Chocolate World
Oct 20
Everyone,
Pictures from Chocolate world!
Enjoying our chocolate we bought there. Yum!
Safire
Pennsylvania Pennsylvania sites
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2010 PA Ren Faire
Oct 16
Everyone,
Back from the Ren Faire and completely bushed! Pictures included!
We decided to do a little road trip and went to Chocolate World. Yummy!
Safire
From Another State
Oct 15
Everyone,
We’re here in Pennsylvania for the 30th anniversary of the PA Renaissance Faire. Should be fun! Some highlights from today:
- We left about 3 hours later than we wanted to leave. The house desperately needed to be clean. The car too. And then we needed gas. And then I thought we should get the oil changed. And then we kept finding things to remember to bring. But what did we NOT remember to bring? Coats. And it’s about 60 degrees today. Yeah…
- It was only a 2 hour drive from our house. Seriously, we could have done this as a day trip. But then we wouldn’t have had the pleasure of getting all 3 kids to sleep in a hotel!
- Driving through PA, I asked Butterfly if it was different than MD. She said yes. Her reason? “There are less plants.” Okay then. I think she means less trees. There are a lot more fields here, and a lot less houses. Juice and I keep teasing each other than we could move to PA one day. That’s a whole state closer to Utah, right?
- The hotel suggested a restaurant for us “just down the road”. After about 20 minutes of driving aimlessly and finally getting the gps out, we found it. 5 miles away! Never trust directions that say, “go to the T intersection off of the square and turn right”. In our wanderings, we saw a cool street name: Kraken Alley!
- At dinner, the boys had maybe two bites and wanted to play the rest of the time. They ended up tipping over a chair with Pirate on it. They both screamed. We left a 10 dollar tip because we were in such a rush to get out of there. Not one of our most stellar restaurant eating stories.
- The hotel lost power FOREVER tonight. We were planning on watching a movie with the kids to keep them quiet and hopefully get them to go to sleep. Instead, we all laid in the dark trying to be quiet. The kids giggled and moved and popped their heads up, and we (as parents) kept saying “Lay down!” “Be quiet!” “Go to sleep!” They fell asleep, and the power came back on. At about 11pm. And now I’m going to bed to sleep like everyone else!
Safire
Road Trip!
Nov 04
Everyone,
Alternate title: I have enough Billy Joel on my ipod to last me from Ohio to the Maryland border.
A week ago yesterday I talked to my good friend and cousin in law who lives in Ohio. Her family came to see us in August and we had the best time! Her girls are 5 and 3 and got along smashingly with Butterfly.
Since then, life has changed drastically for them. No details here but my cousin and cousin in law are getting a divorce and she is moving to Colorado. I’m sad for them because it’s a rough time. I’m also sad that I will be loosing my closest family! Ohio is 6 hours away from here.
So, during my talk with L, my cousin in law, she mentioned that she was feeling overwhelmed and not prepared for her move, etc. She didn’t think she had enough time to get everything done before the truck came to pick up her stuff. I heard, “You need to go help her.” clear as a bell in my head. Once I was off the phone with her, I turned to Juice (who was still home from work) and talked it all over. The next afternoon I was headed to Ohio without the kids and Juice. Let me tell you, I was ecstatic about having 6 whole hours in the car by myself. Juice was awesome and stayed home with the kids.
So, off I go in the car through Maryland and into West Virginia. By now it is getting dark and raining. I started climbing the little hills that they call mountains here and it got foggy. And dark. Wow is West Virginia ever dark at night! Around 7pm I got hungry and decided I wanted a salad and a sit down restaurant. I haven’t been to one of those by myself in awhile! The signs on the side of the road lied though. I took the exit headed for some Cracker Barrel thinking of my last road trip to Utah. This exit was the University of West Virginia exit. I drove around for about 20 minutes looking for that stupid restaurant and couldn’t find it at all. I found a lot of pizza joints and the stadium but nothing else. I went back to the freeway and kept an eye out for something to eat.
West Virginia is a lot like Wyoming with nothing much going on in the state. Plus it was super dark and I didn’t feel like stopping in any old tiny town. I entered Pennsylvania. It got lighter for some reason and I kept going. By this time I was tired of the candy I had brought to munch on and I wanted actual food. Anything would do but there was nothing besides McD’s. Yuck.
