Father's Day

In the height of wedding season in San Diego, it was a miracle that Dustin got ALL of Father's Day weekend off. He didn't even ask for it. Pretty great, too, because since we'd moved here this was his 2nd weekend off. Otherwise he's working 7 days a week. Boom. Earned it.

When given the chance, like most father's I know (hint, hint Eric, Uncle Rick, Dan), men will opt to take their families on epically long drives into the dessert or woods. We live in San Diego so it was the dessert option. We drove to a place called Salton Sea. It was hot. It was dry. It was interesting but, after the 90 minute additional time spent trying to get there (map quest was wrong, wrong, wrong), we decided that it may not be all that interesting. Not wanting to be a wet blanket, I chalked it up to now knowing that we don't have to take any visiting family out here. We did you all a favor. You owe me, now. Actually, a wet blanket would have come in handy then. Did I mention that it was hot? Well, it was hot. HOT.

Totally made up for the Saturday by going to the San Diego fair on Sunday. This is no side show, folks. For a place that is known for it's theme parks, Southern California can do up a pretty spectacular fair. And it's clean. And safe. Alden has carney blood coursing through his veins. He won his first toy at the ball toss game. Naturally, we named it Carney. He is the third generation of carney. I'm proud. And nervous.

Two little fuzzy headed chickens staring at each other.

Racing ride? Loved it.

Roller coaster? Loved it.

Riding the elephant? Didn't love it. Our little peaceful hearted kid worried that he would be using the animal for entertainment. Gah. We discussed that the elephant looked well cared for and safe so he obliged but I think he may have opted out if we hadn't already bought the tickets.

Mother's Day

After we got back from visiting friends for the weekend in Long Beach, we went out to dinner in Old Town. We don't particularly love Mexican food but it's hard to be in a bad mood with all of the fun colors and loud mariachi music.

Four years of being a mom and counting....

 

Sticky Note Reminder

 

"Dear Mom,

I'm inviting you to play and I like you."

 

Now, I'm not one of those mom's who looks back and wishes that she had played more with her child. I did. I do. And I will. There are countless hours of Alden and I spending time shoulder-to-shoulder building and tearing down structures, painting, coloring, bathing, sleeping, swimming, racing, chasing, climbing, imagining, inventing together. But in the reality of a child's mind, even all of those hours compounded don't even come close to how many he would prefer we spend together.

 

Alden came up with this sticky-note invitation all by himself after a particularly long session of my having to work. Typically I am done with my job by 11:00 a.m. but today (May 2013) went a little longer.

 

And my heart crumbled up like an used sticky note. I adore this kid. Needless to say, I closed my computer, turned off my phone, and got down on the floor with him to play.

 

Easter-Schmeetster

Amidst all of the hub-bub of moving we were able to meet up with the Anuschat cousins for a little Easter Egg hunt in Grants Pass for one last time. Those kids are so awesome. Alden looks up to his boy cousins and loves the new addition, too! Conner, Colby, and Chloe will be sorely missed.

Of course, I nearly burst into tears watching Conner and Alden waiting in line together. Conner is an excellent older brother and cousin.

Annie the Clown is such a perfect friend to children. She customizes their art work to fit their demands.

I can see this photo blown up to about 100% this size at a family reunion sometime in the future. Tough guys.

Grandma Robbie with her three boys.

Cut to our Portland trip where Aunt Bekki has egg dying down to an art form.

 

Saying Hello = Glaaaaaaaaaaaaaad

There are a lot of good things about San Diego. At this point in our expedition and with this very white-knuckled flyer (meeeeeeeee), I can appreciate that the weather is consistently lovely there. Meaning? The flight in and out is smooth, seemless, and offers beautiful sun scenes.

We could have done this a million more times. We may have gotten close.

I was too invested in watching Alden and Dustin hug for the first time in over a month to catch any photos of it. I wanted to be there to see it and to get a hug for myself. Dustin and I have spent a lot of time apart in our years together... we traveled for work and moved quite a bit. This was the most trying time apart though. It's a total game changer when you have a child that misses their parent during that time. It was hard for Dustin to be alone and looking for the perfect home for us. It's also difficult to be the single parent on the other end packing up the whole house all with no car. But. I'm posting this nearly 6 months later so we must have made it.

 

Saying Goodbye = Saaaaaaaaaaaaad

With the house on M St. entirely packed up (Thanks Dad and Sy) and the house completely cleaned (Thanks Mom and Robbie) we were able to leave Grants Pass a whole day early in the latter part of March. I thought that it would be really hard to leave Grants Pass and our little home but, to be brutally honest, it was a huge relief. Our economical portion of life had become such a crippling issue that it was difficult to have fun at even the simplist things in life. And as usual, it the people that it's the most difficult to say good-bye to.

 

This is at Bekki's home where we all lounged around for the day before we boarded the plane to San Diego.

My mom offered to take our long term traveling cat, Y'all. The apartment we had waiting for us didn't accept animals AND in her near 12 years, this cat has moved so many times that I didn't think her sanity could handle one more test. Though it was hard to hand her over, I know that Y'all has been purring ever since.

 

Bekki kept Alden busy while I checked in our bags at the airport. We were all a sobbing mess by the time it came to depart. It's astonishing what kind of control you have to keep, though, so you can show your child that it's ok to move on. I didn't want him to focus on the good bye but the huge HELLO we were anticipating on the other end. Dustin was eagerly awaiting us in San Diego!