Did you really fall for that?

It's Friday afternoon and I'm getting ready to head home after a long week of work.  As I approach the elevator, a co-worker of mine is standing there waiting to leave as well.  We have little in common, so we engage in the typical small talk one normally finds in these instances as we get on the elevator.  He's red, I'm blue.

How are the kids?

Fine, yours?

Fine.  Got any plans for the weekend?

Not really, you?

Nothing major.  As he walks away he says enjoy your weekend.

The smart ass in me wakes up at this exact time and takes the conversation over.

You taking a long weekend?

No.  I'll be back Monday.

I'll probably see you tomorrow then, but still have a good weekend when it gets here.

He stops and turns slowly.  I can hear his mind working, but barely.

Where will I see you tomorrow?

If you're working too, I assume I'll see you here.

Tomorrow's Saturday, I'm not working.

I give him a puzzled look.  It has been a long week, but today is only Thursday.

Again, his mind starts working, but only a little.  All day I've been thinking today was Friday.  Are you serious?  What is wrong with me?

It happens.  I've been off a day this whole week too.  Must be the weather.

I guess.  Well, have a good night.  I'll see you tomorrow.

Okay, you too.

I let it go at that.  I'm not sure how long my trickery lasted, but as he was walking away I saw him pull out his phone.  I hope he checked the calendar and didn't come into work on Saturday. 

Vacation - Papa's point of view part 6

I was recently made aware of the fact that I failed to mention where we went on our vacation.  South Carolina is the answer. 

Since I don't really want to do a post with just two sentences, I thought I'd throw in three of my favorite pics from the trip.  All were taken by Melissa.



I know it's a cheap post, but since:

a - it's free for you and

2 - I didn't have much time to do anything this weekend it's all I got for ya.

Better stuff to follow this week.

Professor Papa - Part 3

This is another instance of taking a good thing, and using it in the wrong fashion.

On vacation we had a bit of extra time to kill between bath and bed time.  Mama was tending to Brynne, so Hadley and I were playing in their room.  We were on the bed reading one of their sign language books.  I turned the page to the next sign, which was jump.

She then jumped.  Okay, so she didn't jump like this, but she clearly made the attempt.  With the extra spring in her step provided by the bed she was able to put some air between her feet and the bed. 

It caught me off guard.  I know that she knows the signs for the words in the books, but I didn't realize she knew what the words meant.  Granted, I was helping show her how to jump (as best I could from a kneeling position), but she took right to it.

She was laughing and smiling - obviously as proud of herself as I was. 

Brynne came in (attracted by the squealing of Hadley), climbed on the bed, and proceeded to do exactly the same thing.

The next day we worked on jumping off the ground.  Without the bed springs to supply some much needed lift they were only able to "jump" to their tip toes.  Since then they have been able to get a little lift, so I'm calling that success. 

In my opinion, even if you can barely put a sheet of paper between their feet and the ground it is still a jump.   Once we get a little basketball hoop for them we'll work on layups and dunking, but for now we'll stick with increasing their vertical.

I guess I am partly (or fully) to blame for their jumping on the wrong things.  I am the one who introduced them to jumping on the bed.  They, however, did start jumping on couches, chairs, and in cribs.

It's gotten to the point where if they are on the couch (where they know they are not to stand up) they will stand, jump, and then land/fall on their butts - laughing madly the whole time.

My two concerns are: 

1 - jumping over the back of the couch or off the sides/front

2 - landing on their butts from a jump on a hard surface.

The first one is higher on the danger scale than the second as they don't have as far to go, but it is still a concern.



Obviously it will be a long time before they do something which puts them way up on the danger scale, but even these small falls can do damage.



I'll just have to deal with it, though. Can't keep my girls in a bubble.

Vacation - Papa's point of view part 5

This is the last time I’m going to say it; if you’re just joining me you should really go back and start at the beginning of this adventure. 

We left home and caught our flight.  From there we got our rental car and hit the road.  We pulled into the parking lot and there waiting was a stranger with a box fan that would never be ours. 

Jane was the box fan owner.  Jane is actually Melissa.  John is her husband Derek. 

Julia and Melissa co-write a blog about beauty.  They found each other through a twin web site and hit it off.  They became virtual friends.  Last fall, Julia made the statement about how she was so blessed to have stumbled into such a great friendship, but she felt sad as she didn’t know if she would ever meet her friend in person as she lived half way across the country.

