The trip -- Chapter Two.

So, its Friday. If you remember from this post we were woken up by a 19month old banging ever so loudly on the bathroom cupboards in the adjacent room. Shortly after waking (but still not dragging my behind out of bed) I heard that my brother-in-law and his girlfriend had arrived. They had taken a red eye flight into Atlanta and father-in-law had turned around, after getting back after midnight, and went back to the airport at 5 in the morning. Beanie woke up and was very excited when I told her that AJ and Nacho had arrived.

So, we drag our butts downstairs and fill up on some coffee. Beanie is a little overwhelmed by the number of people downstairs (let's see there were ten of us), but did pretty well. She was excited to play with her (super sick) cousin. After showers and etc were orchestrated Nacho and AJ decide to take a nap. They weren't going to be staying at the house, but somehow they ended up sleeping in the room we had been staying in. Glenn and I went in and grabbed our suitcase and bathroom stuff so we could get ready while they were sleeping. They had been up for over 24 hours between working all day before the flight, some serious turbulence and thunder storms, and a gassy passenger (eeewww) next to them. So, they go nap and everyone else starts getting ready for the day.

We all wanted to go to the Georgia Aquarium so we started trying to coordinate a trip. I emphasize the word "try" because coordinating nine adults and two toddlers is difficult! It was decided that mother-in-law, Glenn's sister and her son, and Beanie and I would all walk down to the community park and let the kids play, hopefully wearing them out so they would nap. Glenn and his older brother were going to go to the store and pick up a few things. Well, a few things quickly turned into a big ol' list which was funny because I'm pretty sure older brother only offered to go to the store to show off his fancy pants Mercedes or whatever-the-hell-it-is sports car. Glenn's sister has a ton of allergies so, obviously, she needed some special things from the store. Well, a lot of special things. She must've asked me 3 times "how I fed Beanie." Um, hello, we were going to be there for 2 days, I'm pretty sure Beanie would eat something in the house and I wasn't about to go out and buy a bunch of stuff for her. She emphasized how she made sure her child got 2 veggies a day (and, okay, I try but Beanie isn't too into veggies right now and I'm really not going to stress over it). She told me about Dr. So and So and how she's "really into him." Whatever, its two days! I should mention that sister-in-law is very competitive about all things kiddo-related & I was pretty much done with it. So, she writes a big ol' list of stuff for the guys to pick up at the store, which left Glenn wondering why she wasn't just going to pick it up herself. Oh yea, the sports car *rolling eyes*

So, we're almost all ready to head out to the park when I realize my shoes are in the room where AJ and Nacho are sleeping. We had hastily grabbed our suitcase and other stuff, but hadn't thought to grab the shoes that I tossed off somewhere at 1am. Mother-in-law encourages me to go commando style into the bedroom and grab my shoes. Um, my brother-in-law and his pregnant girlfriend are sleeping in there!! No thanks. Luckily, sister-in-law has an extra pair of shoes that I can borrow. So we're about to head out the door when I realize that Beanie's shoes are also MIA. Once again, mother-in-law encourages some super secret stealth action to retrieve the shoes. I once again decline. So she pressures Glenn to do it. The look on Glenn's face was like are you fucking kidding me??? Like I said before, the shoes were sort of thrown off in a sleepy stupor and I didn't even really know where they were in the room. But, not surprisingly, mother-in-law took it upon herself to up her ninja status and find Beanie's shoes. Mission accomplished. Glenn is convinced that AJ and Nacho weren't really even asleep (since both kiddos had been so loud all morning) and just pretended they were while MIL tiptoed through the room.

Okay, finally. Off to the park. It is hot and its only 9 or 10am probably (yes, it took that long to get out of the house). As soon as I start walking in my borrowed sandals I can feel a blister forming on my toe. Yikes. Not fun. It was going to be a looong walk to the park. Glenn's older brother revs his engine and drives off through the neighborhood like a bat out of hell. Just one thing, um, pleaes don't kill my husband with your crazy driving.

