two

Dear Adeline,

Two years ago, you came into our world on a cool, gray afternoon. Or should I say, we (your father and I) came into your world. A world we could not have imagined prior to it happening. Sure, we pictured the sleepless nights and a faceless you filling the little onesies we folded into your drawers, but never could we have guessed what your laugh would sound like when we tickled you, or how it would feel the first time you clasped your hands behind our necks and proclaimed, "I love you."

The leap from one to two was at times unnoticeable--so gradual your development appeared because I would see you every day...that is, until I looked at you one day as you sat in your chair eating yogurt you requested with a spoon like a normal human being, and I marveled at how just a few months ago, I was washing most of that yogurt out of your hair after every breakfast. Or how at fourteen months, you were still wobbly, learning how to balance, shuffle, and scoot along on your feet for the first time, and now you run full tilt down a sidewalk with your arms swinging along your side. How you've taught yourself to bend your knees and jump, something I never realized was a learned skill. You love to hop around, especially on the bed while holding my hands for extra leverage...I even made up a song for you that I hope you'll remember when you're older.

"I'm a little bunny, I'm a little bunny, I'm a little bunny, and my name is Addieeeeeeeeee. And I like. to. HOP, HOP, HOP, HOP, HOOOOOOOOOOPPPPPPP."

(Yes, mom's songwriting skills are not the greatest, but she made it up on the spot so give her some credit.)

You are such a chatterbox. Most of the time I can understand your toddlerese, acting as an interpreter to everyone else when you speak to them.

You ask to wear your Halloween costumes. You remind me to give you gummy vitamins. You tell Zoe to get the toy you threw at her head. You LOVE to sing...your current repertoire includes, "Twinkle, twinkle", "Itsy-Bitsy Spider", "Row Your Boat", "ABC's", and of course, the ever-monotonous, never-ending classic, "Old McDonald Had a Farm".

"...and on his farm he had a...?"

"A SEA OTTER!"

Speaking of which, you are also obsessed with animals. Especially animals that live in the ocean. It's a good thing we have a membership to the Monterey Bay Aquarium, and how much do I love that you want to read my book about Sharks every day...not even a children's book about sharks, but a thick, serious-looking one with lots of text and photos depicting terrifying scenes of Great Whites leaping out of the water and shark feeding frenzies.

"Look mama, sharks! So cuuuuuuute."

(everything is "cute")

"Mama, let's go to ocean. Jellyfiiiiish. Sea otterrrrrrs. Shaaaarks. Whaaales. Dolpheeens."

(Your dad says you mimic the way I speak to you--lengthening out the end of each word. )

I feel bad that your birthday is jammed in between Christmas and New Year's. I promise we will always do our best to make this day your very own and keep it separate from the common festivities. I also promise to never wrap your birthday presents in Christmas wrapping paper (ok, this is the last year).

Tonight (the night before your birthday), your dad put together the balance bike your Cheney Family got for you, and I blew up balloons and arranged your presents on the coffee table. I tidied up the living room and moved the bike three times to secure an optimal location for it's discovery in the morning. Tomorrow, I'll hang the hand-made birthday banner and we'll wear the party hats I spent way too much time making last year for your first birthday. I know you probably aren't going to remember any of this when you're older, and like your dad said to me, this fussing about and making sure everything looks nice is mostly for myself, but I replied (a little defensively), that it matters because we make it matter...because that's how you celebrate anything you value. It may just be another day to everyone else in the world. But to your father and me, to your extended family and the friends you have made, it's a day that will be spent being happy and giving thanks that you were born.

Happy Birthday, monkey.

Love, your mama

little green thumb

My father has maintained a garden in my great-grandmother's backyard for the past eight or nine years. Every year he and my step-mother plant tomatoes, daikon radishes, squash, cucumber, arugula, carrots, turnips and the like, as well as a variety of herbs. I wish I could do this. Correction: I wish I had the attention-span to do this. A veggie garden always sounds so nice in my head, and then when I buy a pot of herbs at Trader Joe's to give it a test run, they're dead by the end of the month. I've bought this same pot of herbs five times now. I can be very poor at carrying things out...Zach calls it shiny-object syndrome.

