Sleep Talk

Jim is a good sleep talker. A week or two ago, I got into bed after he'd already fallen asleep. He stirred and said, pausing after each sentence: "Some fro you got going there, Mrs. Rollins, whatever your name might be. Chewy's mama. I love you, Chewy."

Birthday Backpacking

Turning 40 is weird. It used to sound so old, and I know to people in their 20's and early 30's it still sounds old. I did not want to make a big deal of this birthday, and Jim had the idea that we should go backpacking for a night. I thought that sounded perfect. Hannah Hawkins agreed to babysit the girls from after school Friday until Saturday night (her first overnight gig) the weekend before my birthday.

We ended up getting away at 4:00 P.M., putting us in Julian around 5:30. Turns out nearly every place closes crazy early in Julian, so we had a hard time finding somewhere to get dinner. We ended up eating basically fried gas station food from the corner market. Then we got a slice of apple pie a la mode and a cinnamon roll (billed as giant and ooey gooey). Both were incredibly disappointing, which was sad. We threw away about half of the cinnamon roll, which was seriously lacking in frosting and hardly ooey gooey.

We started hiking in Cleveland National Forest after dark. We worried that we were missing prettiness, but I actually think it was probably prettier and more fun hiking under the giant moon. I kept hearing movement in the vegetation on either side of us, and at one point I was certain I heard a growl. I told Jim we were being stalked and made him get out the only weapon we had on us - a tiny pocket knife - just in case we had to fend off a boar or a mountain lion. In the end, the only creature we encountered was a man who was alternately really rude and really nice. When he first came down the trail toward us, he called out, "Are you hunting?" I was confused by the question and answered, "No. Are you hunting?" Turns out he was very perturbed that we were hiking with our headlamps on, given the bright moon (which did not always illuminate the trail and when it did wasn't bright enough to allow us to walk at a decent pace). He said sarcastically that at least we gave him and his friends a heads-up about our approach. We talked to him about where we might be able to camp, and he was really nice, other than a rude comment about how late we were heading in. We ended up going a little past where he and his friends had set up camp and finding a nice spot to pitch our tent. In the dark, it looked as if we were in a magical little valley. In the morning, it was nice but not as magical as it had seemed in the dark.

A view of our tent:

The sun came over the hill shortly after we got up.

Jim had asked me if I were OK with oatmeal in the morning. Camping oatmeal always ends up lukewarm and not my favorite, so I requested "jimmies," as Deetrix and I named them (donut gems/donettes). He complied with a big bag.

We figured we had hiked in about three or three and a half miles Friday night, so we had about seven or seven and a half to go on Saturday to complete the loop. It's amazing what good time you can make hiking without kids. We saw some pretty views, and I took a lot of pictures of Jim's back.

Part of our loop was on the Pacific Crest Trail. Jim began scheming about a giant, months-long trek on the PCT after we retire. It sounds fun, except I wonder if I'm too wussy and/or if my knees could take it. We'll have to see how we're doing in 15 years, I guess. 

I really liked this lone tree in the grassy area, but the picture isn't very exciting.

We had some nice views of Anza-Borrega Desert State Park. 

We reached the car at noon. Hannah was planning on babysitting until around 9:00 P.M., so we had to figure out how to spend the rest of the day. We decided to eat lunch in Julian, which officially has the worst food, although we did have a better apple-pie experience Saturday. There were pretty trees there. I love fall.

While we ate, we researched movies and decided to watch one in Escondido. We also hit a MetroPCS store to get me a new phone. (I had shattered the screen of my old one.) We tried to go to the Cheesecake Factory in Esco for dinner, but 5,000 other people had beaten us there. We ended up at a terrible restaurant on Restaurant Row in San Marcos. I have decided that a) as in Julian, all of the Restaurant Row establishments are awful and b) any restaurant frequented primarily or solely by gray-hairs is bad. Why do so many old people like bad food? 

When we got home, we found that Susan and family had put up some birthday decorations and left a quart of my favorite flavor of Baskin Robbins ice cream in the freezer for me. Meanwhile Mel and Derrick had come and hauled away a big pile of palm debris from our entryway. Jim had trimmed our trees a few weeks before. When I discovered evidence that rats were enjoying the new home created by the pile of debris near our front door, Jim agreed to borrow Derrick's truck to take it to the dump. Mel and Derrick made it disappear so we didn't have to deal with it. Good friends + great husband = fab birthday.

Conference Weekend, Haircuts, Cheerleading, and Walking Practice

Conference weekend began as usual on Saturday, September 30. We overloaded on cinnamon rolls we acquired via the Young Men fundraiser. We watched the morning session. Ever played some conference bingo. Between sessions, Wrenzy (clad only in undies and some hand-me-down bedroom slippers) helped Jim in the yard.

