There's No Place Like Home

The last time I posted, I mentioned that I was getting the hell out of here. While I continue to LOVE my job, I am discovering that the first few weeks of school are insanity. Last week I worked about six to eight hours more than I had to (no, I don't get overtime) and had the persistent feeling that I was drowning. Add to that a husband that has just changed shifts at work, leaving me feeling like I'm a single mom with a grumpy, unavailable roommate, and let's just say that things in our house have been stressful. Even Amelia seems to be impacted, as she has been starting some minor aggressive behavior-- towards Mommy only. Good. Times.

So clearly, life has been challenging lately. I know we will get past it and things will improve. My initial coping mechanism was to escape, so as I said, Amelia and I went on a little getaway a couple weeks ago. We went to a local waterpark/hotel with my friend, Anna, and her daughter, Bela. Amelia adores Bela, and will often follow in her footsteps (for better or worse-- let's just hope Bela doesn't rob a liquor store some day. I guarantee Amelia would be her co-conspirator.) I thought that if Bela enjoyed the water areas, Amelia surely would to.

Nope.

Amelia spent most of the time either sitting in my lap in the shallow end, uninterested in playing with any water toys, crying, or sitting next to Anna on the ledge of the pool. Much like an old lady. It was still fun in that we were able to spend time with good friends, but I wish that Amelia had enjoyed the main reason that we were there rather than having to work up courage to get within feet of the water.

Our lovely ladies, ready to head back home.

Last weekend, we packed up and attempted camping a second time. While it was fun overall and less anxiety producing for Amelia, the campground that we chose did not have nice boundaries like the first time we went camping. This led to a lot of me telling Amelia "No, don't go over there. No, don't get close to the road. Come back here, I can't see you when you are over there." Top that with some rain our first day, which made the majority of our site muddy (did I mention that we also have a large dog to watch and minimize the muddiness of?), and it just was not the grand picture of relaxation that I had painted in my head. As a result, we headed home after two days rather than staying the full three days that we had reserved.

Morning cartoons, camping style.

Molly enjoyed the camper-- please note that is MY bed, she was supposed to be sleeping on the lower section.

My little buckeye fan exploring a playground near the park.

This is not to say that I didn't enjoy the last two weekends, but I definitely have gained an appreciation for relaxing at home, where there are DVR'd cartoons for Amelia and boundaries that she is already familiar with. With working from home, I often think I need to physically get away to diffuse some stress, but clearly there are times where I am more at ease within the confines of our country home.

With that said, I have to say that this has been a nice weekend so far. We have enjoyed spending a lot of time at a local art festival, I made some treats for my husband's police department, and was able to make a nice dinner for him last night before his twelve hour shift. Apparently, all of this down time is making Amelia rather sleepy.

Zonked out at the art festival.

Here's hoping that all of my readers are having an equally relaxing weekend :)

The Great Escape

I don't know what happened to me last weekend, but I was super productive. I cleaned the majority of our house, including the bathroom, kitchen, coffee pot and disgusting area behind the coffee pot, microwave (inside and out), pulled weeds, washed, dried and put away a load of laundry, swept, and wrapped our spare change to put in Amelia's savings account... $37 worth. I also cleaned Amelia's room and then organized the spare room so I can start utilizing it as a craft room/office and complete projects like this more often:

My friend's wedding invitation and program are inside the ornament.

It was terrific that I could get all of this done because on Monday, Amelia started to seem a bit off. Fussy, poor appetite, impatient... something just didn't seem right. By Tuesday, she was throwing her morning milk up on me and sleeping a lot during the day:

We think it was either a little stomach bug or some sinus/allergy issues that were making her nauseous. This lasted all week- the week before students start at the online school I am a 12th grade guidance counselor for. You know what happens when you are a high school guidance counselor the week before classes start? You get several phone calls per day about schedules:

•  Why did you schedule me for this? (You need it to graduate.)
•  Why didn't you ask me what I want to take this year? (You were supposed to complete the scheduling survey in May.) 
• Why am I a junior this year and not a senior? (You keep failing all your classes, we don't just hand out diplomas out, OK?!?)

Did I mention that I had three cavities filled this week too?

Yes. It's been a super week. I have to get the hell out of here. And I am, with these lovely ladies:

Amelia and her BFF Bela at our local county fair.

Let's get this party started...

Southern Roots

Don't worry, I really didn't fall off the face of the earth. We took our first big vacation with Amelia this past weekend and since it's best not to put any info about being gone on the internet, I had to leave everyone hanging. Or, I could have brought my laptop and continued posting, but that doesn't seem like a true vacation. Nor did I run while I was gone. That was probably a mistake.

Anyways.

Thursday we left around noon and stayed in Florence, KY, which is just south of Cincinnati. Amelia was super and slept almost the entire way. I pat myself on the back for this because I had to pee for the last hour and held it, as I did not want the stopping of the car to wake her. Needless to say, I was pretty desperate by the time we hit the big city. I may or may not have peed in some bushes at a local park that did not have their bathrooms well marked. Can you get public indecency charges by posting that in your blog? I'm not sure.

Cincinnati Skyline

Little Peanut practicing walking after Mommy committed a minor crime

We ate dinner at a nice little restaurant called Biehl Street in Newport. Amelia was getting pretty crabby by then, but Jon and I were OK with it since it was half off a bottle of wine night.

