Sand in our shoes

What better way to spend our first full day together in SoCal than introducing our girls to the beach.  They were both absolutely mesmerized.

Day 5: Home, sweet new home

Final leg of our trip today: 478 miles

Grand total over five days: 1,848

And now we’re HOME!  Today was the longest stretch of the trip.  We crossed the AZ-CA border around 1pm (and immediately shifted to Pacific Time) and later had an unexpected welcome around Barstow in the form of sleet and snow, which turned into steady rain the rest of the way home.  Go figure.

Overall a very long day, but a good one.  In typical M and C fashion, C spent the majority of the afternoon asleep and M took a cat nap and then occupied herself with books.  Ah, this girl and her books, she is most certainly her mother’s daughter.

There has been a resurgence of paci, or as we call it “babu” (pronounced ‘bah-boo’) activity during this trip.  The girls gave up their pacis except for naps and nighttime around 18 months, and we typically don’t allow pacis in the car, even for short trips that occur during nap time.  M and C are used to keeping them in their room and cribs, but for this trip we made an exception.  Okay, yeah we totally caved.  Try taking away a paci from a shrieking toddler, while flying down the interstate wanting nothing more to just get to the next stop, and in peace.  And it’s doubly hard with C, because her babu (she coined this term way back when, one of her first words actually) is her security blanket.  She sleeps with no less than four, count em’ FOUR pacis in her bed – one in her mouth, one in each hand and the fourth one usually next to her face or under her tummy.  And when it comes to shrieking, C totally has us by the you-know-whats with that.  Her screams can spike your blood pressure in an instant and peel the paint off the walls as well.  And it isn’t random with her, oh no this girl is seriously smart.  She has us both figured out and keeps on pounding away at those hot buttons whenever she can, more so with her daddy than me, but I still get my fair share.  And M just stands back and does her own thing, generally doesn’t get too worked up about much and even tries to comfort her sister mid-meltdown.  I know we can undo this one once we get settled, and I expect that the paci fairy will be visiting us in SoCal not too long from now so that the girls can send their pacis to little babies who need them more than they do.  *wink wink*

When we got to the house late this afternoon, we took the time to walk the girls through the house (which we’ve been leasing since January and the Hubs has been living in each week while he works here) room by room to get them acquainted.  Our moving truck should arrive in a couple of days so the house is currently pretty much empty with lots of room for the girls to run laps and get crazy – of which they promptly took advantage.  During the time I’ve spent in this house earlier this year, getting it ready and livable, it never quite felt right to me.  Always a bit off, and I began to doubt it we would ever feel settled once we got here.  As soon as the girls started running around here tonight, from room to room and repeating back to me who or what each room was for, it all just clicked.  They will be happy here, we will be happy here.  Home for us is being together – all of us again after many, many months of separation and weekends-only togetherness, and it doesn’t matter in what city, at which address or under what circumstances.  We are together again and we are home.

Day 4: Superheroes and scaredy-cat dogs

This post was written last night but is coming in a day late, thanks to no wireless at the hotel.  Really, who doesn’t have wireless these days?

Sunday’s distance: 322 miles

Grand total: 1,370

Holy cats, thirteen hundred miles.

After a hefty breakfast at Cracker Barrel in Albuquerque (a must during a road trip, per the Hubs) we made it into Arizona and to Flagstaff by late afternoon.

We then let the girls wreak havoc on the hotel room and burn off A LOT of stored up energy.  Thank goodness for the kitchenette in our hotel room and stash of pots and pans and cooking utensils.  They have plenty to keep them occupied while in the car, but they definitely miss their toys and the standard fare of fun stuff that they’re used to at home.  Give them something to “cook” with, their baby dolls to take care of and their blossoming imaginations and off they go.

Throw in a couple of amazing superhero capes courtesy of Grandma and it’s quite a sight.  We then filled their tummies with pizza, subjected them to the first hour or so of the Oscars and off to bed.

J-dog threw us a little curveball by refusing to go up the stairs to our hotel room.  We’ve been doing the extended stay/suite setup for extra space since the girls are not yet ready for big beds and sleeping on toddler aerobeds.  Our room for the night was accessed from outside and the stairs leading up to it were open-back cement steps, and much like our wooden basement stairs in STL, J wanted absolutely nothing to do with them.  A first floor room wasn’t an option so guess who got to carry our petrified and shaking 60 pound black lab up a flight of stairs?  Yep, that would be us.  Good thing I’m used to frequently carrying about that much weight in squirmy toddler (“Up, Mommy, PICK ME UP!”)  Bless her heart, for such a big dog J has always been fairly skittish, but thank goodness she went down the stairs on her own.