Ever and I prepared a muffin tin of snacks labeled with a word or phrase for each tin. During the afternoon session, she got to eat one of the items in a tin when she heard that word or phrase. 

She ran out of some snacks (turns out "love" is a big one) and never got to eat others, so we had to do some shuffling. On the whole, though, I like the idea.

When the afternoon session was about a half hour from concluding, I thought, as Ever was sitting on my lap, that I should check her hair for ukus (hair lice). Sure enough, she had them. I had no reason to suspect, as she never did any itching, but I'd thought shortly after school started that I should start checking her. Jim was highly interested in examining what we found under the girls' little microscope (and in fact did not believe me that she had ukus until he did so), but I was anxious to spring into action. I was SO glad I found it that day, when Jim was home and could start the laundry and deal with the other girls while I did her treatment. If I'd discovered it on a Monday morning or something, it would have been a nightmare. 

Ever was up for a haircut, so I started to cut and then got scared and let Jim take over. He did a real bang-up job. By the end it was so short and weird and mushroom-like that I started laughing uncontrollably but tried to hide it so I wouldn't upset Ever. That turned to crying - not sad crying but the kind that Mamo does when she starts laughing really late at night and can't stop. Ever never caught on and actually liked Jim's handiwork, so that was good. This was when the front was close to the length I envisioned it all over:

After the haircut debacle, I combed out her hair for at least three hours, trying to make sure I got everything. (I didn't. I found more nits later, but by the third and final treatment, her hair was clean.) 

Monday after school I took her to Supercuts for a fix-it cut and decided to get Wren's wisps trimmed, too. Why is it that kids look so cute and big when they get real haircuts?

So conference weekend didn't end up being ideal, but like I said - glad I discovered it when I did. I'd love never to deal with ukus again, but I'm sure I won't be that lucky.

I took a picture of Ever later in the week to document her short hair on a good hair day. She is getting so big.

Later that morning, Wren went outside to watch the garbage truck dressed like this:

She's currently obsessed with her flower jammies and wants to wear them all day every day. The hat was given to her by Jim's home teachee at Easter. It was quickly forgotten but for some reason has come back into favor recently.

Palmquist (and other Oceanside elementary schools) offers, for a fee, some after-school activities for several weeks at a time. Ever wanted to do dance/cheer, but I basically said Daddy and I really aren't into that and didn't sign her up. Then she found out her friend Leela was doing it, and she REALLY wanted to do it. I heard that I couldn't sign her up late because it was full, so I got out of it this time. She's getting her cheer exposure at recess now. A girl in her class, Naomi, is the "coach," and she teaches Ever, Leela, and one or two other girls cheers during every recess. Ever loves it. She does them at home all the time, and the Monday after conference I caught her teaching Wren. "Hit it!" 

Ever said the boys want to play with them during recess, and it's really annoying because they just want to do cheer. At our parent/teacher conference last week, Mrs. Tesluk brought it up and said it's really good for Naomi (being the teacher) and also really odd hearing these girls doing cheers like, "Dominate! Decimate!" Pretty funny.

In other news, Tyna has been practicing walking. One day she was standing up, doing a victory grunt, going down to the floor, and then standing back up again, over and over, like she was exercising. She has had some good walking performances but hasn't been consistent. This was one of her better stints (I have bad excited voice):

Alisal Retreat, Girls, Julian Hike

Despite probably barely breaking even for the firm (I've been billing about 20 hours a month recently), I took Jim to the HFB attorney retreat at Alisal Guest Ranch & Resort in Solvang September 8-10. We left the babies at home with Taylor (who watches them while I work) during the day on Friday, and then Alissa Hawkins took over for the rest of the weekend. Christian and Shandra were kind enough to take Ever, so we dropped her in Ventura on the way to Solvang. She couldn't wait for the cousin time.

Friday evening we went on a sort of hayride to the outdoor dinner venue. The ride back in the dark was really pretty. It was also hilarious because we were with Steve Tomasulo, who was wasted.

Saturday we played golf. We were paired with Tom and Linda Reed. I do not golf ever, but they were very nice and supportive. We had a good time, and the day was lovely.

The hospitality suite was available to our group all weekend, so we could grab drinks and/or hang out anytime. (Man, attorneys are drinkers! Our continuing legal education meetings on substance abuse really make sense now.) Jim and I enjoyed a couple of sodas after golfing.

We took a giant nap (a feat for me!), and then it was time to get ready for dinner. I was bummed that we never went hiking or made it to the lake on the property. There just wasn't time. 

We lingered after dinner to socialize a bit. Steve, again, was super drunk and was cracking us up. We three were the last to leave the dining room. Jim and I exited the building, but Steve seemed not to know where to go and went further into the building into an adjacent room. We became concerned he'd get lost and/or drown in a puddle somewhere. We doubled back, spotted him (he'd made it out of the building by then), and tailed him until he made it to the hospitality suite where the after-party was going on. 