Luckily Addie and Louie will be able to experience the joys of gardening through my father and Zach's mother. It was far too cold this last trip up to Washington to get any real gardening experience in, but Addie was still able to spend a little time with her Grandpa Johnson, digging up turnips and carrots, and raking leaves in the yard. Child labor is always the way to go in these situations...

How have I managed to keep this child alive for two years, yet killed every plant in my possession?!

trading brothers

My friend, Kat, had her second baby last month, and I am so happy she did. It's comforting to know that you're in the same boat with someone, especially when that someone is as awesome as she is. Her older son and Addie are very close friends, and they recently had fun trading little brothers during a recent visit.

A big hip-hip hooray for little brothers (and their awesome older siblings)!

things that make me feel like a grown-up...

...not getting married or having two children or living in a house...

...but finally organizing Christmas cards to be sent out for the first time in my life!

(That, and serving Thanksgiving and Christmas meals on nice platters and matching dishes rather than the pots and pans they were cooked in.)

I actually mustered up the time and energy to buy Christmas (penguin!) pajamas for the kids and took some photographs so I could make cards on Snapfish. Out of the hundred and thirty photos I took, there were probably only five good ones where both of their eyes were open, one of them wasn't crying, or being choked by the other, or had jelly on their face...

pretty freakin' cute, huh?

flowers from my father

I 'm conflicted about telling this story (you'll see why) but I think it's necessary since it's been on my mind since May 27th. The day Zach and I were married.

photo credit: John Olmsted

We decided to get married one week before the 27th. The extent of my planning included: calling San Francisco City Hall registrar, booking a small public ceremony, buying my dress at Anthropologie and nice clothes for Zach at Banana Republic, and informing my family that they were to meet us at 12:30 on Thursday. I purposely kept it as low-key and stress-free as possible.

Still, I felt nervous the day of the ceremony and regretted that I hadn't thought it through more carefully. My legs weren't shaved. Both of us needed haircuts. The shoes I bought didn't really match my dress. I didn't even order a bouquet. A bit of bridezilla began to creep in as I called local florists to see if they could whip up something within the hour, only to be told that they couldn't. Panicked, I threw a bunch of scrap ribbon, fabric, and scissors into the car at the last minute, thinking we could at least stop by Trader Joe's and pick up some tulips or lilies. No roses...

We left the house too late to pick up any flowers at the store, and then hit traffic on I-280. I could feel my anxiety level rising. We're going to be late for our registration appointment and they'll cancel the ceremony, I thought, and I don't even have any damn flowers on my wedding day. And I look really fat in my dress (well, I was six month pregnant at the time. dummy.).

What actually happened: we pulled up at the steps of City Hall with five minutes to spare and scored a great parking spot right out front. My father and step-mother were visiting from Washington, and they parked their car in front of ours. We were back on track.

I hurried over to my father's car to give the two further instructions, when a man standing a few feet away from me on the sidewalk suddenly spoke.

"Flowers, miss?"

He was not from America. Possibly East Indian, but I wasn't sure. He held a large bundle of red roses and he looked cold and desperate. I automatically said no thank you and didn't give him a second thought, turning back to talk to my father through the passenger window.

"Flowers, miss?"

"No THANK you." I rolled my eyes at no one in particular.

I continued to ignore his requests to please buy a flower as we pulled our clothes out of the trunk, filled the parking meters, and started walking up the steps. I turned around when I noticed that my dad wasn't with us. He was still standing on the sidewalk, having a conversation with the man. My father had a serious, sympathetic look on his face, and his hand rested on the man's shoulder. It looked like the man with the flowers was crying.

"Seriously?" I said in a loud, exasperated voice.

I was annoyed because this was typical behavior for my father. Always trying to meet strangers on the street, listen to their stories. And it usually meant that we were late to wherever we happened to be going. What followed is the part of the story I feel most ashamed of. I was so concerned about myself and my special day that I felt nothing but resentment toward the man and my father for taking attention off the task at hand...me, me, me.

"He's probably faking it so he'll buy a stupid flower," I muttered to my sister, her boyfriend, and Zach.