I filed her statement away in the bowels of my crazy mind and decided right then and there they would have to meet.

Booking the actual trip took all of two hours, give or take. 

All of the deception and misdirection took ten times that amount of time.

The hardest part was trying to keep it all straight.  Lying is such tough work! 

We had a great week, despite some of the early troubles.  Julia and Melissa were able to do something neither of them had thought possible.  Our girls were able to play with new twin friends.  Derek and I were able to meet and strike up a friendship. 

What a great vacation!

Best of all, Julia was totally surprised.  She didn't know what we were doing, or that we were spending the week there, until Melissa told her in the parking lot where they met.

Vacation - Papa's point of view part 4

I’ll say this one more time; if you’re just joining me you should really go back and start at the beginning of this saga. 

Julia was starting to freak out a little bit. 

She had so many questions about what to pack – for herself and especially for the girls.  Would their nightly routine be too disturbed?  Would we be able to have white noise for them to sleep?  Would we take their high chairs?  What about the stroller?  What about toys and books to pack?  What would they be eating?  What was the weather like – at least the temperature range?

I assured her that I had already considered these issues and she should trust me to take care of everything.  John and Jane, having twin girls of their own who were slightly older than ours, were able to provide us with most of the larger necessities we couldn’t pack, but Julia had no way of knowing that. 

Then it happened – Julia made an off-hand comment about the trip and was too close in her statement to our actual location, so I had to throw another curveball.  I don’t throw a curveball, so I actually threw her a knuckleball – those are tougher to hit as nobody (not even the thrower) knows where it could end up. 

Monday – One week to departure.  I came home from work trying to appear very much stressed out.  I informed her that the airline sent me an email as they had cancelled our flight due to a lack of passengers.  I hadn’t had time to work through any alternative plans, but I assured her I would get on it tomorrow. 

Tuesday – Six days left.  I informed her I had been able to get flights in roughly the same time frames to an alternative airport.  It would require more driving time, but it was doable.  I was also able to change the car rental, but the hotels were proving to be more difficult.

Wednesday – Five days out.  Still showing her my frustration as I couldn’t find what I needed from the hotels in the area.  I recapped my struggles from early on, making sure to point out that now I was trying to find two more hotels to add to our itinerary.

Thursday – Four days to go time.  One more hotel down, leaving us one night unaccounted for.  I also let her know I had found a box fan on Craigslist so our need for white noise and to replicate the girls’ sleeping environment at home was solved.  We were to meet the seller on Monday in the parking lot of our first hotel. 

Friday – Three days until we leave.  I booked the last room and we were all set. 

In case you didn’t realize, the original plans were still our actual plans.  This was all for show.

Saturday and Sunday were days we spent creating lists of what to pack and then packing what we could in advance.

Monday we left.

One more post next Friday to finish this off, hope you tune in.

Vacation - Papa's point of view part 3

Again, if you’re just joining me you should really go back and start at the beginning of this saga. 

Everything is planned, so this is the point where the deception begins.

We are still in July – I asked six friends on Facebook to post a comment on my wall about things to do in their area of the US.  Each of them came through for me.  Each of them lives in a location which would require roughly the necessary amount of flight and drive time I had mentioned to Julia.  Pennsylvania, Kansas, Texas, Michigan, Florida, and Minnesota were now in play. 

I wasn’t getting any reaction from her, which was a little disappointing.  I know she had seen the first post as I saw her reading it, but she remained stoic.  A day later the second post hit. 

She then confirmed seeing the first one, but was trying to be nice and pretend she didn’t see it.  The fact that I hadn’t deleted the first post, coupled with the second post hitting, cleared things up for her.  At first she was a little upset since she thought she had figured it out so early.  When the second one hit she did figure it out – I was messing with her mind. 

I then told her one of the posts on my wall was the actual location, while the others were there for deception.  This was a half-truth.  Ultimately, our destination would be posted on my wall, but so far it had not been.  I didn’t clarify to Julia whether or not it had already been posted, so I wasn’t officially lying.  John was going to post it AFTER we were in the air, so my statement to her would become a true one by the time we arrived.

