Weekend At Grandma's

This past weekend, Tim I and decided to paint our living room. We tore everything apart and only got the ceiling painted. The house was deemed unsafe for children and the boys and I spent every waking minute at my parents. My dad was going to visit my grandmother this weekend so the boys and I tagged along so Tim would be able to get the room painted and the house back in order. I learned this weekend that my son must spend his free time thinking of ways to torture me...

My dad picked us up at 7:00 on Saturday morning. Nick fell asleep, Collin sang his little heart out until we stopped for breakfast in La Vale (about halfway to my Gram's). We ate breakfast, and Collin actually ate sausage and pancakes, I fed Nick and we were on our way. Nick and Collin both fell asleep and stayed that way until we were almost there. Collin woke up singing his little heart out again and Nick woke up as we were driving through town, just about there. It was the best I could hope for on a 4 hour trip with my boys.

We had a lovely visit with my Grandma on Saturday. My Aunt Katie and my cousins Audrianna and Brittney came over for a while. Collin was well behaved, it was a really good day, except for the part where he made a jailbreak and I thought I'd lost him. Either he slipped out of the door after my Dad when he took some trash out, or he figured out how to open the door himself (I'm not sure which) but all the sudden I realized it was too quiet in the house. I called into the kitchen to see if he was with my Dad and Grams, they thought he was with me. I was feeding Nick at the time so my attention had been on him. My Dad went running out of the house up to the swings he'd been playing with Collin on earlier and sure enough, there was my little boy safe and sound. I have never been so frightened in my entire life! He walked in the door and told me he'd been bad. I just held him for a long time until he got so wiggly that I couldn't anymore. Last night I let him stay up late because there are no gates at my Gram's and her steps are steep. I wanted to be sure Collin would sleep before I put him in bed around 9:30 or so. Lord knows, I didn't need anymore jailbreaks. Nick and I went to bed around 11:30. And then the fun began...

I don't know what time it was, there was no clock in the room and no light to see my watch but Nick woke up. I heard him stirring and jumped out of bed to pop his pacifier back in his mouth so he wouldn't wake up his brother. We did this about 10 times before I finally gave in and fed him. He fell asleep nursing on the first side so I put him back to bed and laid down next to Collin who had somehow managed to occupy the entire full size bed. My head no sooner hit the pillow when Nick got up again. I jumped up and fed him on the other side. He fell asleep again and I put him in his pack and play. The odds were against me. As soon as I got back into bed and moved Collin over a bit, Nick was up again. I know all the rules against sleeping with babies and how dangerous it is, but I was desperate to get a little sleep so I put Nick on my chest and we both finally went to sleep.

I don't know what time Collin got up this morning but the next thing I knew, he was telling me Grampa and Katie were downstairs. (For some reason, he doesn't use titles with adults. My neighbor is just Joan and Aunt Katie is just Katie, we're working on this). Apparently, he had opened the door and gone out when he heard my Dad get up. Dad thought I'd let him out of the room because he'd shut the door behind himself. Another jailbreak! So Nick and I got up and went downstairs for breakfast. During breakfast Collin kept putting his hands in his diaper so I finally asked him what was in his diaper, he looked at me and said "poopies". I changed his diaper and went upstairs to pack up our clothes and the pack and play. Collin followed me and came in to say hello. I sent him back downstairs to see Grampa, or so I thought. As I finished cleaning up our room and went to go downstairs again, I passed the living room and Collin came our to greet me covered head to toe in dirt. He'd found an old potted plant that had long since passed away and had dumped the dirt all over the floor. I tossed his little butt in the bathtub but had neglected to bring his ear plugs so I couldn't wash his hair. I carried him back downstairs and put his diaper on again. I went back upstairs to clean up the dirt. Collin followed me and proceeded to remove his diaper. This would have been fine, however, he'd pooped again so now I had a diaperless kid with poop all over his rear and the diapers and wipes were downstairs. I scooped him up, carefully avoiding his rear end and rushed him down the stairs. I was trying to clean the poop up and he was trying his hardest to sit down. I finally got his butt clean and his diaper back on. This time I got his clothes on too for some added protection. I also finally managed to get the dirt cleaned up.

We finished visiting with my Grams and my Aunt and cousins, I fed Nick and it was time to go home. It was about 12:30 when we took off. I should have known I was going to pay for my nice trip up. First of all, it was raining and Nick was furious and screamed his little head off. Collin sang for a while and then fell asleep. Nick finally wore himself out and fell asleep for a bit. After maybe and hour and a half Nick woke up cranky so we stopped to feed him. He was fine but now Collin was cranky and it was his turn to scream. We were approaching La Vale again (Yes! Half Way Home!) when traffic came to a dead stop. I don't know what happened but it must have been bad because they closed off the road ahead of us and behind us and we sat there for about 40 minutes while they worked on re-directing traffic back down the nearest exit ramp and through a bunch of back roads until we finally picked up I-68 again. As we were sitting waiting Collin got cranky so I gave him a cookie. This kept him happy for a while and we were moving again so I was thinking things were pretty good again. Unfortunately, the cookies was one of those yummy cake-like cookies and Collin managed to crumble it all over the place. He began screaming because he wanted his hands cleaned up. We stopped at Sidling Hill to clean Collin and feed Nick who was awake and screaming again. Sidling hill is about an hour and a half from home. This was at 4:30, we should have already been home, or at least almost home. While I fed Nick, my Dad got himself and Collin something to drink. I made the mistake of handing the bottle to Collin while he was in his car seat and he promptly spilled 3/4 of it all over my mother's van. We cleaned that mess up and were finally on our way again. Thankfully, the kids settled down some, the rain slowed and the traffic kept moving. Dad dropped us off a few minutes after 6. The trip that should have taken about 4 hours had taken a miserable 5 and a half! And my poor Dad still had another 15-20 minutes to go... Remind me of this trip the next time I decide to take my boys on a long car trip. I don't think I'm going to forget this one any time soon though....