How To Pack A Car (Alone) With 2 Children In 27 Easy Steps

1- A week before your trip, make multiple lists for every possible item you may need. 

2- Spend every spare moment you have in that preceding week packing the bags and making new lists.

3- The night before you leave, collect your bags by the door and double check your packing skills.  Make a new list of last minute items to be packed in the morning and have yet another bag ready for those things.

4- The morning of your trip, wake up, get the children up and (referring to your final list) pack your last bag.  Go ahead and feel really good about yourself right now and take a moment to let that feeling sink in because this will be your best parenting moment of the day.  Please notice that your best parenting moment did not include children. 

5- Try to take the dog out and realize that it's starting to rain.  Well crap.  You will then have to pick the dog up and put her in the grass because she has developed a sudden, irrational fear of water (especially the kind that falls from the sky).  Tell her that she's being ridiculous, that it's only sprinkling and that she needs to pee now.  She does not pee, but turns around the second you put her on the grass and runs back inside. 

6- Go put a pee pee pad down on the floor in your bathroom for the dog to pee on. 

7- Attempt to stop the 1 year old from unpacking all of your beautifully packed bags that are still sitting by the door.

8- When the 3 year old asks to help, tell her that she can help by watching the 1 year old.  (She will then say "OK!" and sit on the floor in your room with the 1 year old to play with her.  Appreciate this moment.)

9- Begin carrying the bags out to your car.  You will need to take the double stroller, so there will be some strategy in packing the trunk of your little Ford Focus. 

10- After you have the stroller and larger bags by the trunk of the car, take a moment to assess the situation and visualize how everything will fit best.  About half way through packing the bags into the trunk you will notice a small, chunky baby running out of the garage into the rain...barefoot.  And guess who's running out right behind her?  The (apparently miraculously healed of her water phobia) dog.  The same dog who was acting as if we had acid rain in North Florida is now chasing after the 1 year old and jumping in puddles like she's a puppy.  Meanwhile, of course the rain starts coming down harder and the bags are getting wet. 

11- Screw the systematic approach and throw the rest of the bags into the trunk.

12- Run after the barefoot 1 year old who is now soaked and filthy and is also now running away from you while shrieking with laughter.

13- After you get the 1 year old back into the garage, go back out for the dog who has now apparently gone deaf because she suddenly has no idea what the phrase "Minnie! Get back in the house!!!" means.  As you get the dog, be prepared for the 1 year old to try to escape back out into the rain...it will happen.

14- With the dog under one arm and the 1 year old under the other arm, get back into the house where you will find the 3 year old standing in your room.  Now here's where I'm going to save you the trouble because if you ask her: "Alexa, I thought you were going to help Mommy by watching Kate and Minnie"  she will answer: "I was watching them and then they walked away from me and I couldn't see them anymore."  I have no words.

15- Get the baby cleaned up and put shoes on everyone.

16- Pack up some snacks for the car .  Look up and realize that it stopped raining (probably as soon as you came inside).

17- Tell everyone that it's time to get in the car and, with the bags that contain the car toys on your shoulder, try to herd the children through the garage and out to the car.

18- Spend about 5 minutes getting them into their seats and buckled in.

19- Bring the dog back inside.  Again.  Tell her that she's not coming this time.

20- Grab your purse and keys, lock the door and get into the car.  This is when the 3 year old will ask for a drink...and you realize that her sippy cup is not in the diaper bag.

21- Go back into the house to get the missing sippy cup (which the 1 year old had pulled out of the bag in her attempt to unpack everything).

22- Get back into the car and realize that your phone isn't plugged into the charger and in the cup holder where you keep it.

23- Search frantically for the phone.  Dump out your purse and diaper bag onto the front seat.

24- Go back inside to look for your phone.  (you left it on the kitchen counter)   On your way out, grab some more snacks.

25- Dump your phone and the snacks onto the front seat in the car and go back into the garage to get a Pepsi out of the fridge (because who the hell thought it was a good idea to wake up at 6:45 so that we could leave as soon as the girls got up?!).

26- Go back into the house at least 3 more times for random items that you either forgot or one of the girls said that they need.

26- Drive to the stop sign at the end of your street where you will suddenly remember 2 more things that you forgot.

27- Keep driving.  It's not worth it.