Minus my father and step-mother, the group of us walked into the building and went through security. They joined us five minutes later, my father holding four roses in his hand.

"WHY did you buy those? He was probably just crying so you'd feel sorry for him!"

The look on my father's face revealed a mixture of emotion: concern, sadness, compassion, and ultimately, a little disappointment at my self-centered and jaded reaction.

"No...he was really crying, Ariel,"

He went on to explain the plight of the poor man. How he came to the States to meet family. How a series of unfortunate events had left him homeless with no money to return to his country. How he didn't even have enough money for his next meal. So my father gave him twenty dollars in exchange for the roses. He hugged the man with the flowers and wished him luck for a better today and tomorrow.

"And now you have flowers for your wedding," he added.

Oh.

I was smacked with guilt...and still, anger. I felt very selfish, privately wishing all of this didn't have to happen right before we were getting married. Why did he have to stop and talk the man? Why couldn't he be more like me and the rest of the world and ignore those men and women on the street? Look the other way and go about his life?

The answers are always the same.

Because my father is good man.

(I shouldn't have expected differently. I remember when he worked as a barista in a Seattle coffee shop years ago and befriended a homeless man. He would let the man wash up in the restroom and gave him money for a couple tools (a shovel?) that the man offered to sell him. It was clear that the man suffered from mental illness, especially when he returned to the shop one day demanding that my father return the tools to him (my dad refused), but I clearly recall loving my dad for being the way he was at that time and has always has been...kind and respectful to everyone.)

I ended up with flowers on our wedding day. My step-mother took the roses, scrap lace and ribbon, a paper towel from the public bathroom, and artfully transformed them into a sweet little bouquet for me. It wasn't professionally made and I wouldn't have picked roses myself, but it was perfect. Because regardless of whether or not I wanted that man to briefly enter our lives, whether he was lying or telling the truth, whether I acted like a brat and then learned an important lesson in humility, I am grateful for the way everything happened. For the important lesson I held in both hands as I married the man I loved. For my father's act of kindness to grace us that special day.

*****

Happy Thanksgiving, everyone. Let's all be grateful for the blessings in our lives...

xo, Ariel

a morning in Portland

let's pretend we're friends!

It's been a rough couple days adjusting from the itinerant lifestyle that ended last Friday night (I have NEVER been so happy to see the City of Campbell sign). We ended up going to San Francisco the very next day (45 minutes? Psh. That's nuthin'.) so Zach and Addie could attend the Yo Gabba Gabba concert while my mom, Louie, and I gorged ourselves on sushi in Japan Center. We made the mistake of staying in the city too long thinking we could enjoy Union Square and some holiday shopping, which ended up with us getting caught in a downpour, me having to nurse Louie in a shoe store, and all of us waiting thirty minutes just to get our car out of the valet parking garage. I started to experience Road-Trip-PTSD when the kids began to cry and whine while we were trapped downtown in what was essentially a parking lot filled with angry SUV's and pushy pedestrians. We made it home though, and vowed not to get in the car unless absolutely necessary for the next few weeks.

*****

So of course I break that pact today and pack the kids up to visit the Children's Discovery Museum. I was determined to get out the apathetic funk I've been feeling, and we hadn't been there in awhile. I scored a close parking spot and made sure to feed the meter so we had plenty of time to play. Yes! Pro-active and responsible!

I always feel so awkward in public spaces for children. Parks and museums especially, since all the adults are forced to be in close proximity with one another but do our darndest to pretend the other doesn't exist. Of course not everyone is stand-offish. There are many different types of parents out there...

The most enthusiastic and hands-on parents, usually fathers armed with expensive cameras, are the ones who normally work full-time jobs and took the day off to spend time with their kid. They have boundless energy that's channeled into chasing their child around, crawling with them through the tunnels, proudly exclaiming over their amazing ball-throwing abilities, and hovering over every activity with a huge grin on their face. It's really very sweet. I think Grandma's and babysitters come next in the pyramid of happy, active participants.

Next are the moms who have obviously been to the museum 4,382 times, because this is one of the few enclosed spaces to play in when it's cold outside and you don't want to drag screaming children out of mall stores. They usually have an older kid running around while a baby sits in their lap or hangs in a Baby Bjorn. They look really tired. I think I fall into this category now.

