Also, it was dark, so we were trying to keep track of Lydia, who firmly believes she can swim…but she can’t. And Ammon is two, and so we have to keep our eyes on him, not to mention Mary–who, as we said before, had swallowed a lot of water while we were taking care of Kamiyah–and anyway, it was just out of control.
I hadn’t had time to get enough towels and clothes together because I didn’t realize Vince wasn’t swimming until the last minute, and as soon as I realized he wasn’t swimming I threw as much stuff together as I could as fast as possible so I could get in the pool and help Abe deal with five kids. The result was that when we got out of the pool, our situation went from perilous to abjectly miserable. We had one towel for all five, cold kids. Also, Abe and Kamiyah had no clothes to change into. Also, Clarissa was shaking from cold. Also, Vince got confused about how to help Kamiyah change, and so Abe ended up running around the camp trying to find him for 40 minutes while I stood aching and streaming blood while holding Clarissa in the shower. Thankfully, Mary and Lydia were awesome and helped by getting showered and dressed themselves, but after my 40 minute, bloody shower with my poor, sad baby, I was beside myself.
Finally everyone got dressed and Abe came to get Clarissa, at which point I could finally take care of my situation. Once we were all changed, we put the kids in the car and intended to take them to dinner, but they all fell asleep except for Kamiyah. Vince got lost on the way to McDonald’s, and so we ended up just heading home to camp and transferring our sleeping kids while he found McDonald’s and fed Kamiyah.