Sometime in July, John and I started emailing back and forth.  Jane gradually got cut out of the emails, but I’m still not quite sure how that happened.  Oh, wait, yes I do.  John was planning a little surprise of his own for her!

Having two allies at our destination was wonderful.  They each played a vital role.  Jane was spying on Julia to find out what about the trip was concerning her, and then reporting back to me so I could be sure to take care of those issues.  John was working on filling our days when we were there.  Both of them were a huge help in making sure I had planned for everything.  All of us, I think, were enjoying it a bit too much.

August – Julia spent some time with another friend of ours that “accidentally” made a statement about pushing the double stroller on the beach – this coincided with her husband’s wall post about going to the panhandle of Florida. 

A week later she sent her an email to ask if we might have some room in our luggage to bring something back from her mother, who just happened to live in the area we were travelling to.  Georgia and Alabama were now possibilities.

To further the deception, I had my brother-in-law (the husband of Julia’s sister) “accidentally” send her a Facebook inbox addressed to me asking for our flight number and arrival time.  She replied and accused him of being in on the plot to trip her up.  He confirmed he was, but cleverly asked her not to say anything about the incident to me as I had been working so hard to keep it a secret.  You see what he did?  By asking her not to mention it, even though he was claiming to be involved, he planted enough doubt in her mind to cause her NOT to mention this to me.  I assume she thought we were going to see them.

There was now another state in play – Wisconsin.

This puts the tally at nine states, but none of them were correct.  See you again soon for the next update!

The secret to dining out with little ones

During the first 18 months of our girls' lives we ate at a restaraunt a grand total of three times, I believe.  The girls did well each time, or at least well enough, but we were still afraid to make it a routine occurence until they were a little older.



Vacation caused us to press the issue. 

Over the course of five days we ate almost every single meal either at a restaraunt or in the hotel breakfast area.

We packed everything we needed such as forks, spoons, bibs, and wipes.  The one thing we didn't have were our high chairs.

Even when we eat out in town we take those travel high chairs as they are, in my opinion, the greatest chairs ever.



Since we were such a long way from home we didn't take them with us. 

Once again the girls adapted wonderfully to everything we threw at them.  Along the way we learned a few little tricks I thought I would share.  I might have mentioned how much I enjoy a good list, so here we go:

1 - When you order food, don't order anything for yourself unless you think know the children will eat it.  Order more of the smaller dishes off the children's menu and let them eat what they will.  You, then, get to be the parent that finishes everything they don't.  Obviously, you can tell them there are starving children in Africa that would gladly eat what they won't, but I don't think that line is as effective as it once may have been.

2 - Most every place will have some sort of children's size cup that comes with a lid and a straw.  As long as your kiddos know how to drink through a straw (very similar to a sippy cup, though a bit easier) you should be good.  BONUS - you now have more cups to drink from at home - cups they will most likely not be able to break.  And if they do?  So what - it was free.

3 - For us, fruit is a good "go-to" food as the girls will almost always dig right in.  It's also a lot healthier than a side of fries or onion rings, so make the substitution where you can - assuming your little ones like fruit.  Also, fruit can be eaten immediately, but you'll have to wait for a piping hot plate of food to cool down.

4 - Find places that are at least semi-kid friendly.  They don't need to have a playground, but any place that has paper table cloths and crayons counts.  Don't let them fill up on crayon appetizers, but feel free to let them scribble on anything that should be scribbled on.

5 - Try to get a table in a place that will bother the least amount of other diners as possible - just in case your little angels become little demons.  It's just a consideration thing.  The other people eating there are paying for their meal as well, so try to be aware of them when planning your outing.

6 - If you aren't sure how they're going to act, and if it works with your schedule, try going to eat a little earlier than the normal crowd.  Eating with the blue-hairs is not a bad option.  Not only have they probably been in your same position at some point in their lives, but since they don't hear very well your children can be as loud as they want and still not disturb them!

Six is not a very good number for items in a list, but for now it will have to do.  If you have any other thoughts to add I would love to hear them - and put them to use when we head out next.

Vacation - Papa's point of view part 2

You’ll really need to read part 1 before jumping in here.

When we last left our story, I was just starting to plan our first ever family vacation, so that is where we'll jump back in.

January - I broke into Julia’s email to get Jane’s email address.  Once I had the address I lobbed the first test email to see if she was receptive.

