Catching Up

I must admit that I did not think it would have been this long before I would have been able to post anything, but we have been quite busy for the last few months.

A while back Southwest announced that they would be opening up in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, and that gave us the opportunity we were looking for to go somewhere to be close to our family and also be able to make a decent living. San Diego was nice while it lasted, but it was just not for us.

So I put in to transfer and got everything all ready to move. We brought the kids up and left them with their grandma and grandpa while we stayed and got everything else cleaned up and in order. I had my final day of work at my station in San Diego and was very sad to have to say good bye.

 

It was a paid move and probably the easiest move I have ever done.  One day two guys came in and packed up all of our stuff and the next day four more guys came in and put it in a 53 foot truck and took it away. I packed my van completely full of all the things that could not be shipped or I didn’t want to be shipped and headed north through Las Vegas to my Mom’s house.

I took a round about way driving the 2000 plus miles to Milwaukee so I could stop and see the majority of my family members. I was lucky enough to be able to attend our Cousin’s Reunion, even if it was for just one night, and see some of my extended family members that I rarely get to see.

 

I love being at the Ranch because not only is it just so breathtaking, but the atmosphere is so peaceful. It doesn’t hurt that my cousins can be incredibly fun as well. I got to see three of my brothers and my oldest sister while I was at the reunion and learned that my sister is expecting another baby soon!

My mom met me at the Ranch and we drove the rest of the way together. The first day we drove from the Ranch, which is in Southern Utah, to Provo, Utah where we stayed the night with my oldest brother, James. I got to see his newly purchased house and visit with him for just a little bit before heading out again the next day.  I took tons of pictures of all the scenery as we were driving through. These are all seen out the window of my van.

As we passed into Wyoming the temperature dropped dramatically! We saw some of the biggest wind farms I have ever seen while driving into Wyoming.  

At first it was just cold and clear with patches of snow on the ground,

but then it started getting colder and more and more ground was covered by the snow,

then it was freezing and snowing! This was white knuckle driving for me. I have not driven in snow ever! Texas to Arizona to Southern California… this was definitely a new experience. No chance of me falling asleep at the wheel because i was too scared to even close my eyes! Every time a big truck passed i thought for sure I would end up in a ditch somewhere and freezing to death.

I just wanted to make it to Sheridan, Wyoming to my sister Amaryllis’s house before dark because I just knew it would be so much worse in the dark. Luckily for us, we made it just after dusk safe and sound. I had originally planned to spend just one day at my sisters house so I could make it to Wisconsin in time to meet the truck and get it put into storage, but that truck was a lot quicker than I thought. Since there was no way I was going to make it there in time I went ahead and spent an extra day with my Sister and brother-in-law and my niece and nephews.

I really didn’t get any photos while I was there because we spent most of our time inside. I can not even believe how big her kids are!

When we did finally leave my sister’s house I had planned on driving about half of the rest of the 1300 miles and staying the night in a hotel, but the weather conditions were just terrible and I didn’t want to stay and wait for it to get worse. So with me at the wheel, my mother and I drove 18 hours cross country and made it to my in-law’s house at about 12:30 in the morning. This is definitely not something I would recommend to anyone.

My mom stayed for two days while I got all settled in. It was nice that she finally was able to meet my in-laws and get to know them. I was sad to have to put her on a plane back home, but she has her own life to take care of.

So for the past month or so My children and me have been living with Andy’s parents and trying to make as little of impact as possible on their life. That is an extremely tall order considering how active Jack and Alex are.

Andy, who is staying in San Diego until he can find a job here in Milwaukee, came for a short visit to celebrate our anniversary and also to take the kids trick-or-treating. That little outing didn’t last very long because it was just too cold and windy to go visit every house in the neighborhood.

Jack wore his Spiderman costume from last year that he never actually wore to for Halloween and Alex wore Jack’s actual costume from last year. So much easier then having to go out and buy new one’s or, even worse, trying to make some.

We ended up going to mostly to people that we knew and by the time we went to the sixth or seventh house, Jack asked to go home.

They weren’t too worried about the candy and neither were we. Ann had bought enough candy for the trick-or-treater’s that never showed up to last plenty long.

I also started my job at my new station and am pretty happy with the people I get to work with. I already consider some of them to be more friend then acquaintance. There have been all kinds of corporate people coming and going and a lot of the time there was really nothing for us to do except sit and wait.

We finally checked in our first passenger on November 1, 2009 and then it was business as usual. With all the change going on, it is kind of nice to have something that is very routine. The decorations were still up when I left work on Wednesday, but will probably be gone by Saturday when I go back.

