To Grandma's House We Go (Part 1)

This is a long blog, so it will be divided into two blogs....

Yesterday we had plans to go to Hubby's Grandma's house to celebrate her 93rd birthday. I can't imagine living that old, some days I feel ready to keel over due to exhaustion from taking care of my children... but that's a different story.

I awoke with the kids around their usual 6:30 time and Hubby got up a little later. He informed me he wanted to leave at "ten to ten". I was like, "Isn't this a lunch thing? Why are we leaving so early?" Then he sighed, and explained that we needed to get gas and that he yahoo-mapped our destination and we needed to allow an hour and a half for drive time. Fine, whatever.

A little after nine Hubby asked if I was planning on getting ready. So off to the bedroom I trotted, and a half and hour later I was only half ready. "You're not ready yet!" He yelled. Resisting the temptation to pop him on the nose, I explained that I had been interrupted about thirteen times by the kids asking for things or complaining about each other. During this discussion, my cell phone chirped that I had a text message. Hubby rolled his eyes at that and informed me that he "still wanted to get on the road at ten to ten". I swore if he said that phrase to me again I was going to strangle him at ten to ten.

The message was from my sister-in-law, Hubby's brother's wife (she's also my best friend which is helpful at these dreadful family functions) and she was asking if we'd left already. I glanced at the clock (it was about 9:45) and responded that we'd be leaving soon. I picked up my pace and started to get a move on towards my ten to ten goal. Then my phone chirped again and she made a joke about how she's "finally not going to be the one who was late" (a rare occurance for her). I was quickly applying my mascara with one hand and texting back "what are you talking about" with the other hand. Then, in my efforts to multi-task, I got the wand too close to my eye and blinked really hard and had fresh mascara bands imprinted on my upper cheeks... so I had to start over from scratch.

Hubby was poking his head around the door every couple of minutes hurrying the "kids" along (which I'm sure was aimed at me). Then my phone chirped again, and my heart stopped a little when I read the message. Apparently, according to my brother-in-law, were supposed to be there at 11, not 11:30, and the clock on my dresser was now flashing "10:05". Oh great!! So I start running through the house trying to remember to pack pj's and swim shorts and snacks and diapers, while Hubby was doing I-don't-know-what with the kids outside. My adrenaline was pumping so hard my head hurt, and then he opened the door and sent in a screaming two-year-old. This caused me to come to a full stop to handle the situation, and when I couldn't calm him down I was stuck toting around a sniffling two-year-old-who-weighs-about-a-hundred-pounds on my hip while I finished packing.

I then remembered we were traveling to a house filled with breakable objects, old furniture and no toys... oh, and it's in a trailer "community" which is about the size of my bathroom. So I felt forced to pack an overwhelming amount of "quiet activities". The clock was now flashing "10:15". Hubby sat down on the couch to put on the kids sandals and he made a small comment about how he hates to be late. I felt bad, because he really does dread being late. My largest annoyance in life are fingernails on a chalkboard, his is lateness.

So I bravely faced the lion and explained that we were going to be more than just a "little" late. He stopped and stared at me for a beat and then calmly said, "You want to run that by me again?" I explained about the change of time and he literally threw his hands up in the air. (I might have seen smoke coming from his ears, but we won't go there...) I shooed the kids out to the car, grabbed my purse, diaper bag, bag of toys, portable dvd player, two juice boxes and a sippy cup and trooped out to the car to buckle them in.

The tantrum from the baby was still continuing in the car, apparently he was upset about life in general, so over the noise from him, the noise coming from Jake (he was singing) and the hum of the engine Hubby and I were screaming to each other things like "Did you grab the dvd player?" "Did you get bottled water?" "Did you pack Grandma's card?" "Did you go pee-pee?" (after a little confusion I realized that last comment was directed toward my five-year-old.)

Finally we pulled out of the driveway, but not before Hubby spilled coffee all over the dash. I suggested we skip getting gas (we had enough to get there) and head for the freeway. Hubby asked if I grabbed his stack of business cards (that was a big fat NO from me) and then he began to lecture me on how he was hungry and very disappointed that there were no snacks for him in the car, and why wasn't I more prepared. I said, "I'm sorry, I didn't realize I had to feed three children this morning." Then I said, "I thought you already ate?" Apparently only eating two pieces of bacon doesn't constitute a breakfast.

We reached the freeway and got about two exits from the house when Hubby threw his hands in the air and exclaimed,"Oh great! Look at my shoes!" Sure enough, he was wearing his ratty, beat-up, five year old, black and white Addidas flip-flops. These are referred to as the "poop shoes" in our house because we throw them on to go out back and pick up dog poop. I busted a gut laughing, and insisted that he turn around. We headed back to our house and I ran inside to grab him a change of shoes, snacks and a hefty amount of business cards. Back on the road we went...