She was.

February – I broached the idea of a vacation with Julia, and she shot it down; it was out of the question.

March – I tried again and the answer was the same.  I now decided that trying to suggest this each and every month would get us nowhere, so I let my plans simmer.

April and May – Nothing to report.

June – I throw caution to the wind since the girls were making great progress of their own and reached back out to Jane.  I was targeting a trip between August and February, so the girls would be under two years old and, therefore, could fly for free.  Jane was due with baby number three in October, so that limited us a bit.  John would be taking vacation in September, around their girls’ birthday, so we set that date.

July – I booked the flight, car, and hotels once Jane confirmed John’s vacation plans.  The only thing I told Julia was the trip would involve a two hour flight and a 90 minute car ride.  I also told her how much went into scheduling the flight, car, and hotel. 

You cannot book a flight for an infant on your lap over the internet.  You first have to book the flight and then call in with the other two riders.

For the car, you have to call the location to confirm they have car seats and can reserve them for you.

The hotel is a little trickier.  Unless you want to spend an arm and a leg to get a suite with two different rooms, you have to call around.  I couldn’t afford the suite, so I had to find a hotel with adjoining rooms.  Even if you do that, you have to find a hotel that can provide two pack n plays.

I distinctly remember one call where the person informed me they did have a pack n play.  I was in the middle of booking everything when I decided to ask a stupid question.  Did they have one crib or more than one?  In a hotel with 1,400 rooms they had only the one crib.  Click (that's me hanging up in disgust), on to the next.  The ninth hotel I called had what we needed so I booked it.

So everything is booked.  Julia has no idea where we're going or what we're doing.  Just to make sure she didn't figure it out by accident, I decided to throw her off the scent.  More on that to come next time. 

What is that sound?

I've discovered another trait the girls picked up from me - large feet.

Sure, they have their mother's coup de-toe, but they seem to have my length.  They also have the ability to outgrow shoes quickly.

Several weeks before our vacation Julia ordered them new shoes as their little toes were becoming scrunched in their current pairs. 

Several weeks went by and we still had not received said shoes.

The night before we left we decided they were not coming, so we headed to a local shoe store.  By local, I mean the only store that carried the brand we (and by we I mean Julia as she does the shoe research) wanted was 30 miles away.  We called them and confirmed they carried the shoes and had the ones we wanted.  Off we went.

The store did, in fact, have one pair of the shoes we wanted.  They had nothing else in the style we wanted in the girls size.  We contemplated buying a different type, but they didn't have the features and support Julia was looking for. 

Then it happened.

The salesman brought out a pair of Squeakers. 

We slipped them on and the girls took off.  Fortunately, we were the only ones in the store at the time.

Do you hear that funny, squeaky sound?

Squeak, squeak, squeak, squeak.

With every step they took a squeaking sound was produced by their shoes.

NO.  NO WAY.  TAKE THEM OFF WE ARE NOT GETTING THEM.

That was my initial reaction. 

I mashed their feet back into their old shoes and prepared to leave. 

Brynne started to take her shoes off.  Only then did I notice how the velcro strap appeared to be cutting off her circulation. 

MacGyver might have just cut the end of the shoe off and created space for her toes, but that wouldn't have allowed the blood to flow to those toes freely.

We tried on several different sizes of other shoes, but none fit quite as nicely as the Squeakers.

The salesman assured me the squeak-making piece of the shoe could be easily removed, so we went ahead and purchased the shoes.

I had every intention of removing the squeaky thing, but I didn't. There are a few reasons for that:

1 - the squeaky sound is very easy to identify and lets me know exactly where they are.  If for some reason they escaped my grasp and took off I could follow the squeak better than a GPS tracker.

2 - they love to hear the squeaky sound.  Both of them have done their fair share of toe walking, but this was encouraging them to walk properly.

3 - one of the squeakers did fall out on its own on vacation, and this caused a little distress for Hadley.  She went from "squeak, squeak, squeak, squeak" to "squeak, (silence), squeak, (silence)".  She then stopped and just started stomping her squeak-less foot in an effort to get the squeak back - this is how I realized the squeaker was gone.  No sound was being produced and she didn't want to move until it did.