One. more. day.  We’re all very ready to arrive at our new home.

Day 3: The good, the bad and the ugly along Route 66

If today had a soundtrack it would be:

Distance covered today: 288 miles, the shortest of our five-day trip (the Good).

Believe me when I tell you there isn’t much in western Texas, except tumbleweeds – thirteen of which crossed our path – and wind.  That’s my tally; the Hubs tried to debate with me size of tumbleweed required to make the tally cut, but he wasn’t driving so I win.  The insane wind out there (the Bad) actually warrants various degrees of warning signage, for example:

“Extreme Crosswinds” – aka white-knuckle the steering wheel so you don’t get blown into and past the median and into oncoming traffic.  I’m only slightly kidding here.  My hands will be feeling that come morning.

“Dangerous Crosswinds” – sneakier than the extreme category above, and really fun to pass a semi when they gust up on you.

We drove by the Midpoint Cafe in Adrian, Texas, which marks the exact midpoint of Route 66 between Chicago and Los Angeles,

and passed into mountain time zone at the New Mexico border.

We arrived in Albuquerque mid-afternoon and finally got the girls down for a proper nap, while the Hubs watched (and cussed) over the MU-KU game (the Ugly).  I’ll refrain from too many digs here, but Rock Chalk!

While the girls are still so young that we know they’ll adjust quickly once we get settled, they are also very aware of their surroundings and breaks in routine, and they’re smart enough to ask some of the trickier questions.  Poor C is not handling this trip very well and has been acting out and asking to go “home” both today and yesterday.  It’s very hard to see her sad and out of sorts over this monstrous change we’re tackling but in the long run we know there’s no “permanent damage” being done here.  We just keep working to divert attention and redirect with something from our road trip bag of tricks, and generally can end up back in a happy, giggly place.  Three down, two to go.

Day 2: Deep in the heart of

Total distance traveled today: 365 miles.  Grand total so far: 760 miles

Today was apparently sponsored by the letter C, for no other reason than the collective random occurrences of our six-hour drive:

We renamed the borrowed GPS “Callie” in honor of our final destination.

We (adults) successfully dodged the full Baby Einstein playmate sing-along album by listening to a few hours of Coldplay.  The girls were introduced to them by the Hubs a few weekends back, and they think it’s way cool to ask Daddy to play Coldplay – and a lot of it.  Well done, my dear.

Cows, cows and more cows.  M and C love seeing cows and my mooing impressions are getting better every day.  We’re staying in Amarillo tonight and it even smells like cows.

Cold, as in I’m getting one.  I predicted that my body would rebel once I finally relaxed a bit and whaddya know.  Sore throat, runny nose and cough.  Rock on.

Comic relief courtesy of the Hubs.  A surprise cough with a mouth full of water does wonders for cleaning the inside of the windshield, and for giving your spouse as well-needed laugh between overly-tired toddler meltdowns.

We’re looking forward to the scenery coming up over the next couple of days.  The Hubs and I drove this route back in 2003 to move me out for my grad school summer internship in northern CA and we loved New Mexico and Arizona.  Shorter drive scheduled for tomorrow and planning some downtime to recharge, remove the indentations in the seats from our sedentary bums, and possibly get a good nap in for the girls.  An hour and a half to two hours of nap time  in the car just ain’t cutting it for them at this point.

Day 1: Ohhhhhhhh-klahoma

… where the wind comes sweepin’ down the plain!  And yes, it certainly does.

Last night, the Hubs and I said goodbye to our now-empty house, walking through it together room by room, crying and talking about the memories we created there, most of which revolve around the girls.  It didn’t really hit me until we were standing there that we won’t ever be coming back to that house. Ever.  It was a crushing realization after days and even weeks of numbness while working through the preparation, packing and final loading process.  It’s all finally starting to sink in.  New and exciting adventures ahead, but still hard to leave certain things behind.

This morning – new day, new adventure.  After a lovely breakfast with my in-laws and my parents and a nice little game of how-the-heck-do-we-fit-all-of-this-in-and-on-top-of-the-car, we began our trek west for a five-day journey that will bring us to our new home in SoCal.  It didn’t take long (i.e., less than an hour) before M and C were out cold.

Poor C has a cold and was snoring, drooling and sleeping like Grandma (with her mouth open – ha!)  We stopped for a nice picnic lunch and some playtime in Lebanon, Missouri, enjoying the bizzaro 74-degree weather.  Yep, still February last time I checked.  We christened the new dual-screen DVD player with Alice in Wonderland and some Curious George, both of which were a big hit.  We don’t do a lot of TV at home, but I’m now convinced that those little 9-inch screens can be a life-saver on long road trips, particularly when you have a child with a very short attention span.

