Spanish time

This is day five of our Spanish odyssey (though day 1 didn't really count because it was mostly travel). So far Tucker has been a champ. We took a redeye over and Tucker slept almost the entire flight over. It was pretty funny because he assumed the craziest sleeping positions on the airplane--he would flop himself off the seat and then climb right back up (still sleeping), or he would sleep hinged at the midle with his feet on the floor and his torso on the seat.

The only part of the trip that was stressful, and this was not in any way associated with Tucker, was navigating the Madrid airport. We only had one boarding pass for both of our flights which had the same flight number (but on which we had different seats). The pass didn't tell us what gate or what time the second flight (to Barcelona) left. I thought maybe we were just supposed to stay on our plane at Madrid and that plane would just go to Barcelona. No. Iberia airlines just has some crazy system of ticketing so we deplaned (only with our boarding pass stubs) and got kicked all around the airport, through customs and everything. Only after 45 minutes of this were we able to figure out that our stubs would be enough to get us on our next flight, which had about 15 different flight numbers (and whose gate was posted only about 10 minutes before it boarded). Weird.

Aside from traveling, we envisioned a vacation where Tucker would more or less keep the same hours he does at home (awake before 7 am, asleep before 7 pm) and thus basically be on our own for long parts of the day because the rest of our group would get up late and go to bed late. Instead, Tucker seems to have embraced his Spanish roots and is staying up to 11 pm and waking up at 11 am (the LAST of everyone to wake up). Austin and I have even been sleeping until 10 am--I think the last time either of us has woken up at 10 am was college. It feels very luxurious.

The villas where we're staying are right on the beach, but we were surprised to find that the beach is definitely a clothing optional beach. It is a bit shocking to our American sensibilities. We are definitely the most clothed family on the whole beach with Tucker's swim shirt, and my swim shorts, not to mention just suits in general. Thankfully, Tucker remains oblivious to this fact (which is very important because has absolutely no filter and the naked beach could become a favorite topic of conversation for him for months).

We're staying in Sitges (see-juhz) which is a little seaside town outside Barcelona. The downtown is a 15 minute walk from our villa. One of the highlights of our trip so far was the paella we had at a oceanside cafe on Sunday. It was amazing. (Incidentally, we learned that marinara paella is seafood paella NOT tomato-sauce paella). The streets in Sitges are cobble stoned and lined with little shops in old stone buildings. There is a prominient old cathedral along the rocky coast (the beach is below the rocks). It is just beautiful. Another highlight was timing our trip for the night Spain won its first world cup. Sitges is really a tourist town so I'm not sure we got a sense for the true nationalist soccer fervor, but it was still pretty exciting.

We ventured into Barcelona yesterday to see some of the big city sights. We didn't bring a stroller because Tucker is not good at sitting in one anymore (he likes to push them and "fix" their wheels). But that makes walking around in hot weather pretty tough. We ended up seeing the outside of Gaudi's La Sagrada Familia, an amazing cathedral still being built (only 130 years in the works). The line to get in was two blocks long and according to my aunts and uncles that had visited the day before, there was a lot of jackhammering going on inside (Tucker hates loud noises), so we skipped the inside. After that we saw La Ramblas and La Placa Catalunya then took the Tourist Bus around the old town. Tucker liked the double decker bus and the water fountains around town the best. The bus ride was a little too long and not very well narrated, but we got a little bit of a sense of the city. Tucker ended up conking out in my lap for 45 minutes... when it was our time to get off, Austin slung him over his shoulder, and Tucker slept another 10 minutes on Austin's shoulder. It has been more than a year since he's slept like that on us.

Recent Pics

We're getting ready to go on our big family trip to Spain in a couple days and are tying up lose ends here. I'm charging my camera and making room for vacation pics, so here's the latest of the pics that were on there: our trip to the mountains including some shots of the hotel Tucker loved and the gorge we went to (notice the swinging bridge and my son's utter lack of fear--even though the bridge had a 4" gap on either side of the planks), hanging out by the river on our property (thankfully the pics don't show the 45 minute tantrum that followed when we told Tucker it was time to leave the river...), and a fourth of July concert that involved a lot of wearing of other people's hats.

Trip to the Mountains

This week Austin was doing work in a mountain county a couple hours away this week, and stayed out there so that he wouldn't waste half a day just driving to get to the site. Tucker and I decided to join him for a night to get a break from the heat, get to play in the mountains, and so that we could get some spray foam sprayed in our basement (necessitating an empty house for 24 hours).

Anyway, I learned some things on this trip:

1) I am a hotel snob. I haven't stayed in a run-down motel ("vintage" is how the motel guide described itself) in a long, long time. It was worse than I thought it could be. No bedskirts, stained rugs, cigarette holes in the bedspread, mold on the wallpaper in the bathroom, a broken bedframe, flat pillows that hadn't been replaced in years (and that gave A. and I both allergy attacks), and more.

