THREE

Bet you wish your dressup was as fabulous as mine!

2016 week three

Rainy and peaceful (but seriously pretty naughty) California visit.

First stop Walnut Creek to see my uncle and a couple cousins over brunch. Vera cried the whole time because my uncle took her out of the car to help me (because of the pouring rain) and she was scared. She calmed down but then I didn't let her eat all the raspberries from my pancake so she started crying again. Theo is blurry but the picture of contented. 

                                                                                                                                             

This hand. I want to kiss every sleeping baby hand.

The only toy Vera would let Theo play with -and then only for a little while until she thought it was too much fun for him or something. We, ahem, had a bit of entitlement naughty issues on this trip.

I took V on a walk through my high school campus. I can't believe I was a junior 10 whole years ago. 

And if the beaded head dress wasn't enough, we found my old dance costumes so V had enough sparkle and sequins (secrets) to keep up the normal 10 outfits per day rule. Why did I even pack her clothes?

Oma's house is clearly pretty magical.

At breakfast with Uncle Jared and Aundie. 

The 30 minutes this day where she listened and was halfway cute. Half way. I love you bug, but I think we all need a vacation detox. 

He's so happy. By day 3 into the trip he was very tired of being held by other people. He's only happy in this photo because I brought him into the bathroom with me. :) 

Redding has some really great second hand/antique stores. I was so excited to find these fabulous candlestick holders made from bullet casings from WWII. Matthew said that if he absolutely had to have candlesticks (non-negotiable, we must have them) these would be the ones. :) 

Fruitlessly trying to make Louie and "Marcelf" (Marcel) obey her.

And this is why people put up with California's nonsense: when you can walk through your neighborhood and it looks like this.

Sunday morning Mass with Oma. 

Theo was polite for Grammy Kristy only after he fell asleep. :) It's your own fault Theo; when you are incredibly smiley every single person wants to hold you! He was such a charmer, full of smiles and dimples for everyone -until they tried to hold him. 

And Vera was polite for Grandpa Dean after the puppy knocked her down the stairs and she was given free access to Reeses Peanut Butter Cups -oh and fabulous pink camo leggings and pink snow boots. Candy and clothes: those are her loves.

Can you even? Little Baby Bunting [ready to go] a'hunting...

Visiting her (middle)namesake family. She was so polite -but was also given free reign to candy. :)

More LaVelle's! Some of my favorite people. I could have spent another two hours (or days) visiting with you all.

But oh dear, California does my hair no favors. Texas humidity you are my dearest follicle friend. 

I am always so proud of V when she is friendly even when she is nervous or shy. I was also so proud to hear so many "pleases" and "thank yous" come out of her mouth this week. Terribly two? Yes. Terribly polite while she's acting terrible? Yes. I'll take it. :)

I just had to take this photo of the light streaming in on Giraffe's face on the airplane. This dirty little animal has been to so many places with us. Vera loves to tell me about how she is the Giraffes mama and all the silly things her giraffe does. She just loves him (her?) so much. And he looked so sweet and calm next to stir crazy Veronica on our last flight home. 

And we're home and suddenly everyone is sleeping better and listening (marginally) better. I feel like most of my photos were captioned with a bit of exasperation, or maybe I was just remembering all the exasperation while I was captioning. Traveling with them was harder than I thought it would be, but also so much easier than it could have been. The 4am kicking and fussing and peeing the bed and Vera's unending frustration and poor listening -those were things I didn't anticipate that were so hard. But I'm grateful Theo can sleep strapped into a baby carrier and eat discreetly and quickly whenever and wherever. I'm grateful Vera usually listens quickly and stays by me and doesn't run off and tries really hard to do the right thing. Tonight as I was snuggling her and singing her a bedtime song she looked at me and said, "Sometimes I'm naughty." Yes. Yes you are. But you are only two, and you are incredibly good and reliably reasonable, and sweet to Theo and sweet to your family, and full of love and happiness and excitement. And I'm sure every single person loved hearing you sing "Let it Go" really loudly on our 6 am flight 10 times in a row. "Snow glows white on the mountain tonight..."

Quotes:

My mom gave her a fluffy pink robe with princesses all over it. She couldn't remember that it was called a "robe" and kept asking, "Where is my robot?"