Then there are those who look bored shitless and super resentful of the fact that they are sitting here watching their kid finger-paint rather then leading a team-meeting in a boardroom. They check their phones a lot and offer a wan smile when their child shows them their masterpiece.

genius!

However, it really depends on the individual when it comes to adult conversation. I think most parents prefer to avoid interaction with each other. We prefer our children's play-time to be like one-night stands: no names, no future plans, no meaningful personal information exchanged. The most that's usually offered is a query into the age of your child, and then a nod and smile, like, "okay, that's all I'm going to ask you now." I can't really blame anyone though. We're all tired, and it can be mind-numbing saying the same thing over and over every time your toddler slobbers on another kid's toy. Plus, having children doesn't change one's personality and suddenly transforn you into an extrovert.

Yet everywhere I go, I get bored enough to try and work up a conversation with another adult. This is usually a mistake. I end up sounding incredibly awkward and dorky, and after several failed attempts at starting friendly banter, I tend to give up and join the little people at the miniature kitchen table to nom on plastic fruit.

Here are some gems I offered up today:

To a friendly-looking mother in the bubble-making exhibit:

"I guess this means I don't have to give my kid a bath now, right?" (She turns toward me and gives a half-hearted smile while revealing that she is on her cell-phone. She ushers her son away.)

****

To a man who must have been at least six and a half feet tall with hair all the way down his back, wearing a scary trench coat:

"Wow, I thought I had hard time chasing my daugher around the tunnels and crawl-spaces...hahaha...you must barely fit through them! hahaha."

"No, I fit through them okay." (obviously perturbed at my joke about his height which I'm sure has been commented on his entire life.)

He was very tall.

****

To a harried-looking father who is trying to keep his daughter from getting paint all over herself in the art-studio as I point to the butterfly habitat:

"Looks like one of em' didn't make it, huh? Like, it's dead! hahaha!"

To which he glances at the habitat and then back to me, and shrugs, "Yeah, I guess so."

It was very dead.

And so it goes...

****

I still felt pretty triumphant about our outing, regardless of my social skills, until we were on the freeway halfway home and I noticed the traffic ticket flapping against the windshield. GAAARRRRRRRHULKSMASH. I couldn't believe it. There was still fifteen minutes left on the meter when we left the parking space. It must have been a mistake! When we got home, I opened the envelope and read that I was parked on a red curb. Um, no, I wasn't. Unless a red curb constitutes six inches of scraped off red paint at the very edge of the parking spot. Which had a working meter. In between two other parked cars. Whatever, California, I thought you were more laid back than that asshole, Washington, but that's obviously not the case. I've now racked up $600 in traffic tickets within a week. Let's see what happens tomorrow...maybe I'll be in a car accident! Maybe I'll get my 84th hospital bill from a private company saying I owe $300 for pain medication administered to me after Louie's birth! Just kidding on the car accident...that's not very funny.

It's a good thing I have zen-master friends I can talk to when shit like this happens. After I kicked the car tire as hard as I could (not smart), I called a woman who very calmly talked me away from the edge of a cliff. I now have a homework assignment: find a baby-sitter to give Zach and I a break every so often, and call two friends. I think I can handle that. Breathe in, breathe out. Moving on with my day.

I hope no more traffic violations (of both the car/parent variety) are involved.

on the ragged edge

Right before she plunged in

I’m sitting in the guest room of my Granny’s house in Cheney, Washington. This is the house I’ve visited every year since I was two years old—where I built my first snowman, where I learned to play racquetball, where I fished for rainbow trout and bass at Chapman Lake, where I first went to college and first dropped out of college. Where I ate Granny’s goulash and gingerbread and pecan pie. It’s basically like my little comfort womb. Which is a good thing considering how I feel right now (see post title).

First, let’s focus on the positive:

-The three and a half hour drive from Portland to Seattle was uneventful; the kids slept and kept quiet the entire time.

Addie, Pep, and Zoe

-We got to see new and old family in Seattle who helped us celebrate Louie’s birth, our recent nuptials (“nuptials”…hehehe), and Zach’s birthday.