2) Tucker is not a hotel snob. He thought the room was fabulous and the hotel really nice. He thought we should stay in the room all day, waiting for "Bob" to come on TV (Sponge Bob Square Pants).

3) Tucker thought it was really fun to be in the same room as his parents. Austin and I did not share his opinion. We did our best to construct a visual barrier so he would go to sleep, but it was just too exciting. Instead, Tucker spent most of the night chucking Ducky off the bed and going to retrieve him. We spent most of the night having allergy attacks and trying to ignore Tucker.

4) White noise machines are helpful, but they're no match for a rowdy toddler. Key piece of packing advice for our next vacation: ear plugs!

5) The most exciting part of our trip for Tucker was the water fountain at the playground. Apparently he hasn't drunk from one before, and it was an unmatched experience. Will he think the airport fountains are equally exciting next week?

Incidentally, I should mention that I'm writing this entry with Ducky on my head. Apparently, Ducky is my hat and I am supposed to wear him all the time. Tucker sometimes wears Ducky's brother on his head so we can match, but mostly it is just ME that is supposed to sport a Duck headdress.

"My kisses and hugs flew away!"

-Tucker, at bedtime

A few months ago Tucker's hugs and kisses kept getting lost, necessitating more kisses and hugs being administered. We no longer have that problem, but despite my best efforts, Tucker's kisses and hugs keep flying away at bedtime. I painstakingly apply our best imaginary tape and glue all over Tucker and give him his hugs and kisses, but somehow when I leave the room, they tend to fly away (and he tends to scream about it).

Incidentally, Tucker seems to be in a tantrum phase these days and has a tendency to throw a fit over some pretty silly things (like kisses and hugs that fly away). On Sunday as we got ready for church, he had a tantrum over letting Austin brush his teeth. At the pool last week he had a tantrum because he wanted to snuggle with his towel rather than get dressed. The other night at 4:30 in the morning he had a screaming fit because he couldn't find the cars he wanted in bed (Austin had apparently moved them so that he would have room to read Tucker a bedtime story). The list could go on from there. I'm not sure I like this phase.

Quote of the weekend

"Daddy, can I kiss your toes?"
-Tucker

This weekend Tucker was suffering from a severe case of I-love-Daddy, needing to follow Austin everywhere and help him with everything he did. It culminated yesterday afternoon with Austin reading the paper in the recliner and Tucker playing by his feet, offering to help him rock in the recliner, and yes, to kiss Austin's toes (did he get this idea because they were up in the air on the recliner???)

Recent pics

This is at our first McDonald's playland on our trip back from Annapolis with the trailer of bricks. Tucker enjoyed it, except for the other two year-old that came over and just started hitting him when he was playing inside the tunnel system (in a place where I could see). Sad.

Our native grass meadow after one year

We planted native grasses in the floodplain below our house last year, and here are some pics of how it looks now. I have to admit that I'm a bit fuzzy as to what are actually native grasses and what are annual weeds that have come up and are sheltering the grasses as they grow (Austin shows me, but I promptly forget). The grasses have such deep root systems that they spend most of their energy in the first couple years sending down their roots before they really get big and bushy. Austin mixed in some native wildflowers so we have some coreopsis, blanket flower and others down there now, too!

Crime of Passion

I paid for my first ever library book today, Axle Annie by Robin Pulver. Really, of course, I paid for Tucker's first destroyed book. Its destruction was a crime of passion during naptime last week, because Tucker adored that book. It's the story of an intrepid bus driver who makes it up the steepest hill in town through the worst winter can throw at her so that schools are never canceled. Two members of the local Grouch and Grump Club want schools to be canceled and set out to get Axle Annie's bus stuck on the hill.

Apparently, Tucker was looking at the book during his naptime, and he got so worked up over the two mean men that he just started ripping them up. When I went into his room after naptime, I find him still prone on a sea of ripped up pages. I asked what happened and he began sobbing uncontrollably, he was so sad about the state of his beloved Axle Annie.

Bricks are heavy

Helen and David ripped up the bricks in their driveway and put in a nice new concrete one, freeing up more than 300 square feet of bricks. We've been thinking of making a patio, and decided the trip to Annapolis was worth the offer of free bricks.

So to celebrate Father's Day we rented a trailer and loaded it with 5000 lbs of bricks to take home. Austin and David managed to encase the bricks on the flatbed trailer with an impressive wooden box of sorts. Besides having to load 1000 bricks in the 95 degree heat on Saturday, the job wasn't too bad... until we hit the road on Father's day.

