The Queen's Rambles

We leave tomorrow! I can’t believe we are doing a red eye, but that seemed the best option at the time. We’ll just feel like shit for a few days, then turn around and come home and feel like shit for a few more days. Isn’t travel fun?

My goal is to just take two bags for the four of us. You may start laughing now.

My mom’s washer is always going since my sister uses her as a laundry service so I think we can make do with very few clothes. We won’t need any long pants or bulky sweaters, so that cuts down on a lot of room right there. I am going to take a supply of cloth diapers and detergent, but that shouldn’t be too bad.

I never thought I’d be schlepping cloth diapers across the country, but I can’t stand to use disposables when I could be using cloth. I have always hated disposable pads with intense hatred so I can’t stand the thought of sticking my baby in disposable diapers for the first several years of her life. Didn’t seem to bother me with Erik, but now that I have the diapers and know how to use them it just makes sense that we would take them with us.

Our weekly library trip was a total bust this week. I don’t think we ended up with a single good kid’s book and the two grown-up books are also total crap. Have I ever told you I love calla lilies? I picked out a book about a girl named Calla Lilly by Rebbecca Wells (Ya-Ya Sisterhood fame).

Someone needs to hire that woman an editor, stat! I think the Society for the Integration of Exclamation Points was paying top dollar to ensure an exclamation point in every single paragraph. I am only about 100 pages in and am going to turn it in tomorrow. I wouldn’t have read that much but it was the only unread hard back I had available to take to the gym. It reads like a very poorly written blog. I’m 1/3 of the way through and I have no idea what the central plot or conflict is supposed to be.

The other book is a parenting book that is totally outdated–Raising Your Spirited Child. Someone told me I should get it b/c it might have some good ideas for Erik. Thus far I’ve only read the description of the “spirited child” and have no clue why someone thought I needed it. Erik does not fit the description at all. If he did I’d have him at the doctor’s office asking for a referral for county services. The book was written in 1991 so maybe sensory issues were not treated at that time? Basically the spirited child as described in this book is probably either on the autism spectrum or has major sensory issues (the whole day can be ruined by a sock rubbing the wrong way, the child has a two hour tantrum if things don’t go exactly the way s/he wants/expects). Things have really changed in the past 20 years in regards to childhood therapies. I’d say Erik is probably one of the few kids I know who doesn’t have some sort of therapy, from speech to occupational to sensory.

Sure, Erik can be stubborn at times, but I usually am pretty good at distracting or manipulating him. He hasn’t had a major tantrum in a long, long time. Certainly not one that lasts for more than five minutes.

Did I tell you about the kid in his camp who was having a full blown tantrum? Full body on the floor, kicking, screaming, punching, the whole nine yards? It was shocking to see a big kid having a tantrum like that, but I just assumed the child had some sort of issue. I did my own little prayer of thankfulness that Erik is a good boy and getting to be very mature.

In fact, today the boy decided our house was dirty and he needed to clean it. I was quite impressed with the way he cleared the floors and put his toys away. He was not impressed with my attempts at cleaning. It’s hard to clean when you have a 20 pound weight attached to your chest.

Mike got home super late because he was picking our friends up from the airport. He had the van all day so he could fit them all in, which meant I had his little Mazda.

I swear I was driving a clown car. I was really dumb and put the baby seat behind me, not thinking about how much room it takes up. I had to have my seat pulled all the way forward , so my legs were squished against the dash. The dash was about 100 degrees, which meant my leg was burning and sweaty. I could barely drive. It was not a safe situation, which is how I came to be in the parking lot at the pool switching out the car seats.

Have I mentioned that I love my van? The car was hot and cramped. After sitting up high in the van it felt like I was sitting in a hole. I could barely shove the baby seat in, even after I moved it over to the other side. It was just a mess. Am I spoiled? Yes indeed.

No idea when I will be able to post next. My mom says her computer is full of viruses since my sister and her husband use the computer and download stupid things. They always fall for the “You’ve won the lottery! Click here to claim your prize! Forty gold nuggets will be yours! I’m a Nigerian princess!” scams. You’d think it’d be harder to scam a scammer, but they both believe they are special and deserve random money to fall in their laps.