A Whole Lot of Crazy - part 2

Since Alexa has had the bumpers off of her crib, she has been having a little problem at night keeping her pacis.  She doesn't realize it, but when she's sleeping she throws them on the floor.  The phrase 'active sleeper' just doesn't even begin to describe her.  You have to see it to believe it.  So, on to my story:

I got up for work one morning and everything seemed to be how it should be.  After showering and getting dressed, I was in the kitchen making my oatmeal when I heard a whimpering noise.  It sounded just like Wolfie.  Wait.  I think I should first tell you that about two days before this happened I swear I saw Wolfie in my family room.  Alexa and I were playing in her room and when I looked out her door I know I saw him walk by the couches.  At first I assumed I was crazy, that it must have been one of the girls but then I realized that both girls were sitting right next to me.  This is not even the crazy that I'm going to talk about, either.  I swear that I see people all the time.  Like the ghost at Dance Explosion (that many people have seen) who I know is my grandpa Nettina.  Oh and another time, when I was vacuming, I was positive that I saw grandpa Natwick sitting on my couch.  And the obvious time when grandma Natwick stopped by on her way to heaven to tell me about her chair.  Are you telling me that it is a coincidence that I woke up at the exact time she passed and could think of nothing else but that chair?  OK, I'm getting off track.  Anyway, so it's 5:30 in the morning and I hear a whimpering noise.  First, I dismiss it, thinking that I'm hearing something from the microwave or something outside.  Then it happens again.  And again.  And again.  Enough times that now I know I am hearing something and that it is in the house.  Oh yeah, and it sounds EXACTLY like how Wolfie used to whimper.  Do I think that I have a small child in the other room?  No, of course not.  I immediately jump to the conclusion that my dog has come down from doggie heaven to say hello.  Trying to be sane, I turned on the lights in my room to check on the girls and make sure it wasn't them (Nick was sleeping in the guest bedroom that night - with the monitor.  But that's a whole other story that will take up much too much time).  So anyway, I turn on the lights and Glynnis and Minnie are passed out sleeping.  I'm pretty sure Minnie was snoring, and I'm positive that neither of them were whimpering.  'Great', I think, now I'm just one step closer to crazy.  So what do I do?  I go back out to the kitchen/family room and I'm sneaking around whispering Wolfie's name.  And then I hear it again.  Now I'm sure I'm crazy.  Thoughts of schitzophrenia are running through my head.  Here's the crazy girl who doesn't hear voices.  Oh no, she hears her deceased dog crying for her.  I decide that I need to go wake up Nick because he needs to have me admitted somewhere, he needs to take me to the crazy house and OH MY GOD, why won't that dog stop crying?!?!  It is at this point, when I am about five steps away from the guest room door, that I remember that I have a child.  I walk up to Alexa's door and slowly creep inside her room to find her sitting up, kind of slumped in the corner of her crib.  She looked at me, made her little Wolfie-like whimper and I silently said a small prayer of thanks for the last bit of my sanity.  Apparently, I'm not quite as crazy as I once thought.  When I walked up to Alexa and asked if she was ok, she nodded yes.  And then in a completely big girl and whimper free voice she said "paci fall on floor". 

Pictures of Wolfie



Maybe Next Week

I know I haven't written anything in awhile but we have had a very exhausting week. Dance rehearsal and recital and a bridal shower for Jenifer among other things. Then on Monday morning we had to put down our buddy, Wolfie. He had a stroke and had progressively gotten worse over the weekend. Maybe I'll write something next week.

toothbrush

Oh, that moment when you just realized you did a superb, top notch tooth brushing with...your husband's toothbrush.  And even though you have known him for more than half your life and you've been married for 7 years, you're pretty grossed out.  :/

That, together with the bath I just had to give Glyniss because she had diarrhea stuck to her butt really makes me want to go back to bed and start today over.  Oh well, off to work (hopefully to witness some more miracles like last night!).