We go to the park and the kids play. Glenn's mom manages to call or text them about 4 or 5 times while they're at the store. Just to tell them this or that. And then to call them back and tell them again. It was so hot the kiddos didn't last long at the park. Both of them were getting smooshy-faced. So we head back to the house. And Glenn gets another text saying not to even bother coming to the park because we were headed back. Glenn was bummed. It was so hot; I was so sweaty. Like, seriously, I sweated through my underwear and pants. Yuck. Time to do some laundry too.

So we get back to the house. I can't remember if Beanie's cousin napped or not, but Beanie didn't. First off, AJ and Nacho were still sleeping in our room so there wasn't a bed to lie her down on. I tried laying her down on a blanket on the floor in a room and she was (maybe) almost out when FIL returned from picking up Glenn's younger sister (she was staying at another house). Yea, so the front door opened and Beanie was done for. Mother-in-law had decided that we should go the aquarium the next day (of course on a Saturday when it would be like a gazillion times busier and when we also had to deal with the surprise party she didn't know about). So, we're just sitting around doing absolutely freaking NOTHING. All day. Glenn and I decided to borrow one of the cars and drive Beanie around to get her to nap. His younger sister came with us because she was just about bored up to her ears as well. We drive forever trying to find some Starbucks. You know, when you live where there's a coffee shop on every corner (or sometimes 3 on 3 of the 4 corners...lol) it is pretty weird to have to drive for over a 1/2 hour just to get a latte. So, we all get our caffeine fix and a break from the insane boring-ness of just sitting around the house. And Beanie napped for a good long while.

Father-in-law has a lot of family in Georgia so Friday night we call went to a dinner at his cousin's (?) house. The house was immaculate and museum-like. The first thing I thought was Great, I'm going to be carrying Beanie around all night long. MIL says, "Oh its okay she can run around wherever. She just can't touch anything. And especially not the tea cups." Okay, there were tea cups everywhere. And letting a 2 year old run around in a novel environment where she can't touch anything??? Not going to happen. So it sort of happened that Glenn and I just passed her back and forth over the evening. After awhile there was another 4 year old (who was so short Beanie was taller than her!) who Beanie got to play with. The 4 year old (Emily??? can't remember her name since I met about 50 people that day!!) was hilarious! Glenn had taken Beanie outside to play. They were playing with big old sticks, more like sword fighting...accident waiting to happen...haha. Glenn said maybe they could build a pile of pinecones. If you know Beanie, she loves pinecones. Silly kid could be surrounded by toys but she's happier playing with pinecones, rocks and dirt. As they were gathering pinecones and starting their pile, Emily (we'll just call her that, okay) said "This is the most brilliant idea ever!!!" Later we were all on the back covered porch and Beanie was blabbering around, talking but not really using her words. Emily grabs her hands and says "Beanie, what are you trying to say? Use your words so I can understand. Are you trying to say that the bird is beautiful?"

There were family members who just reinforced Glenn's stereotypes of Southern folk (his words). Like the guy who, when referrring to Nacho, said "oh yea, she belongs to that guy in the ACDC (it was really an ADHD) shirt." Belongs to?? Or Emily's dad who commented how his daughter was going to be small and smart and his son big and dumb. And that his son couldn't play with dolls, and was shocked that Beanie wanted to play football. The BBQ was delicious though! ***And I should add, that I loved everyone we met; they were all very nice and welcoming! It was just funny when they said things like "belongs to" or almost passed out when Glenn's younger sister dropped the F bomb***

The mosquitos were bad so we didn't stay out on the porch too long. Also, Beanie was trying to eat this fake plastic fruit that they had on the porch. Then she picked up the plate it was on and MIL told her "No!" Glenn took Beanie inside for some totally unrelated reason and then MIL started freaking out that we were offended she told Beanie no. Um, she was picking up a breakable plate...by all means tell her no!! Then MIL started showing us 3 week old mosquito bites on her legs so we really did hightail it inside.

We left pretty early on because Beanie wasn't on her best behavior and we were exhausted. I coudln't blame her though...it wasn't exactly a toddler friendly environment. With that in mind she did pretty darn good!

I can't remember what we did that night...I think just headed to bed. Ugh, I guess that's what I get for taking so long to get this written.

Okay, time to make some breakfast...I'll write about Saturday later!