Monday, September 04, 2006

...and we're back

I've decided that vacations with young children are both hard and fun all at the same time. Especially when you are in a very small space with them and especially with my children who picked this weekend to test their authority to the limits, constantly. We only left on Friday afternoon and by Saturday morning we were ready to pack up and leave. We were all sharing a bedroom and you can only confine 5 people in there for so long before someone's going to lose it (mostly me, I admit). Luckily, after telling them that they had the option to behave or leave immediately (and no we were not bluffing, we were ready to go) they chose to stay and things were mostly better after that.

We went to the lake with all three kids and for the first time ever I heard dh say that the water was cold. He normally dives right in but he was having a tough time and the kids and I thought it was funny. My dh is pretty goofy sometimes. #1 child had a lot of fun on his whale, #2 child decided that she didn't really like being wet and I was trying to figure out how to get #3 child into his inflatable turtle which is still a bit too big for him and then he decided the water was too cold too so that was the end of that. After a nutritional lunch of hot dogs dh took the older two to the park so that I could relax on the deck in the sun since the baby was sleeping. That lasted 5 minutes and #3 was awake again so we did a little deck dance and back to sleep he went. After awhile I couldn't take the sweatiness of the baby and I together (I had him covered to protect him from the sun and he loves the heat so he was a happy camper) so I managed to get him in his swing in the shade and he stayed asleep. I got to sit in the sun and read a whole magazine, it was wonderful. We all went back to the lake again and I managed to go in up to my waist (what?! it was freakin' cold I tell ya!). When #1 child started getting goosebumps and he was shivering we decided we'd call it a day (no point in making the child sick just because the water kept him happy and out of our hair for awhile!). Honestly he and dh were the only ones of us who could take the water for any length of time, although #2 child was happily creating rock castles (not the sandiest of beaches at Cultus).

We then had a fabulous dinner and a rousing game of Junior Monopoly (you get to buy amusement park rides instead of real estate) where #1 child beat everyone, although dh says it was beginner's luck. Yeah, I don't think so, there was nowhere in the rules that said you could borrow from the bank to pay your admittance for these amusement park rides when you were out of money yet dh kept borrowing and paying back and borrowing and paying back. There's your problem right there buddy! LOL I couldn't confirm that when you had no money you were bankrupt and therefore out of the game since the only instructions we had for Junior Monopoly were in French and dh didn't believe me when I said I could read them. Ha - shows what he knows. I read that he had to go directly to Lunch and when he passed Go he could not collect $2.
I also read that when he landed on #1 child's amusement park ride and said child owned all of that particular coloured rides that he had to pay double the ticket price!

On Sunday afternoon our friends arrived to join us for our last night at the lake and they looked more tired than we were. They had already crammed a lot of activity and driving in to a very short time period and they needed to decompress (I originally wrote decompose and then realized why that didn't look right!). We cooked a lovely dinner, which seemed to take forever to make, mostly because I had never grilled corn on the cob in its husks before but wanted to try it because one of those cooking shows made it look easy. When I had asked the corn boy I bought the corn from about how long you would cook them like this he informed me that most people don't eat the husks - huh, you don't say! Therefore I had to ask the ever intrepid, adventure girl to help me in assessing corn doneness. She can also fearlessly brand steak so stay out of her way when she has hot tongs!

Today we replenished our weary selves with a hearty breakfast of bacon and eggs, cleaned the cabin and then set off for Giggle Ridge mini-golf. This is the coolest mini-golf place I have ever seen. I'd like to share photos but as we forgot our camera we will have to wait for the cupcake man to send me some or to post his own. I didn't play but the baby and I watched everyone else aget a really nice, high count for strokes. Wait, in golf that's a bad thing! LOL No matter a good time was had by all, except #2 child did not understand where her pretty purple ball went on the last hole and she was a bit concerned about this. After that we tackled the bumper boats with #2 child and me in one boat and #1 child in his own. Everyone else decided to sit it out. May I say that they were oh so wise as to this very minute I am still not feeling all that great. Of course the object of this was not to spin the bumper boat, over and over, in circles so fast that you wanted to be sick so I have no one to blame but myself. It's just that spinning made my daughter laugh so hard and her laughter makes me laugh and there you go. I understand the object is to just bash (er, bump) in to other people's boats and get them wet so in between spins we went after #1 child and anyone else in our way. When emerging, ever so elegently, from the boat I just about pulled the attendant in to the water with me so it really topped the ride. Good thing that the cupcake man was distracted at that point because, honestly, I did not need that moment captured on film.

Feeling very dizzy and decidedly nauseaus (and after my pregnancy I definitely never need to feel that again) I thought it best to call it a day. My children thought otherwise as the wanted to go on the go-karts and dh had to give them a lecture about appreciate the things that they were given and adventure girl said something about children in Africa not getting to ride on go-carts or bumper boats or something to that effect. Then there was something about wildebeasts and gnu but it all went over my head as I tried to concentrate on getting back to the cabin and not be ill in the dead grass. My appropriately contrite children apologised and thanked us for the golf and the bumper boats and then promptly got in to some kind of something with the toys back at the cabin and I pretty much lost it and told everyone we were leaving. I actually only meant my family but adventure girl and cupcake man left in a blink so I think I may have been a bit overzealous. Sorry about that.

See...fun and hard all at the same time. We really did have a good weekend. Now we need a vacation - oh look school starts tomorrow.