At this point we went back to the hotel for bed time, searched for a local store that had the Squeakers, and found one the only one in a  60 mile radius just happened to be right close to our next morning destination - so we stopped in and got a replacement squeaker.

So, I 've gone from vehemently opposing the squeak, to actually seeking out a replacement squeak.

All was once again right with the world. 

As with anything you constantly hear, the squeaking is now hardly noticeable to us.  People are constantly commenting on them and we have yet to hear a negative remark.

Yes, I did use some form of squeak 28 times in this post.  I dare you to outdo me.

Don't have what you need? Be creative

As we arrived at the airport for our vacation, Julia had a bit of a freak out moment.

WHERE'S BRYNNE'S BINK?!?!?

Bink = pacifier

It wasn't strapped to her shirt.

It wasn't on the ground.

It was nowhere to be seen.

Like an idiot, I suggested the following:

Well, we've been thinking about helping her kick the bink habit - maybe this is a sign that now is the time to start.

Apparently that wasn't a good idea.

I was politely informed she would probably like to have her bink for the flight to help with her ears popping, and we wouldn't want to wipe it down every time she dropped it.  And she would drop it.

She knows when it is dropped it is still right there for her.  So even if she sneezes it out (which is a pretty cute sight) it is right where it should be.

As luck would have it we could not locate her back-up holder before we left, so the AWOL holder was our only option.

I had a brilliant idea!

The shops at the airport have a very strange inventory they maintain.  I was sure they would have a holder.  AND it might even be duty free!!

They did not. 

I could buy a little yapping dog that flips over all by itself.  I could choose from a wide variety of shot glasses, magnets, and even bumper stickers.  Or any number of pills, electronic devices, or reading materials.

SIDEBAR - I think it's very interesting how the airport shops sell Playboy, Penthouse, and other adult-themed magazines.  Do people really buy them there and then read them on a plane?  What an awkward flight that must be if the reader sits next to a member of the clergy or a little old lady.

SIDEBAR OVER

I couldn't, however, find anything that would even come remotely close to fitting my need.

There comes a time in every man's life when he must ask himself one very important question:

My answer was simple: 

• I pulled a spare bink from the bag of them I held.
• I pulled out my shoe.
• I removed the shoe lace.
• I used it to fashion my very own (patent pending) bink holder and tied it around Brynne's neck.
• I actually tied it through a button hole on her shirt - her neck was too big.

 Problem solved.

I'm sure we looked like the biggest rednecks in the world with my daughter sucking on a bink being held to her clothing with a dirty shoe lace, but I didn't care. 

She would have that bink in a familiar place if she needed it - and that mattered more to me than my appearance.

We did, however, stop by the local Walmart once we landed to purchase an actual bink holder. 

It was the wrong kind, but that didn't matter.  With a little more MacGyver ingenuity, and the assistance of a local seamstress, we had our bink holder - and I had my shoelace back.

It was a little moist, but still functional.

Vacation - Papa's point of view part 1

I am better than Clark W. Griswold – Sparky if you will.

We hadn’t taken a real vacation since our honeymoon, so I thought it was time we did just that.  Staycations just don’t provide the same level of adventure and anxiety that real vacations do.

I also know how much Julia loves surprises, so I decided to make the entire trip a surprise.  Yes – I said it – EVERYTHING was to be a surprise.

How would you react if your spouse decided to plan a trip for you and your two children that were under two years old?  Julia will be posting her experiences in the whole thing soon to help you get a feel for what she thought.

I’ll start with the basics.  The only two people in the world other than me who knew where we were headed were two people that neither my wife nor I had ever met – John and Jane Doe for now.  I told our girls, but I don’t think they got it.  I even tried to sign it to them, but apparently you have to know what the signs mean before you can interpret them. 

Oh well, less chance of a slip from them.

I tried to get her to go in the spring, but due to the girls weaning and nap schedules Julia didn't want to take any trips.  I then decided we would do it in the fall, around our anniversary, and she couldn't object since I was giving them all ample time to prepare.

What will come out over the next five Fridays is the “diary” of my deviousness.  The planning took nine months; the trip took five days.  I can’t foresee doing anything like this again, so I am not worried about giving away the magician’s secrets.  Maybe you can use this to surprise your spouse as well.