Goofing around with Aunt L

-Zach’s mom and boyfriend baby-sat Addie while we stayed at a hotel in the U-district to get a little break. Delicious sushi was had. Life was easy again for 3.7 seconds.

Seattle foliage

-Once again, the kids were great on the five-hour drive from Seattle to Spokane. The Road-Trip Gods must have taken pity on us after the first leg up to Portland. However, they saw it fit to punish us a different way…

The negative:

-I, the California driver who forgot she was in Washington, land of slow and excessively polite drivers, was issued a FIVE HUNDRED FIFTY DOLLAR ticket. (*head slam to steering wheel. repeat ad infinitum.) It wasn’t even for speeding. I was cited for “aggressive driving in the second degree”. That sh*t sounds mean! I mean, I wasn’t driving like I was in Grand Theft Auto or anything. The state trooper said that I drove up behind a car too quickly before he switched to the slower lane, and then I “sped past him”. WHAT?! That’s just standard driving in Silicon Valley, buddy! (I know…we’re not in California anymore, Toto) Apparently, there's a new focus in this area we were driving to give out more of these “aggressive driving” tickets. I still have a feeling that I was doubly screwed because the officer noted that I was from California and knew that I wouldn’t contest the ticket since I would have to show up to the Ritzville County Court (aka: Bumblef*ck County Court). Either way, I know I was speeding and, ok, maaaaaaybe I was a little aggressive. So I fully accept my consequences, but not without a little WAAAAAH, THIS SUCKS. Ok, I’m done now.

-I feel like I’m turning into that mom who is constantly making excuses for her toddler’s recent maniacal behavior, like, “oh, she’s tired…she must be hungry…she had a bad nap…she…she…she…I swear my child isn’t Satan’s spawn!” I don’t know. I guess I feel self-conscious and put pressure on myself for our family to behave perfectly in front of everyone. Family will love you unconditionally, but they can also judge unconditionally (as my mother jokes, “Who else will tell you when you’re overweight/slow/have big ears/etc… if not your family?”). My fretting over whether Addie is a persnickety child is probably compounded by the fact that my parents insist I was the most angelic child to ever grace the Earth. Comments like, “you were never this loud”, “you were potty-trained by Addie’s age”, and “you always did as you were told”, make me feel I’m doing something wrong. I guess all I’m meaning to say with this ramble is, parenting: it’s hard.

don't do this, don't do that.

That’s really it for the negative.** Louie has been a piece of cake (he’s asleep sprawled out on the bed next to me as I write this). I’m very tired all the time, but that’s to be expected. At least we’re on the last stop of our trip which means we’ll be back to our old routine very soon. We just have one last hurdle: in two days we’ll be making the seventeen-hour drive (not counting any stops) back home.

I’m not even going to think about that right now though. I’m just going to snuggle in bed with mah bebeh and wait for the rest of my family to wake up so we can have a fun today.

**Edited to add: How could I forget this one? When we were in Seattle, Zach looks at the car’s gas meter and realizes it’s below Empty. We check the “Remaining Gas” digital reader and it says “0 miles left”…basically, “you guys are screeeeeeeeewed.” We take the next exit and just as we’re ONE block away from the gas station, our car dies in the middle of a busy street. Awesome.

Portland: Land of food-pods and folks with SADD

Well, we've concluded our first stop on our epic Pereyo Road Trip of what the hell were we thinking!? Family Reunions.

I love Portland. I really do. The city is filled with charming neighborhoods. Streets lined with old houses, smoke floating out the chimneys, yellow leaves blanketing wet lawns. There are so many businesses housed in unconventional places--everything from gourmet restaurants serving pho and burgers out of huts and school buses, to this dress shop operating from a double-decker bus.

The food? Incredible. And cheap! Portlanders are Pod-People. Everywhere you go you run into herds of independent food-carts, or entire blocks of huts smashed side-by-side. We ate Vietnamese, Chinese, Southern, Thai, and Italian. Deep-fried okra. Authentic muffaletta sandwiches. Tender bulgogi with homemade kimchi and Miso beef-heart hash. Uuuuuhhhhhhhhhmmmmmm. Mouth drooling...