Sunday morning we ate breakfast and headed out. We had promised Ever we'd call but never did, and we were excited to see her. She, however, started crying uncontrollably when we pulled up to Christian and Shandra's, completely devastated about leaving her cousins.

We had Luc Oddou over after school one afternoon. He and Ever spent most of the afternoon putting Wren in "jail." I was in the kitchen and let them do their thing. They decorated a box with pictures they drew, stickers, and other things. They had twine and tape and ribbon and were hard at work for a long time. Toward the end, Wren was in the box in the tent, and they wanted help wrapping the tent with twine. Jim got home and found Wren like this: 

I hadn't seen her and had no idea that's what they'd done. The sight was sort of shocking, and Jim freaked out. He pulled everything off Wrenzy as quickly as possible (I was barely able to snap that photo) and told Ever never, ever, ever, to put tape on someone's face. He was worried about scratching corneas, although really he just found the whole thing deeply disturbing. I thought Wren's entire face had been covered with tape and warned Ever about covering noses and mouths and making people unable to breathe. She told me that's why she made sure to leave Wren's nose uncovered (the picture confirms she did) but hadn't thought about her mouth. Anyway, I think the picture is amazing, and it was all in good fun. 

Wren's been having some playdates. She and Amelie are adorable together. They giggle constantly. Last time she was over, Amelie fake read to Wren for the longest time. Wren kept getting more books/magazines and asking for more. These pictures are uncomfortable because Wren wasn't dressed; she'd recently stripped down for a trip to the bathroom and hadn't gotten dressed again yet.

So Wren is potty trained. I was dreading it, but it didn't end up being so bad. We did a week of softcore training, with her in undies when it was convenient. The next week we had a couple of rough days (one for Taylor and one for me), but she's only had a couple of accidents since then. She just needs to be encouraged to go to the bathroom somewhat regularly. Super exciting to have only one left in diapers!

Susan took Wren and Amelie to Legoland. Apparently Wren was subdued and wide-eyed the whole time. She must have been overwhelmed; she's never been anywhere like that before. But she had the time of her life.

Tiny does some great talking these days. This video is kind of gross because she's got yogurt all over her lips, but it's all I have.

Saturday the 23rd, Jim and I decided to take the girls to Julian for some hiking and the annual Apple Festival. It was our first whole day out of the house with Wrenzy in undies. We stopped at some bathrooms on the way to our trailhead, and Tiny Tot gave Jim the sweetest, longest snuggles.

We ended up shortening the first loop we did, sticking to a .6-mile nature trail instead of going up on the ridge and doing a 2.5-mile loop. Jim really, really, really wanted to do the long route, but Ever was complaining, and I was not thrilled about the lack of shade. Turns out as soon as we finished the short loop, we came upon some bathrooms, and both biggers had some serious business to do. I took that as confirmation we made the right call. Dealing with that out on the trail would have been a bit of a nightmare.

We did another short hike in the vicinity and then headed to the Apple Festival. Traffic was backed up so far that we couldn't see the entrance and became convinced we couldn't even get in before it closed at 5:00 P.M. A few cars in front of us turned around, and we realized we had to give up, too. 

We headed into town to find food and discovered that town was completely overrun with zillions of people, too. It was a nightmare. Sidewalks were packed. Every bakery in town had a gigantic line outside it. (Julian is famous for its apple pie.) It was ridiculous. We wanted to interview people and find out why in the world they were OK with waiting at least an hour for pie that couldn't possibly be that amazing. 

We managed to find a little cafe on the edge of town that had room for us. We ordered some real food, and then Jim ordered about seven desserts and got upset with me when I tried to stop him. 

Julian is a quaint place when it's not completely overrun. I'm sad that people have to ruin all fun places. A local told us that our best bet for getting into the Apple Festival would be to arrive at 8:00 A.M. for the 10:00 A.M. opening, so it seems that we'll never go. It's crazy.

Tiny's hair was voluptuous one morning, and she was so cute. I can never capture it, but I tried.

She's gotten good at maneuvering the walker and speeds around now.

I took the littles to Target, and Wrenny protectively put her arm around Tyna as they stood together in the cart on the way to the car. 

Palomar Hike to Boucher Hill Fire Tower

On Saturday, September 4, we went on a new hike at Palomar. We did a loop involving a number of different trails and a stop at the Boucher Hill Fire Lookout Tower, where we enjoyed the view.

Ever desperately wanted to climb this tree. She sat and schemed and discussed for some time. Then she scooted up as far as she could go and became unhappy when we told her it wasn't possible for her to go any farther.

Missy also spent a lot of time looking for the perfect walking stick. She and Wrenny enjoyed holding sticks and hitting things with them.

It was a relatively short hike (supposedly only about 2.5 miles), but it involved a good amount of climbing and took soooooooo long. Someday we'll be able to do big hikes at a normal pace. Someday.