Gary Kelly, our CEO for Southwest, stopped by for a press conference on day 2 and was nice enough to stop at the ticket counter and let me take a picture with him. He is such a nice person. I think if all CEO’s and corporate people were like him there would be less wrong with big businesses.

He is squatting down in this picture, by the way, to make me look not quite as short!

Finally, the very latest good news is that we found a house we liked and put an offer in and it was accepted! So now we wait for all the paperwork to begin and hopefully (fingers crossed), we will be moving into our new home in early December! This is a picture of the house we are buying. When we get it all finalized and the keys are in my hands, I will post more pictures and give more details.

Jack goes to Preschool… otherwise known as my baby is not a baby anymore!

It happened about two weeks ago and i am just now coming to the realization that my little baby is not a little baby anymore. He is not even a toddler, he is a little boy or more appropriately, a young man.

I thought putting Jack in school, even preschool, might be a little hard for him as he has never been in any type of day care and has had very little interaction with children his own age except for the times we take him to the park. Even then there sometimes is no children his age to play with, so I was really worried for my little boy going out into the big world without his Mommy and Daddy for the first time.

It was twice as difficult for me because of the way in which we were going to go about putting him in school. I wanted to get him in school and settled right away so he would not have to join his class late and miss out on all the potential opportunities to make friends and learn new things and because we are moving this became a little difficult.

Luckily, both Andy and I were able to take Jack to his first and second day of preschool and meet the teachers and see the other students. After those initial days though, we had to fly back home and leave both our babies in the very capable, but somewhat nervous hands of their grandparents.

The second day of dropping Jack off at school was a lesson hard learned for Mommy on how fast these little guys are growing up. As we walked into the school building, Jack started this conversation with me:

“Mommy?”

“Yes Jack?”

“You don’t need to come into my classroom with me today. I can do it by myself.”

A little choked, “Okay, Jack.”

It was only his second day! How am I supposed to feel? I am glad that he is so independent even though he never really had the opportunity to interact very much with other kids. I am glad he seems to be very outgoing and can easily make friends. I am glad I don’t have to worry about leaving him a crying mess in front of the teacher and the other students. However, I am a little upset that I feel not needed by him anymore and know that this is the beginning of the end of me knowing exactly what is going on in his life every minute of every day and I am having a hard time dealing with that.

 

On the upside, he has a really great teacher, Ms. McNeil, who seems like she really loves her job. Jack likes her and wants to keep going to school which can only be a good start in his educational career. Although I am not currently there to see all the things he does and find out about all that he is learning, it will only be a few more long weeks before I will be reunited with my baby/young man.

He is such a smart little child that I am pretty sure he could accomplish anything without the help of me or his Daddy. Even though this is only two and a half hours a day for only three days a week, he is getting a great start for the real thing when a year from now I will be dropping him off at his first day of kindergarten.

Tis’ the Renaissance Fair

 

The entrance to the Renaissance Fair.

While we were in Milwaukee getting everything ready for the big move, we had one day of play that we decided to go to the Renaissance Fair about an our south of Milwaukee. Neither me or my husband is much for the kind of dressing up that these people do, but we thought once in our lives it would be fun to see what it was all about.

First of all, it was way bigger than I expected it to be. It must have covered about ten acres of land and was set up like it was a very permanent village. They must do this every year. I was also not expecting to find soooo many people dressed up and in character. Jacks favorite was this guy who I think might have been an ogre or something to that effect as he had sharp teeth and leather and swords and claws. He turned out to be very nice and took a picture with the boys and even told them what they should get to eat.

“Yah should get tha chicken stars, they taste like chicken and are shaped like stars…It makes’m fun ta eat!” Say that in your best pirate voice and that is what made Jack want to eat the chicken stars. Alex was a little nervous of him at first, but warmed right up to him when he took a seat beside them.

This was a web that a “woodland fairy” made up. It is made of string and was really big and contained all kinds of things that she had picked up off the ground including leaves, lost items, and what might have been trash.

We saw a great acrobatic group of brothers and a sister who were really funny. The kids got to climb on things and dig in dirt and they each went home with a sword and a shield which we later painted for them.

This ship actually sat in the water, although I am pretty sure it sat on the bottom of the pond it was in.

One of the little village windows in the kids play area.

The boat in the kids play area.

Digging for treasure!

Alex loved going up and down the gang plank.

The boys had no interest in the acrobat show so they fought each other with their newly acquired swords and shields. They didn’t use the shields until Alex hit jack with his sword and Jack figured he better protect himself against his brother.