Vacation, all I ever wanted. Vacation, time to get away

So our first official family vacation took place this last week.  All in all, it was a great time, though we did get off to a rocky start.  Let's walk through the list of what happened.

1 - Thanks to hurricane/tropical storm/tropical depression Lee, we had a little longer trip on the way out.  Our flight was delayed about an hour, and we only found out about it once we were at the gate. 

2 - When we finally boarded we discovered the plane was full, so we did not get to sit together.  Even though we booked  our seats (a window and an aisle seat) in the same row.  Since the girls were on our laps and each set of three seats only has four oxygen masks, Hadley and I were forced to move up a row. 

3 - We were nearing the end of our flight and the girls were nearing the end of their patience - not to mention their snacks/books/moving the tray up and down. The captain came on the PA and informed us that we were going to have to circle the airport for 25 minutes until we were cleared to land.  Not exactly what we wanted to hear.  Fortunately, five minutes later we were cleared.

4 - After landing, we had to wait for a gate to open up.  Then, since we were in the back of the plane, we had to wait for everyone else to take their sweet time unloading.  Finally, we were free.

5 - We went to the rental car lot and were given our car after a modest wait.  The girls had been travelling for five hours and were ready to be done.  Mama walked with them while I got the vehicle.  We discovered it was too small to hold us and our luggage.  Fortunately, they had larger SUVs so we were able to take one - for a few dollars more.



6 - The rental car seats were crap - utter crap.  The girls may have been safer just sitting in a cardboard box on the hood.  We wanted rear facing ones and they claimed to be such.  They did not, however, have all of the appropriate connectors and straps to install properly.  For the first time ever our girls rode facing forward.  They seemed to love it.  We loved being able to look back at them and see what was going on, but it just isn't as safe for them at their size.

7 - We got to our dinner location about two hours later than I had planned.  Since we were so delayed, we decided to feed the girls in transit some blueberries we brought with us for snacks.  They were starving, apparently, and gobbled them all down.  In the middle of the night, Brynne's stomach decided it didn't want them in there anymore and she expelled them.  At 3 AM I got her up, we cleaned the vomit off her, changed her to a new sleep sack, replaced her bedding (with towels since I didn't pack back-up bedding), and put her back down as she seemed empty.

8 - Less than 30 minuted later she needed new towels.  She was reenacting her Papa's trip from a few weeks ago, so Mama laid in bed with her.  Hadley was not happy about her sister getting more attention than she did, so I took her to sleep with me.  This was the first time either of them had slept a good part of the night with us.  Everyone (except me) slept pretty well.  Once again I was a chicken and feared I would either roll over her or let her roll off the bed, so I remained awake.  Even if that fear wouldn't have been there, she is a very active sleeper, apparently, and if I got close to sleep she would kick me, roll over on me, or put her head right on my windpipe to constrict my breathing.

This may seem bad, but this is all that went wrong.  Five days away from home, and this is all we had to endure.  Our girls did a wonderful job in adapting to whatever was thrown their way.

Now that the bad stuff is out of the way I can move on to all the great things we did.

Lists, lists, lists

I am a big fan of lists. 


I never leave home without my red European man-bag.

If I have any reason to make a list I will.  I suppose it's not so much the list itself as it is the ability to then cross things off that list.

I will write something new on the list AFTER I've done it, just so I can cross it off. 

Not only does it give me a sense of accomplishment, but it helps ensure I don't forget anything. 

For my money, there is nothing worse than getting home from running errands only to realize I forgot one thing - usually from the place furthest from home.

Taking our first family vacation provided me with the perfect opportunity for some lists.  Here's a list of those lists:

1 - things I needed to plan before we left

2 - things I could do to deceive Julia about the trip

3 - clothes to pack for me

4 - clothes to pack for Julia

5 - clothes to pack for the girls

6 - things to pack for the flight

7 - toys and books to pack for the girls

8 - toiletries to pack for all of us

9 - things we could buy once we got to our destination

10 - documents I needed to pack

11 - other things I shouldn't forget

Have you ever had that sinking feeling you were forgetting something?  I have, but not often. 

With my list(s) prepared well in advance, the actual packing takes less time since I don't have to think about what I'm missing.  I just know it's all there since I've reviewed my list and added items as time went on.

Yes, I am probably a bit insane, but it all seems to work out - for the most part.

More on the vacation to come soon!