Thankfully we got an early start so there weren't a ton of cars on the highway when the trailer started violently swaying, shaking the truck. Thankfully Austin was able to remain in control of the truck and maneuver it gingerly over to the side of the road without any damage to any of us or the equipment. We were only about half an hour outside of Annapolis so we turned around and limped back to town on back roads, sick to our stomachs, hoping the trailer wouldn't try to turn us all over again. (It didn't.)

We weren't sure whether we would have to unload all the bricks back into the garage and leave for home with the trailer unloaded, or if we had other options. Thankfully, Austin was able to reach his boss and an excavator they work with who both routinely pull and load heavy trailers, who advised us to shift the weight on the trailer to get more tongue weight on the truck, and to shift some of the bricks to the back of the truck.

After two hours of agonizing in the 95 degree heat and the sun playing stack the bricks again, we hit the road again... this time, the back road back to our house so we wouldn't need to drive at highway speeds and could make a quick pull-off if necessary. It turned out not to be necessary, thankfully. It was a long, slow trip home (Austin is proud to say we passed two vehicles that were going slower than us, the whole four and half hour trip!). And then when we got home we had 5000 lbs of bricks to unload (which takes a little more than an hour and a half in 90 degree heat with two people working).

In case you were wondering, I'm not sure this was Austin's idea of a relaxing Father's Day.

It's a girl!

Can't you tell from the pics?? :)

Bathroom Wall Art

This is my experiment with putting vinyl wall decals into the upstairs hall bathroom. That bathroom has some sort of solid, corian-type shower surround. I've never seen a shower surround like it, and am not sure what era it's from (was it put in when the addition went up in the 1930's? Is it from the 60s or 70s?). It's in good shape, but it just looks a bit dingy. I've toyed around with painting it, or at least painting a stripe to try to jazz it up, but the permanence of epoxy has dissuaded me.

Instead, I found some vinyl wall decals that are waterproof and removable and I made a little underwater scene with them. I'll be interested to see if they really last in such a wet location. I ordered the polka dots and the whales from two different sellers on Etsy.com and neither of the sellers' colors came as I thought they would. (The whale was supposed to be the same color as the dots, and there was a whole additional set of polka dots that were yellow that I had to ditch because they came in a really bad shade of yellowish orange.) After my initial disappointment with the colors, I decided that since I already had bought everything, I might as well see if the vinyl decals work... and be glad that I chose something that I can remove when I get tired of them!

Regardless, I think Tucker will like them.

Quote of the Day

"Daddy, don't be silly. This is not a game!" -Tucker to Austin at dinnertime. (Austin was fixing his own supper and not actually being silly at all, which made our two year-old's comment even funnier.)

Fruitivore

Tucker is a fruitivore. One of the most common things I hear in the kitchen now is, "Does Tucker want a mango?" (Tucker likes posing rhetorical questions.) One day last week I went to the store solo and bought some mangoes unbeknownst to Tucker. Tucker woke up from his rest time, came downstairs and he was like a bloodhound, he instantly knew there were mangoes in the house, even though they were completely out of sight (waiting to get ripe). We finally convinced him that they were not ripe and that we would have to wait for them to ripen... he ceased and desisted from his militant campaigning for one, but magically sensed the exact day (several days later) when they would be just barely soft enough to be able to convince us to give him one.

Recently Tucker went missing outside for a couple of minutes while Austin was working out. Austin found him behind the garden, picking raspberries on the outside of the garden fence. He has a knack for picking a berry and then holding it up to ask if it's ripe (by then, of course, the only answer we can give is "sure, why don't you eat it?"). Not that Tucker is super concerned with whether something is ripe or not. He definitely would eat all of the (still green) blueberries on the bushes in our garden if given the opportunity.

The lesson behind all this is that it's not possible to grow too much fruit, especially berries. The raspberries are on their way out, but the blackberries are about to start and it looks like it's a bumper crop. Unfortunately, Ben has learned that he has access to some of the berries if he peruses the garden fence near the berry patch... he may not be the smartest dog in the gene pool, but he is very committed to his causes.

Oil Slick in...

...Tucker's hair!

Tucker has been really commiserating with the situation in the Gulf recently. One night at bedtime I decided his eczema wasn't bad enough that night to need the hydrocortisone prescription ointment we have. But Tucker saw me with it and thought he needed it, so he popped up after I left the room and got the tube of ointment.

I'm not sure what prompted Austin to go into the room a few minutes later but Tucker was swimming in the ointment--on his hair, on the sheets, and on his feet which he had propped up on the wall thereby slathering the wall with it. Austin asked Tucker what he was doing and he said "putting lotion on Ducky."

This is Tucker the next morning (he chose the outfit himself). We now have oil stains on his sheets, a distinct sheen on the wall (even after washing it down)... and I am much better about putting all lotions out of reach.

Cousins