If you are ever in the area, I highly recommend visiting Tasty N Sons for breakfast--their home-made biscuits with honey-butter, Moroccan chicken hash, chocolate potato donuts, and roasted fall-vegetable frittata were all a-mazing. Their menu is like a tapas-bar where you can pick small plates or slightly larger dishes (like the frittata and hash). Mother's Bistro in the downtown area was also very good (and very accommodating for families), but super crowded on the weekends.

I'm pretty sure I would move here in a heartbeat if it weren't for one thing: the weather. I'm forever ruined by the good weather in California and I'm not sure I could handle living in a city where it's overcast and rainy at least sixty percent of the year. Even if it's not raining, it just feels DAMP all the time. I guess that's why everyone has beards and dresses like homeless people. Sometimes it felt like I stepped into a parallel universe where I was the only person not dressed like a hipster/crunchy granola/tree-logger person. And so serious! It was hard to coax a smile out of anyone on the street, but maybe I'm expecting too much (after all, I used to live in the "Last Hometown of America", where everyone smiles). Considering the weather, I can't really blame them for their grim expressions.

The downtown hotel we stayed at, The Nines, was waaaay too nice for us, yet the people working there were so gracious and never sneered at us, even as Addie ran barefoot through the lobby cackling like a little heathen. I'll post pics of our room soon.

We visited Zach's brother and his girlfriend the first night (they, who introduced us to the food-pod religion), and then we reunited with one of my favorite people in the world. We finally got to meet her beautiful daughter (six months younger than Addie) and the girls played together at the hotel and by the riverfront. Little girls running through the rain toward flocks of geese...

Bye, Portland. Thank you for your hospitality and giving me the opportunity to wear my new rain boots!

Next stop: Seattle!

FIRST RULE OF ROAD TRIPS WITH KIDS: DON'T GO ON ROAD TRIPS WITH KIDS

Second rule of road trips with kids: There are no rules on road trips with kids.*

That means access to all forms of junk food, fast food included, unlimited hours of watching Dora and Olivia in the car, and random nap/bedtimes.

Cue "Where is My Mind" by Pixies....

Less than 48 hours later and we are miraculously alive.

Let's just give a breakdown of what's happened so far.

November 10-11:

1:00pm: We are supposed to be leaving the house to avoid Bay Area traffic.

3:15pm: We leave the house.

4:30pm: We hit Bay Area traffic. A round of meltdowns for everyone, please! First stop of the trip.

7:30pm: Addie throws up the entire contents of her stomach all over herself. We stop at a Denny's to get cleaned up and eat the most mediocre iceberg salad ever to exist on this planet. We begin the doubt the value of this trip.

8:30pm-1am: Children blissfully sleep. Too tired to continue driving, we stop at a Motel 6 three hours south of Portland. Zoe somehow slips past Zach and escapes the hotel room, prompting Zach to sprint down the hallways in his boxer shorts until he finds her on the clerk's lap in the hotel lobby.

1am-7am: With the pent-up energy of a 10-hour drive and 4-hour nap, Addie cries, kicks, and screams to go the park for six straight hours in the hotel room. The adults do not get a single minute of sleep. Louie, because he has magical powers, sleeps through the entire demonic episode. We begin to doubt the value of having children.

8am: We embark for Portland. Children thankfully sleep most of the drive, but not without a couple stops for poop-up-the-back situations. My eye starts to twitch.

Noon: We arrive in Portland. I feel like the Pilgrims did upon seeing Plymouth Rock.

Life resumes.

To be continued!

*Of course, that's only if you ignore the first rule.

over the mountains and into the woods...

Do doo do doooooo!

Behold, our son! Three months old today!

King Louie

Ok, now that that's out of the the way (kidding! I have a Louie-post on the back burner, including his birth story, but hello, I'm kinda exhausted from writing Addie's epic tale last week so we'll wait a bit), I can talk about what's going on with our family. This may all come out as stream of consciousness verbal diarrhea but I don't have it in me to sound eloquent and I'm riding a cupcake high...