We rode on a ride that I kind of felt sorry for the poor guys afterwards because it was a merry go round of sorts with boats instead of swings and those poor little guys had to push it. I had thought it would be motor driven, but I guess they were going for authentic. I cringed when I saw the guy rubbing the blisters on his hands from pushing it around all day.

These were modeled after Da Vinci’s flying boat drawing I think. You can see the guys in the back ground pushing this swing by hand!

The best moment on the way out had to be when Jack decided he would ride the ponies. We had asked him on the way in and he was a little nervous, so we said we would try again on the way out. He  was very brave, as he has never been on a horse before. I could hear him talking to the pony each time he came around to where I was standing. He would tell the pony, “Be careful Pony, be careful,” and he would pet the pony and was very cautious about hanging onto the saddle so he wouldn’t fall off. All that and he still was able to pose for Mommy’s pictures.

Needless to say that both of the boys were asleep by the time we were ten miles down the road to go back to Grandma and Grandpa’s house.

I would say that we had fun, but the Renaissance Fair would probably not be something we would do every year as it seems like it could get repetitive. It was definitely a nice little outing for the day though.

These people were lined up bringing dishes of food to the queen.

This guy was very nice and took a picture with the boys and even talked to them about what was going on.

The queen at the joust.

The Mistress of ceremony.

The joust was pretty entertaining. I would recommend seeing it if you ever attend one of these fairs. It was very elaborate and they did all kinds of tricks and skills that were very neat. The section we sat in was the section of the villain and he was hilarious. you could tell this guy was really into his character. He was a comedian and just mean enough that you didn’t really hate him.

                    The Hero                       The Villain and our Knight!

The Joust!

Check out our new rides!

This was the week we moved the kids to Milwaukee to live with their grandparents until Mom and Dad can follow. Jack has been enrolled into pre-school and we have found a new pediatrician for the kids and have them all set up to stay with Grandpa and Grandma for about a month without either myself or Andy. I am not quite sure how I will cope with not being able to see them everyday, but thanks to all the toys and the attention Grandma and Grandpa shower on the boys, I have no doubt that they will have an easier time then I will.

After having completed all of the extraneous stuff, it was time we got down to business. Both Andy and I had promised Jack that he could get a bike when we moved to Wisconsin, granted we made this promise before we ever knew transferring would be an option. So it goes. Jack has a mind like a steel trap. I should have known he would remember since he can recall what he has done from years ago still.

So Jack reminded Mommy and Daddy, who never really forgot, that since he was now living in “Winsconsin” (his pronunciation not mine) that he could get a bike. Really I don’t think Andy needed much prodding or reminding as toy shopping is one of his favorite things to do.

Off to Walmart and Target and ToysRUs we went to find the perfect little bike for our little tike. Of course, anyone with more than one child knows that there is no such thing as buying something for one and not getting the same thing for the other. Between the three stores we were able to find two Transformers bikes: one Optimus Prime and one Bumblebee.

The Optimus Prime bike is 16 inch bike and just fit Jack.

The Bumble bee bike is 12 inches and is perfect for Alex. His little legs were longer then I thought they would be.

 

Poor Andy had to hurry and put them together because not only did the kids want to ride them, but Andy was leaving the next day to go back to California. The first one was a little rough, but the next one was easy because it was exactly the same.

 

We did not forget the helmets and pads to go along with them. We did not have very many options though, so Alex ended up with Thomas the Tank Engine and Jack loved his Ben10 Alien Force.

It took them a while to figure out how to make the bikes go and they had the most difficulty trying to get the pedals to go all the way around and would often push backwards, which of course is the brake.

However, once they got the hang of it, they were cruising up and down the driveway pretty good and only needed minimal help from us to keep them going. Alex was pretty adamant that he wanted to ride in the street, but that’s not going to happen until he becomes a pro and only if someone is with him. Jack on the other hand listened very well and obeyed all the rules laid out concerning bike riding. 

Rule number one is always wear a helmet. Rule number 2 is always wear your pads. Rule number 3 is never go past the end of the driveway. Rule number 4 is don’t intentionally wreck your bike. He did have trouble with the last one as he thought it was pretty funny to ride right into his brother.

They would swap bikes, even though Alex’s little legs couldn’t reach the pedals on Jack’s bike. Overall, the bikes went over pretty well. So much so in fact that I had to drag Alex kicking and screaming inside when it started to get dark. Oh well, I guess it could be worse. I could be dragging them kicking and screaming form a video game!