Crazy, Just Crazy

I am eventually going to post pictures of our Disney trip (maybe even tonight, if I get motivated) but first I must tell you about my crazy day with my crazy child and my crazy dogs.  First of all, Wolfie isn't doing to hot.  He has some back problems and now he's developed some anxiety.  Yeah, that's right, the dog has anxiety.  Now, normally I would tell him to suck it up and get over it except that his form of anxiety manifests as a high pitched whinny cry that pierces your soul and is never ending.  When you are trying to sleep, you will do anything to make that stop.  Trust me.  That being said, while I sleep, Wolfie is now allowed to roam the house at his leisure instead of going in the crate with the girls.  So I woke up this afternoon, an hour earlier than I wanted to (this is of course after getting up to pee three times because of all the Pepsi I drank at work trying to stay awake through the night) irritated that the one day I can sleep in a little bit, I wake up at 1:30.  Whatever.  So I get up, clean up Wolfie's pee off the floor (I'm not going to even get into that), and take the dogs out.  Of course Wolfie won't go outside so I have to pick him up and put him on the grass where he proceeds to lay down.  Fine, obviously you don't have to pee since you did it already on my wood floors.  He lays there until the girls are done and then finally decides to walk around a little bit and do his business.  So we stay outside longer.  Finally, 15 minutes later, after we all were ready to go back inside, I was able to take a shower and get ready.  I left to pick up Alexa from day care and returned home to find poop on one of the area rugs.  I was gone for about 20 minutes total.  I'm not going to get into how I know it was Wolfie poop but let's just say I have my ways.  The next hour and a half was full of making dinner, eating dinner, getting dressed for work and playing with Alexa/trying to keep her occupied so she will quit screaming like a banshee.  After dinner, we went outside with the dogs.  Everything was fine until it was time to go inside.  Of course that was the point where Alexa decided that she wanted to ride in her car or throw a ball or do anything else that I said 'no' to.  I'd be herding the dogs to the door, I'd get Alexa almost to the door and then she'd run to something else that she wanted to play with.  I tell her no, she throws a fit, I drag her to the door again, repeat, repeat, repeat.  Meanwhile, Wolfie now decided (of course) that it was a nice time to take a walk by the woods.  You have got to be kidding me.  Let's all now think back to that wonderful bear we had about 6 months ago which was never actually caught, which I imagine is sitting just beyond my field of vision waiting to pounce on and eat whatever small creature happens to be walking by.  (Hey, I never said that I didn't have issues too)  So, of course now my priority is Wolfie (who, by the way, I need two hands to carry because of his back) and of course I never got Alexa close enough to the door to actually get her in the house.  I run to go pick up Wolfie and Alexa runs to the swing.  The whole time looking at me and shreiking with laughter.  I loose it, and start screaming that every living creature in this yard better get their butts into the house NOW!  (slight paraphrase) Eventually, everyone got inside, Alexa and I got into the car and I was able to drop her off to Nick who was still at work.  During the whole walk to Nick's room, Alexa and I worked on stopping, going and listening to Mommy.  And I also decided that no one is allowed to chase her around the house for fun saying 'I'm gonna get you!' anymore.  It's banned. 

On a lighter note, Alexa and I are going to a 31 party on Thursday with all of the women in the subdivision we live in.  I'm kind of excited to meet some of our neighbors but I'm mostly terrified of having to actually talk to people I don't know.  In any kind of social situation you can pretty much say good bye to nice, kind of funny, sarcastic and witty Kristin and say hello to silent, awkward Kristin.  And without Nick to hide behind, it will be ten times worse.  At least Alexa is coming with me.  She's a good excuse to have to leave if need be.  I can almost hear my mom asking me "Kristin, did you make any friends today?!"  No, mom, I didn't.  Well, at least on Thursday I can get points for trying.

Purple Weed and a Fuzzy Baby

I don't know if I've written about this, but Alexa doesn't say 'Mama'.  She used to.  I still think it was her first word and she used to say it all the time.  But for some reason, since she has really started trying to talk, the Mama thing has disappeared.  She says 'Dada' and 'Daddy' with no problem, but never 'Mama'.  So when I picked her up from day care the other day, the strangest thing happened.  They were playing outside and when I walked out on to the playground, Alexa saw me and started walking real fast toward me saying 'Mama, Mama, Mama, Mama'.  She wasn't loud or screaming, but almost saying it to herself.  Of course, I was super excited to hear her finally say it!  She came up to me and I gave her a big hug and a kiss and asked her to say it again.  Do you want to know what she did?  Shook her head no.  That little crazy.  She can totally say it and flat out refuses!  Hmmmm.