Our route took us through Joplin, Missouri, the site of the EF5 tornado that devastated the city last May.  From the interstate you can still see patches of trees that bore the brunt of mother nature and damaged buildings in the distance as well.  I still remember watching this YouTube video taken while a group of people hunkered down for cover in the refrigerated storage area of a gas station as the storm hit directly.  Sobering indeed, and clearly an event that many will never forget.

We’re in Tulsa for the night, first-time hotel stay for both the chickadees and J-dog.  Hotel stays with children inevitably lead to earlier bedtimes for adults – what else is there to do when you can’t get up and around without waking them.  Having rarely been in bed before midnight for at least a month, I’m really looking forward to a long night of rest and hitting the road again tomorrow.

When all else fails, clean

For the record, my fridge has NEVER been this clean.  I don’t think I’d ever cleaned, really scrubbed it even once since we moved to this house two and a half years ago.  It just wasn’t high on the priority list.  We were kinda busy.  We had babies on the way, I was 30-weeks huge and incapable of doing much physically and then everything went into full-blown chaos mode.  And then it just kept getting busier.  A slightly grimy fridge didn’t phase me.

Now, there are five people whom I don’t know from Adam, in our house at this very moment, loading nearly all of our belongings into a very large moving truck.  My parents are here, in and out helping with the miscellaneous last-minute errands.  The Hubs is at work, dealing with a schedule that is out of his control.  The girls are with Nanny today and Jenna-dog is partying with her doggie friends at Petropolis.  I’m here by myself, watching it all unfold.  If I stop moving or busying myself for too long the waterworks begin in full force.

Solution: clean the hell out of the fridge.  I spent a very long time on this first thing today, immediately after I lost it while retrieving this very small token of memory of the babies M and C used to be – a light switch pull given to us by Nanny, that has been hanging in their room since the beginning.

We almost left without it.  [Cue wave of nausea]

My mom even commented that most people don’t clean out their fridge to the degree that I was tackling all the nooks and crannies of nastiness.  But it felt so good, and provided at least a short bit of focus and reprieve amid the noise and organized chaos that is our house today.  Excitement, fear, sadness, optimism all rolled into cardboard boxes, packing tape and a quickly emptying house.

Now I must go find something else to clean… and fast.

Put me in timeout

Now.

Right now.

Pretty please?

Seriously.

I don’t recognize myself.

This moving your family across the country stuff is most definitely not for the faint of heart.  The Hubs’ job and relo offer should have included a disclaimer on crazy wives and a kevlar vest to protect him from the raging maniac that his wife would soon become.

I’ve yelled and yes, screamed (wince) at those I love dearly.  I’ve incited others to hang up on me.  This makes me sick to my stomach.

I’ve made snippy comments and been downright rude to those just trying to do their job.  And that’s definitely not me – I’m usually the one who offers the “don’t worry about it, we don’t all feel that way” to the poor cashier who’s just been reamed by some total bitch who’s trying to make herself feel better by belittling others.

I’ve dropped more F-bombs at other drivers (thankfully NOT in front of my girls) when they just don’t get out of my way fast enough.

I’ve embarrassed myself by breaking down into hysterical crying and nearly cussed out my dentist upon the news that I need to go back AGAIN, for appointment number four next week, only a few days before we leave.

I’ve burned the candle so far beyond both ends that my fingers are blistered.

I’ve given up on trying to paste together the tiny shreds of what’s left of my patience.

And when all is said and done I suspect I will be reduced to an exhausted shell of a myself, who has cried a river of tears into the Mississippi and eaten more Chick-Fil-A and FroYo than one can measure.  But I also I know that this is a mere speed bump in the grand journey of life and that the shell of me will soon be rejuvenated by the warm Cali sunshine and brilliant blue skies.  We never thought this would be easy, and truth be told I’d rather be a bit crazy over all of it (minus the questionable and rather unkind behavior, of course) than feel nothing at all.

Catching snowflakes

Very fitting that we got some of the white stuff today, before we’re outta here.  Hard to believe we won’t be seeing any more of this for quite awhile.

64 and gorgeous

You’d think we’d already moved west, judging by the temps here this week:

It feels like spring and makes me want to be out in Cali and settled all the more.  A year ago we had ice and snow and a crazy day at home all hunkered down and waiting for “snowmageddon”.  But this year we get gorgeous.

We took advantage of the lovely weather at the park on Monday, and my monkey-girls had a blast.

We also met Auntie J and her fam at the park, and let me tell you that lady and her hubs both have quite the eye behind the camera.  Feel free to enjoy their fabulousness here.  All in all a great afternoon.