Then it got darker and I was back in West Virginia. Wow. This time in West Virginia I found a Cracker Barrel and had my salad.
Straight on to Ohio and my cousin’s house from there. They did close the freeway right in front of me. Thank goodness for my GPS and it’s little “recalculating” voice. Otherwise I’d still be driving around Columbus trying to figure out where to go.
I got in around 11pm and went right to bed. Someone stole a car in the middle of the night (car alarm driving off in the distance) and I wondered if it was mine but not enough to get out of bed and check.
In the morning I was able to help get two cute girls ready for school and talk to L about what she wanted to do that day. She had to take her older girl to the dentist for a filling so I spent the morning sorting through her papers on her kitchen table and boxing up the rest of her china. Only a few minutes back from the dentist and the school called. Apparently the Novocain hadn’t worn off and she bit through her tongue big time. Off to the hospital for L and back to boxes for me. I moved furniture around, cleaned under and around things and kind of ran out of things to do.
No stitches needed for the little girl but she did stay home from school the rest of the day and we boxed up the toys and the craft stuff. I guess Columbus does trick or treating a few days before Halloween so we spent the evening doing that. It was so much fun to be with these girls and their mom! They all had a great time and I practiced my french braiding skills on their beautiful hair.
After a fun filled night of candy, we took the girls home and packed a few things up. We told ourselves we would go to be early but ended up talking until midnight or so. Good thing too because her youngest daughter threw up about that time. I helped get the dirty stuff off the bed while she washed her off. I know how stressful it can be to deal with this as the only parent and I wanted to be as helpful as I could.
We didn’t get up as early as we wanted to on Friday but up in time to get her youngest daughter off to preschool. Her oldest one was staying home because of her tongue and she watched tv while we packed up everything else and moved some furniture down from upstairs. I had to leave by 11am that day to make it home for our trunk or treat but I think what L had left to do was manageable.
I’m excited for if and when we end up in Colorado to be close to this family again. I’m sad that they are having such a hard time and I wish only the best for them.
On the way home, I put on my road trip music of Billy Joel and listened to it from Columbus to the Maryland border. Who knew I had so much?! Also, I had fun taking some random pictures in the car while driving (bad driver, I know, but I just turned the camera on and pointed it in the general direction of what I wanted to see) and enjoyed being by myself for another 6 hours.
I missed my family but it was such a great break from them for me. I’m not sure who was happier to see me, the kids or Juice when I walked in. They survived with a lot of screaming and crying and mac and cheese to eat. But they did it!
I hope the move goes well L and love you guys!
Safire
ipod music, Ohio, Pennsylvania, road trips, service, West Virginia
Pictures….arg!
Oct 14
Everyone,
I think something is wrong with blogger because it will not let me load any pictures up. So I thought, hey, I’ll just make myself a little slide show of my pictures! It’ll be cute!
So I did. Most of the afternoon was dedicated to making this slide show in between feeding, changing, burping, dodging spit up, playing farm, cutting apples, making dinner, throwing a ball, answering the phone, trying to look at Juice’s benefits for next year, dancing with babies, feeding, napping the children, and joining facebook. (Where my slide show came to a screeching halt because facebook is too addicting already. Look me up if you want to be friends.)
Anyway, I finally got the boys down for bed and dinner eaten and cleaned up so I sat down to do the slide show. I finished it, and discovered if I wanted to publish it it would cost me over 50 dollars! Sheesh…these slide show things suck you in with a free account and then don’t let you do anything with it. So now instead of 12 of my most favorite photos from this past week in PA, you get 3.
Hey, be happy with 3!
Safire
PS- Professor has a tooth! No wonder he refuses to sleep on his own, hates to be put down, and has a toned down sunny disposition.
Drive Home
Oct 13
Everyone,
The drive home was somewhat eventful. We didn’t leave until around 12:30…maybe 1pm. We enjoyed the swimming pool for a good 45 minutes and ran around the hotel room shoving things into every nook and cranny. How is it that I got all of my stuff there in 4 bags, and had to come home with 6? Stuff explodes with kids. It’s weird.