The continuation of a super long post describing our week (or at least two days of our week) in pictures:
  

Oh, so many things to be said with this picture.  First of all, yes, that is our Christmas tree, still drying out and waiting to be turned into firewood.  Alexa picked out this outfit to wear and she thought she looked super cute.  Especially the shoes.  She threw an absolute fit when I tried to put her sneakers on her.  I told her that we have to have shoes on to go outside, so she went into her shoe basket and pulled out the purple crocks.  OK, kid, whatever, as long as you have shoes on.  She was probably trying to coordinate with the shirt.  It has Mickey on it and the shoes are Minnie Mouse.  I don't know how that all works.  I don't do fashion.  Obviously. Oh, and her hands are over her mouth because she's coughing.  We are currently working on coughing into our elbow, but it's proving to be slightly more difficult to learn.

 Playing with rocks.

 Now that is a handsome looking dog!

 Is it bad parenting to take a picture first before taking the rock out of your kid's mouth?

 OK, two pictures.

 And....she spotted a bird.

 Yup, there it is, in the tree.

 She's showing me her teeth ;)

 We went to the baseball park to watch Travis, Chase and Brayden play.  It was pretty windy! (Nice hair, Lex! hehehe)

 Just checking things out.

 Look at Hot Stuff climbing the fence!  Hopefully, she won't use this new love of climbing to get out of her crib!  I'm not ready for a toddler bed yet!

 I shall call this picture: "Purple Weed and a Fuzzy Baby"

 "Hey"

 Nick and Alexa planted two of the trees that we got on Arbor day.  And of course they had to use her car to transport them around the yard.  Actually, the pots fit very nicely in the 'trunk' of her car.  Have I talked about the car yet?  She's obsessed.  Every time we go outside she has to ride in her car and then most of the time throws a fit when it's time to go inside again (actually, the going inside part is getting better).  She just walks up to it, sits down in it and looks at you, waiting to be pushed around.  She loves it.  It's the best $3 my mom has ever spent...yay for garage sales!

Big helper girl. 

 Planting the dogwood tree.  See that black thing in the background?  That's our compost bin.  Nick got it for Christmas from his dad.  He loves it.  I fear it and call it the bear magnet, which Nick does not understand at all.  I'm not sure what there is to not understand.  We had a bear in our back yard who went all through our garbage (and ate the food).  So the obvious thing to do after something like that happens is to put a bin in our back yard that is full of old, rotting food.  Because that won't attract bears at all, will it?  Exactly.

 She found an extra tree to be planed.

 Lexi learning the fine art of digging with a shovel.

Tree #2 ready to go in the ground. 

Hi Glynniss.  Glyn says that she's embarrassed to have this picture up because of her rough hair cut.  I told her that maybe if she would stay still while she's being shaved, her hair would look beautiful like Minnie's.  Minnie looked at her smugly, then Glynnie gave her a look and walked away.  (what?  Not everyone has conversations for their dogs?  Because that is totally what happened!)

Animal Love

We all know about the crazy bird obsession.  And the undying love for Wolfie.  But apparently, Hot Stuff is in love with animals in general.  Evidence:

 Doesn't it look like she's trying to eat her?

Instead of taking  'a bite out of crime'  Alexa takes 'a bite out of cats'. 

And yes, I did just reference an early 90s TV commercial. 

You love it.

 I would like to point out two things in this picture.  #1 - how Alexa is totally loving on the ugliest cat in existence.  #2 - how I am making a face at my mom which clearly says 'can you believe Alexa is totally loving on the ugliest cat in existence and that I am actually holding it...nasty!'

In all honesty, this is actually a very nice cat.  I am not a cat person at all but for some reason, our neighbors always have very nice (not so nasty) cats.  Despite being the hairless kind.  Of course they have another cat who is full of nice soft hair but does Alexa want to pet that one?  No, of course not.  She wants to pet the bald cat.  She followed Ally (the cat) onto the patio at their house and pointed to her nose and gave her a kiss on the mouth.  The pictures were taken during our attempt to make her do it again.

Lexi was also in love with Patches, my brother's dog.  At first Patches and his other dog, Allie, completely freaked her out.  They are much bigger then what she's used to, but once they calmed down it was another love fest.  Pats, hugs, kisses, I'm surprised she didn't try to ride her.  Alexa even tried to pick Patches up (which obviously didn't work out too well).  Patches just sat there the whole time, what a good girl!  After this, Alexa kept walking around the house pointing at Patches and saying 'Paa paa'. 