5am Vera is awake and Theo has a messy diaper.
V "Can I wake up now."
Me "No."
V, near tears. "I'm awake can I get up now?"
Me, "Fine. But please bring me a diaper and wipes."
V "Ok" springs out of bed. "Where are the diapers?"
Me, pointing "In the red bag."
V "Where?"
Me "By your foot." still pointing
V, looks at her feet. turns in a circle searching the ground by her feet.
Me "By the wall! By your foot! The RED bag! Can you see the red bag?"
V "yes" still searching all around (I feel like I need to mention that there was a light on. this was not in the dark)
Me "Do you see the wall?"
V "yes!"
Me "THE RED BAG BY THE WALL!" frustrated whisper screaming
V finds the bag, takes a sock out of it and brings it to me.
Me "Oh my goodness, am I speaking English? Please bring me the diaper in the bag."
V finally brings me a diaper.
Me "Bring me the wipes please."
V "Where?"
Me "Right by the red bag."
V looks on the ground all around the red bag, pushes the wipes away with her foot accidentally and picks up my bra and brings it to me.
Me "Veronica! I need the wipes! Please bring me the wipes! Not my bra!"
V puts my bra down on top of the wipes bag and continues searching for the wipes.
Me "WHAT ARE YOU DOING!?! PLEASE bring me the wipes!!"
V picks up my bra again and brings it to me. I'm about to seriously lose it.
Me "DO YOU SEE THE WIPES BAG!? ITS PURPLE AND CRINKLY AND YOU'VE KICKED IT 3 TIMES!"
V picks up the wipes bag and brings it to me and happily skips to the door.
V "Ok Mama, I'm going to go find Oma now."

My mom took Vera to her art class at the college and after the instructor (wearing a purple coat) dimmed the lights to show a video Vera apparently loudly said, "I'm afraid of the purple lady!" She got a lot of laughs for that one. :)


Me "Please bring your jacket inside."
V "I can't because I'm carrying my bag."
Me "You only need one hand to carry that bag. You can use your other hand for your jacket."
She immediately shoots her free hand the the handle of the bag and looks up at me expectantly like she must have tricked me.
I started laughing and made her carry her jacket.


Stories:

On our trip home we took two flights. The first one was a tiny plane from Redding to San Francisco at 6am. The plane was so tiny the bathroom was the size of the passenger seat of a car. The bathroom -not the toilet, so there was no changing table. Theo had a serious poop and so I changed him on my lap. I used a great many wipes to clean that up, and just as I was wrapping it up but had not yet fastened the new diaper, he peed all over my shirt. Soaking a baseball sized area. So, great. This is a fun beginning to a day. After we raced through SFO to get to our other flight Theo pooped again. I was able to change him in the much larger bathroom on the plane before we departed. Halfway through our flight, he pooped again. Seriously boy! I didn't want to get up with V so I just changed him on my lap and laid the diaper on the ground. Near the end of the flight the flight attendants came through to collect trash. As they came near I gave the man the diaper. Or, I tried to. He looked at me aghast and said, "That belongs in the lavatory!" I think, "Great! Take it there please. I have a baby and a toddler and you are collecting trash." I need to mention that he is wearing rubber gloves. He does not take my diaper. He goes into the bathroom and comes out holding, not one, not two, but three paper towels and gingerly takes the sealed up diaper into his RUBBER GLOVE donned paper towel laden hands, and visibly shudders as he removes it. There I sat still damp from being peed on and this man cannot handle holding a diaper while wearing rubber gloves and holding paper towels. Poor man. This was probably the hardest part of his week and I really hope he tells his friends about having to touch a diaper and the traumatic experience that was. :)


Once again I'm sorry to everyone for how many pictures I did not take while visiting you. I wish I had taken a photo with my long long long long time friend Adrienne and her family. V will forever remember running around your house and all the oranges you fed her and the happy time she had there -or maybe she will only remember that you had two cats. And I wish I had taken a photo of my favorite former Young Women's leader Amber holding Vera while she fed carrots to the horses. After your visit we drove past your place a few times and every single time V shouted, "Theres Amber's BARN! I want to go back to Amber's house."