Juice took my parents to the airport and drove around through Delaware (small wonder!) and I took the short way home with all of the kids. We talked about maybe switching rolls, and I would drive my parents back to the airport but then what would he do with the kids for hours at home by himself? Especially since 2 of the kids kind of need me every few hours. And I kind of need them too. Anyway, it worked out the best and Juice came home cross and tired.
I came home by way of Gettysburg. It was a beautiful fall day. Both the boys are screaming in the back and Butterfly is complaining that she can’t hear her movie. (“They too loud! Make the movie louder!”) I saw the sign for Gettysburg: 6 miles and figured I could make it there and find a nice monument to park next to and feed these boys. One mile away, Butterfly starts yelling, “I need to go potty!” Perfect. We were stopping anyway, right?
I am amazed at how long she can hold it because it took me probably half an hour to find parking. Parking that was not 6 lots out in the boonies. It was far enough away from the new visitor’s center that I had to pull out my stroller and strap everyone into it and walk about 7 rows of cars up. Everyone is so excited to see the twins and frankly, I’ve had enough of being the show. It was fun for awhile. Now stop your “aww…twins!” and just move on.
Wow, that came out harsher than I wanted. Apparently it has been bugging me. Will rant later.
As I was waiting in the ladies room for the big stall, several people came up to me and told me they would watch my kids if I had to go. No no no. I will not let strangers watch my children!! I know they were being nice but seriously, do you think anyone would take you up on your offer? In the end, an attendant showed me where the family room is. Whoever invented this with it’s baby changer, potty, chair, sink, kid friendly seats is a genius. I changed both boys (both poopy), had Butterfly potty, fed the boys and never even had to leave the room. It was awesome!
I figured since I had gone to all that trouble to get everyone out of the car, I may as well walk around some. The only path I could find was leading to the bus parking lot so we toured that and got back into the car. We then drove around Gettysburg looking for “statues” as Butterfly called them. They aren’t hard to find. I took a few pictures, enjoyed the fields of black eyed susans they have there and headed home.
We got here in one piece, although Fern is a little more worse for the wear. Never give your 3 year old a can of chips and expect the back seat to resemble anything like a back seat for awhile. Thankfully, FHE tonight was clean the car so she’s back to being her crumb free self. Until we ride in her again.
It took me all day to go grocery shopping and plan my week out. Looks like I’ve got a lot going on!
Safire
PS- Tried to upload pictures…stupid internet is too slow. Will try again tomorrow.
Gettysburg, national parks passport, Pennsylvania, road trips
Oh the Chocolate!
Oct 10
Everyone,
Guess where we went today? HERSHEY!! Yum yum. I bought a case of 1 lb chocolate bars. Normally I’m not a huge chocolate fan but lately (okay, ever since I couldn’t have it!) I’ve been interested in it. Chocolate world was cool. This was my second time here but Butterfly’s first. She was entranced by the little ride with the singing cows. My dad was trying hard not to puke out the side for the corniness of it. She had a great time and now our little fridge is packed with chocolate. Yum!
Butterfly also “made” a little box of kisses which she loved doing. I have pictures, but they are on my camera still.
We also stopped by my mom’s old house that she lived in when she was a few months old till she was about 2. We’ve been here before (last year actually) and so I just sat in the car and fed boys. Mom remembers nothing of the house, except maybe a vague impression of the little alley way next to the house.
We then went back to the hotel to say hello to Juice. Welcome to PA Juice! Butterfly was so excited to see her daddy that she just wanted to stay with him. Since he was not interested in our next outing, she stayed at the hotel with him. And since she was staying, I fed the boys and left them with him too. My dad decided to take a little break too so they all stayed home and my Mom and I drove to Bird-in-Hand, PA.
This is kind of a big Amish community. It was very cool! We didn’t have enough time here (a phone call about 10 minutes into the town with a screaming boy in the back ground) but we did stop at a farm and bought home made root beer and saw them driving buggies up and down the main street. That part was cool because the side of the road was rutted from all of the buggies up and down the street. I want to go back and stay in the little inn that was on the main street with chairs in the front lawn so I can sit and watch them go back and forth all day. I’m not all that interested in the Amish, but their HORSES! 
Safire