We leave for our road trip tomorrow. All of us. That's: one over-worked husband, one sleep-deprived mother, one hyperactive toddler, and one very chill newborn. Oh, and a stinky dog in a peartree. Who I'm sure will vomit everywhere as soon as we back out of the driveway.

doling out books for the trip

I couldn't sleep last night because I was so anxious about what could go wrong during the drive. I don't know why but I keep envisioning that we will get into a car accident and now I almost don't even want to go...which...CRAZY LADY... everything will be fine. I just need to take a Valium and shut up. Or eat a mondo-cupcake, six inches high and filled with chocolate mousse and whipped cream from Whole Foods.

my version of Valium

thank you, Louie

I'm usually an OCD-level vacation planner, with Microsoft Word packing lists that include items for every possible contingency, but I've lost my steam for this one. Maybe because it already feels futile going into it--I mean, sixteen hours in the car with a tiny, drunk sociopath and a creature that needs to feed every three hours (but remember, never after midnight!)? I think all we can do at this point is have a good sense of humor and pray that we make it Portland alive.

We're planning on leaving the house in the afternoon so the kids nap for a couple hours, then stop for dinner and run-around time, bedtime routine, then finish the rest of the trip through the night. I'm curious how long Zach will last before he's so tired he has to relinquish the driver's seat to me...something he HATES to do. He insists that he won't be able to sleep if I'm driving so it's pointless to let me, but I doubt he's going to make it the whole way to Portland.

We will be visiting Zach's brother and girlfriend in Portland, as well as a dear friend who's daughter is close in age to Addie. I think we're going to try hitting up the Portland Zoo while we're there, and since it's Zach's birthday, he will most likely go out with his brother, the Beer Czar of Portland, to various pubs/gardens/whatever they're called. I also booked a hotel on Friday night through Hotwire, which ended up being THIS PLACE...which I'm a little worried about because it basically looks like the hotel equivalent of Tiffany's, and what will the Portland hipster-ati think of our rag-tag family as we drag ourselves into the lobby? But that's Hotwire's fault since they refuse to tell you what hotel you're actually booking until they have your money. The kids are going to have very high standards after this place which is too bad because it's probably going to be Motel 6's from here on out.

Then our journey continues on to Seattle for a few nights where we will be staying with Zach's mother and boyfriend. Zach's family from the Wenatchee area will also be driving over to meet the blessed children. The most exciting part of this stop for me is that Zach and I will get to ditch everyone and see HARRY POTTER ZOMG I"M SO EXCITED. (sidenote: I just heard on NPR that Middlebury College in Vermont developed real-life Quidditch, where people wear capes, run around with brooms in their crotches, and hurl balls threw hula hoops taped on garbage cans while shouting at each other in British accents. I know what we'll be doing this year for Thanksgiving, kids!) Oh yes, and my mother-in-law will be teaching me how to use a sewing machine she bought me for Christmas! I wish her the best of luck and a boat-load of patience because I've already taken a sewing-machine class here in Santa Clara, and I screwed up a PILLOWCASE. That's two sheets of equal-size fabric that I had to sew on three sides. And it did not resemble a pillowcase. Sigh.

Our trip culminates in Spokane, my childhood stompin' grounds, where we'll be visiting my father's side of the family, as well as Zach's dad. I can't wait to take Addie to the classic carousel in Riverfront Park and Manito Park. It will also be the first meeting between Sir Louie and his great-GREAT grandmother, Doris, AKA Granny. She turned one hundred in September. That feels weird to write, let alone say. a HUNDRED YEARS OLD. She's so funny--the last time we were there, we were watching Ellen, and Beyonce was performing when she said, "Who's making that TERRIBLE RACKET?" I love her.

The more I'm writing about this trip now, the more excited I'm getting about seeing my family. They are the whole reason we are going, and while it was tempting to put the time and money into a trip to Hawaii by ourselves, I think this is more important right now. I really want Granny to see the kids, and I know it's hard for the other grandparents as well who only get to see us once or twice a year.

I will attempt to write during the whole trip and use the blog as a journal, so when it's all done and over with, I can look back and laugh. Hopefully there will be laughter during the trip as well. I'm sure there will be.

Wish us luck!

xo Ariel