spring break

Husband had a business trip that would steal him away for the whole week.  So with my 2 week old baby, and three older girls at home for the whole week, I was a little nervous.  The girls adore their brother and are actually pretty helpful, but that’s a lot to juggle!  But we dove in and thoroughly enjoyed our little stay-cation.  We elected not to go anywhere since the baby is so young.  But I tried to find something every day to make Spring Break special.

We started with a great weekend.  On Saturday, Husband took the girls to run a few errands and pick up some supplies.  They stopped by grandpa’s house to pick something up and ended up spending several hours putting in Grandpa’s garden.  Z and I stayed home to cuddle and watch the first session of conference.  The girls and husband were able to join me for the second session and much to their delight, the girls got to do “conference cups”.  After the session, husband worked hard outside to finish off our garden boxes and plant some starts.  Meanwhile I cleaned the inside as best I could to get ready for an appraisal on Monday morning (for a refinance).  The girls ran back and forth, playing and being helpful.  Eventually we got everyone bathed and ready for bed with a quick cuddle movie. 

On Sunday we drove north to my brother’s house for a big family dinner.  The kids were thrilled to play with cousins and Z got passed around for baby cuddles.  We watched the afternoon session of conference together, doing conference cups which were a big hit but definitely harder with such a big group!  And then lounged around reluctant to leave as the kids played awhile longer.  Finally we loaded up and made the drive home, stopped to scrounge a quick dinner at 7-Eleven on the way home.

Husband left before the sun was up to catch his flight.  Which means he missed the excitement—L became violently ill, presumably from our 7-Eleven snacks since she had something different than everyone else.  Fortunately, we already had doctor appointments scheduled for L’s 8 year well child check up and baby Z’s 2 week check up for Monday.  So we made it through the appraisal and then a sitter came to play with A and E (and spent most the afternoon at the park) while I took L and Z to the doctor.  Doc agreed it was likely food poisoning/intolerance and other than that, L is doing great.  Baby Z took a turn with the doc as well.  Doc was impressed with how much he’s grown already and reported that everything looks great.  We dropped off prescriptions, enjoyed some quiet time for lunch at home and then piled everyone in the car to run errands.  We had to take Z to the hospital lab for his PKU test (the girls were very anxious as they watched) and then rented a movie from redbox on the way home.  The girls made beds on the couches and we stayed up late for a movie night/sleepover.

I tried to sleep in Tuesday morning while the girls watched their Redbox movie again.  And then we spent most of the day working on our fairy houses, painting milk jugs and constructing popsicle stick doors and hot gluing fabric leaves to make a roof.  Then we ordered pizza and played the wii all evening.

Wednesday was another lazy day at home.  I left the girls with a sitter so I could run some errands while they went to the park.  And then we redboxed another new movie that night.

On Thursday, I was feeling particularly brave and we took a field trip to the zoo.  We invited some friends to meet us there (especially so I wouldn’t be the only adult) and had a great time.  We took a picnic lunch and visited lots of favorite animals.  After the zoo I had a few errands to run, picking stuff up for the weekend.  The baby got pretty fussy so as I looked for a place to stop and feed him, we found a See’s Candy store.  The girls were in heaven and had a great time picking out “Gram suckers” and truffles for dessert.  And finally we made it to Costco for an epic shopping trip (and ice cream).

Friday was spent at home.  Z was having a particularly fussy day and wouldn’t let me put him down.  So the girls spent most of the day playing in the back yard.  They set up an obstacle course, jumped on the trampoline, read books in the sunshine and played with chalk—sometimes drawing pictures and sometimes grinding it up to make magical potions.  Then that evening, company began to arriving.  My grandma and aunt were first, eager to meet the baby and showered us with gifts.  Then my parents made it and we met them for dinner at Arby’s.  I got the girls to bed and then lounged with the other grown ups until husband arriving home from the airport, bringing my kid sister home with him!  Then we stayed up late, doing last minute preparations for our very exciting Saturday….