Why is a bottle of my lotion more entertaining than her toys?

The next day we went to the Newport Aquarium. Amelia loved it, for the most part, but it really wore her out and she was pretty tired afterwards. I managed to talk her into a nap and we headed to Brother's Bar and Grill, which has a lovely patio facing the Ohio River. After some lunch, we were ready to travel the rest of the way down to Middlesboro, Kentucky.

Amelia did pretty good for the second leg of our trip until about the last thirty minutes. After that she conveyed that she was thoroughly fed up with her car seat. I kept her happy by managing to contort my body so I could nurse her while she was still buckled her into carseat and then singing children's songs continuously. We had dinner with our family and then called it a night.

The next day we were well rested and ready for our family reunion. Remember when I said my teeth are awful because I inherited them from the hillbilly side of my family? I really wasn't kidding. My maternal grandmother's side of the family is from the foothills of Kentucky and they settled on top of a mountain in the Cumberland Gap region. It is now called the Hensley Settlement and is a protected part of the Cumberland Gap park. Every other year our family has a reunion down there, and some of the family heads up to the top of the mountain to relive the past. Being that we have a baby and the path up to the top is treacherous, we chose to just do the chit chat with family and gorge yourself with food part.

Hensley Reunion

Snuggling with Great Grandma post-nap

Happy girl chillin' in the camping chair

After stuffing ourselves and showing off Amelia, we rested up at the hotel. In the evening, Amelia and I went to my cousin Jessica's bridal shower. Amelia was much easier to amuse once I put her on the floor and let her try to get into mischief.

With Great Grandma and ripping her name tag off

My cousin opening her shower gifts

Amelia and her cousin Rebecca seeing what they can get into on the floor.

The next morning, we packed up and headed home. Here are a few random pic's from the trip:

The view from our hotel

Little Amelia in our big king sized bed

Ready to head back home

We had a terrific time but there is always a certain amount of satisfaction that being back home brings. And, if I stuff myself full of much more food, I'm going to need bigger pants and another package of Tums.

Plan B

Every year since I've moved out of my family's house, my mom and I have gone on a vacation in the summer together. I think this is pretty special, especially when you consider that a lot of women I know would kill their mothers if they had to spend 4-7 continuous days with them. We've been Myrtle Beach, Washington D.C., Indiana Dunes Park, Chicago, the Wisconsin Dells, Angola State Park and Pokagon Park in Indiana and a few other places that I can't remember at 7 a.m. on one cup of coffee. But you get the point. We've had some instances of having to make the best of not so favorable conditions too.

Perhaps the most challenging was Angola Park, when it rained for most of our trip. Ever the optimists, we ended up going to a bar, movie theater, and finally surrendered at the end, packing up our camping gear and heading to a Holiday Inn. Of course, there was also the extreme heat of Washington D.C. a few summers ago. The popsicle that I ate at the National Mall on that 95 degree day is still the most delicious popsicle I've ever had in my entire life.

This year's vacation has the twist of adding in little miss Amelia May. At almost nine months old, I was confident enough that she could travel fairly well, although I did tell my mom that we were shaving one night off our stay for various reasons. And so, I packed Amelia and I up to stay two nights and three days at Maumee Bay State Park for our annual girls' vacation.

During the biggest heat wave in years. In accommodations sans air conditioning.

This is a 'yurt'. How fun is that word?

As the countdown to our vacation continued, Mom and I watched the daily news hoping and praying that the forecast would improve. Instead, the temperature predictions worsened and climbed. I voiced my concerns about the heat and we attempted to find a hotel in the area to no avail. Our only choice was to be inventive as always and find ways to cool the yurt we were planning on staying in.

It didn't work out.

We did spend the day at the park all day yesterday. We saw the nature center and Amelia felt (and attempted to eat) the various animal furs and seed pods they had on display. She scared the crap out of  the fish and turtles in the center's aquarium. We visited the beautiful lodge, visited the gift shop, and had ice cream. We took a nice drive in the area while Amelia napped. Then we headed to the campground to set up to stay the night. 

Amelia waiting for Mom and Grammy to set up camp.

The view behind our campsite.

An hour later, we surrendered and headed back to my parents. When they say there is an excessive heat warning, they aren't fooling around.

I feel badly for my mom and disappointed that we couldn't enjoy all the plans she had made for us. But at the heart of it, I'm happy that we still get to spend time together. And, I'm thankful that she is flexible enough to change plans as necessary. In the end, it doesn't really matter if we are on a beach, in a park, or right here in my parent's lovely log cabin. What matters is that we get to enjoy each others company and make memories together. The location doesn't really make any difference.

I think our professions have led to both of us having an even greater appreciation for this. As a hospice nurse, my mom sees families lose their loved ones every week. Many of these families must face the fact that they have wasted a lifetime arguing and using their energy on hating each other rather than making the most of things and loving each other. And for me as a counselor, I see many families that are incapable of appreciating each others strengths and dwelling on what they can't stand about mom, dad, Uncle Joe, whoever-- GET OVER IT. You only get one life, and one chance to love your family.

So today, after we have breakfast, we will be leaving to go shopping and going wherever the day leads us, together as mother, daughter, and granddaughter. We will have a fabulous time, and we will love each other. And THAT is what will make this vacation spectacular.

Good morning! Can't wait to spend the day with my family :)