A Love Affair and a Snow Suit

Isn't it funny how nothing interesting happens (to write about) for weeks at a time and then all of a sudden within a few days a whole bunch of stuff happens? No? It's just me...ok, awkward moment. Anyway, I was driving to work tonight thinking about all the random little stuff I had to blog about, so I'm be prepared for a few back to back posts. Oh! I have an idea! Instead of constantly checking my blog to check if I posted anything (as I know everyone does, hehe) you could just follow me by email and get a notice to your inbox whenever I post something. Just put in your email address in that little rectangle thing over to the left that says 'follow by email', it will send you an email which you have to confirm and then every time I post something you will receive a lovely little message from the Weaver Family. I know, you're excited. I actually tried it out myself and it's super easy and you don't get any other messages other then the ones that let you know when there is a new post.

OK, so on to my stories.  The first one is a love story.  A love between a little girl and her dog.  It's actually between a little girl and three dogs but the other two are fast enough to squirm out of the grip of the two and a half foot hug strangler.  Wolfie, unfortunately, is not.  Therefore, Alexa has become increasingly obcessed with him.  She follows him around, says hi to him, tries to pet him, hug him, lay on him, wiggle with him (she sees Wolfie and Minnie wiggle together and tries to join in).  It's to the point that, due to the frail state of Wolfie's back, we have to either lock him in another room or be within 3 feet of Alexa to pull her off of him in case she decides to attack.  I mean, hug.  Wolfie still loves her but he said that he would like it to be more of a long distance relationship.  And I don't blame him.

 It all starts with an innocent pat.

 And then she wants to snuggle.

 My other little story is that we went to Panama City Beach this past weekend.  Nick had to go to a meeting there for school so Alexa and I went along to see the beach.  Little did we know, it was going to be like being in the freaking arctic.  OK, so it wasn't that cold (a high of 51, I think) but the wind was ridiculous.  Like, knock a baby over ridiculous.  We tried to go to the beach, but after only a few minutes we decided to go shopping instead.  This was a much better use of our time because we found a huge plaza/mall thing that had a Carter's store and we got some Christmas PJs for next year on super clearance.  My mom would have been proud.  It's too bad it was so cold and windy because the beach was beautiful. Not like the nasty beaches in south Florida.  Like, there was actual sand.  Imagine that.  We are going to have to go back when I don't feel like I have to wrap my child in a snow suit.

Uh Oh Spaghetti-Os!

We went home for my Dad's birthday!!!  We were going to be home for other reasons but that party got cancelled.  No worries.  We celebrated my dad's birthday instead (which apparently was a big deal because we never celebrate his birthday other than the usual Boston Creme pie).  Have I ever talked about the birthday Boston Creme pie?  Well it's a running joke in our family that we never get to eat anything that my mom doesn't like.  For example, on the rare occasion that my dad would have to feed us dinner we often got Pizza Hut because we all liked it but mom thought it was gross.  My mom loves Boston Creme pie (only the one from Publix), therefore, we always got a Boston Creme pie as our birthday cake.  Now, I don't want this to sound like that's the only birthday cake we got because we definitely had a 'birthday week' which included many birthday parties (all of which had their own cake).   Back to our weekend.  We brought the dogs with us so Minnie and Rosie got to hang out again.  They love each other.  Rosie just puts up with our other dogs but her and Minnie are BFFs.  Also, Nicky was down for the weekend so he gave Alexa her Christmas present (as if she needed another present).  It was a little shopping cart with plastic food and two spots for her baby dolls, which is perfect because both Rachel and Temperence got to ride in the cart.  Alexa loves it she pushes it around all the time and loves to fill it up with anything and everything.

 I guess Grammy wanted to hold Rachel and Temperence but Lexi didn't like that too much.  She had everyone at dinner banging their hands on the table too.  It's hilarious what we'll do for her entertainment!

 Oh!  And Brittany came over on Sunday!  I'm going to brag a little bit and write about my friend Brittany.  She got a job dancing in an opera!  How cool is that?!  We are going to try to go see it which I am also pretty excited about because I've never been to an opera before.

One more cute thing to write about...

Alexa says 'uh oh'.  I think she picked it up at school because we don't say it at home very much.  Anyway, when she says it, I automatically say 'uh oh Spaghetti-Os'.  Don't ask why, just consider it a turret-like symptom of mine.  So yesterday I was listening to her walk around saying 'uh oh, sedio' over and over again.  Hilarious.