On the road - Days 2, 3 & 4

After our little miscalculation on the first day, we knew we would be spending over 12 hours in the car on Thursday. Good thing we all got a good night sleep...

We split our day between Utah (where there are also few rest areas)


and Colorado (where there are rest areas, but they don't allow pets).


Finally, we made it to Chad and Juli's where there were some cold beers, lemonade and steaks fresh off the grill to greet us.

They read our mind.

We spent that night and all of Friday with them, little Will, and Jed the dog. (Carter the cat was on a hiatus for his own safety). Needless to say Sadie, Linus, Tyson and Canyon were in heaven.

Of course I forgot my camera when we took everyone (dogs included) on a 3 hour hike through town and to the dog park. But I did manage to remember it on our picnic that night in Boulder.


What a great trip, and the best way I can think of to break up 4 full days of driving. Boulder/Louisville is absolutely gorgeous, and spending a full day relaxing in the sun with our friends was terrific. Thanks for your hospitality!

Today was a long day driving through the farmlands and cornfields of eastern Colorado and Nebraska. Luckily, the kids were in the best mood ever and provided hours of entertainment.

(And I will put in a plug for Nebraska's rest areas - frequent, clean and very dog friendly).

Right now we're once again trying to get the kids to fall asleep which is proving to be futile. We keep telling them that we only one more day until we reach our new home, but they don't seem to be listening.

I think we're all ready to be in Chicago.

(I'm not sure when I'll have access to internet again after tonight, but stayed tuned for our trip's conclusion...)

On the road - Day 1

It's finally happening. We've hit the road and made our way to St. George, Utah. We thought we were right in between San Diego and Denver, but it turns out we were off by about 100 miles. Oh well.

As for today, the kids (and dogs) have done remarkably well. After an hour and a half of loading up the car this morning, we said good-bye to San Diego.


We thought it would take us about 10 hours since we were planning on hitting every rest stop and letting both the kids and dogs run. What we weren't planning on was the number of rest stops that actually exist in the southwest.

Go on, take a wild guess.

One.

That's right, one measly little rest stop. What? Doesn't anyone on the west coast need to pee?

Not able to hold it anymore, we took our first pit stop on the side of the road in the middle of the desert.

Our second stop was in the parking lot of a casino. (And I can't believe I forgot to take a picture of that one).

Shortly afterwords we passed the only rest stop for 420 miles, but we were too annoyed to stop there. Instead, we stopped at a dirt lot across from another casino on an Indian reservation.

All in all we actually left the car for a total of 20 minutes, not the 2 or 3 hours we had planned on because there was no where for everyone to run...oh, and it was 103 outside.

The good news: we made it to our hotel in record time. We checked in at 2:30, unloaded the car, and took the dogs for a walk. This hotel also has a little kids wading pool that seemed safe enough for me to venture there with the kids by myself. (This was great for the first 5 minutes when the kids were timid, but after about 20 minutes they were throwing themselves underwater head first and waiting for me to rescue them - we didn't stay much longer). Now Brian and I are sitting in the corner of the room in the dark and begging our children to Go to sleep already!

This was after we sang them Happy Birthday.

But I think now they're expecting cake.

Happy 3rd birthday, kiddos. We love you.

(By the way, we completely forgot it was the kids birthday until my mom reminded us. Terrible mother...can't even remember the kids birthday).

The homestretch

It seems like just last week Brian found out he got the job at Northwestern. Now, all of a sudden, we have movers loading up the truck and we're planning to hit the road at the crack of dawn tomorrow. It's all very surreal.

During the past few weeks there have been many good-byes and many farewell parties, and for the most part I think we were able to see almost everyone before we head out. Luckily we were able to see one of the kids' primary nurses from the NICU too.

Angie was either with Sadie or Linus since their first week in the hospital, and she stayed on a double shift (almost 20 hours) to make sure that she was the last one to be with Sadie when she was discharged. She was also the first one ever to hold both kids at the same time when Sadie was finally allowed to go home.

(Yes, it was 14 long weeks before I got to have both kids in my arms at once). I absolutely love Angie. Despite their tumultuous beginnings, we got pretty lucky when it came to others caring for our kids.

A few days later, Becca came to stay with us. Here I was thinking we would have some time to hit some sites, run a few errands, have a nice relaxing vacation...What was I thinking?!? Becca was basically our live-in babysitter for 3 days while Brian and I ran around like crazy people. She entertained the kids non-stop, and then took a break to clean out our trashcans. What a saint! She waited to leave until Brian caught his plane, and I was mostly caught up on everything that needed to get done here. Hopefully when she visits us in Chicago for Thanksgiving we can make it up to her with lots and lots of food. Thanks Becca!

Brian is now back home after being gone for about 36 hours - thank God! Trying to occupy the kids in a small room with only a few toys while the rest of the house is in a packing frenzy is no small feat. They were totally and utterly bored after about 20 minutes despite my excitement over Finding Nemo and Cars. Sadie and Linus just don't have the same love of television that I do. But, we had a nice reprieve when Ethan and Lucas stopped by...even though our friends could sense how boring our house was and just wanted to get the heck out of there. It was great to see them one last time, and we appreciate the sacrifice.

Now I am watching the movers pack up the last of our belongings and loading them up with the Tacoma. Brian is at Legoland with the kids, and the dogs will be picked up from the kennel this afternoon. Our landlord is coming by later tonight to get the keys. Crazy.

Tonight we will be spending the night in our empty place one last time.


Call me pessimistic, but I don't have high expectations for the next few days. We estimate about 40 hours of driving in 5 days with a much anticipated and needed stop in Denver at the Pearson's. But, if this family can do a cross-country car trip with triplets and a baby, then maybe I need to have a more positive attitude.

San Diego has been good to us. Without living here I honestly believe one or both kids wouldn't be here today. Heck, I probably wouldn't have even been able to get pregnant. Brian definitely wouldn't have been able to get a job at Northwestern. We wouldn't have made such good friends or been able to reconnect with our old ones. I hope Chicago treats us just as well...but San Diego has set the bar pretty high.

The daredevil and the princess

Ever since he turned 2, I have lovingly referred to Linus as "my little monkey" because the boy can climb. Not only is he really, really good at climbing on anything and everything, but he absolutely loves to climb....on me, on Sadie, on chairs, on ladders, on bookshelves, on tipped-over bikes on top of tables (which I don't condone by the way)...you name it and he'll climb it.

Lately, Linus has spent a little less time climbing and a little more time jumping. For a couple of days he was happy to just jump like a frog. Then he had to jump off of stuff because he wanted to jump "really, really high". Lately, he's not content to just jump off of stuff, but he has to jump over stuff...preferably something living, like me or the dogs. Now he keeps asking me to move further and further away from him. Just call him Evel Knievel.

As you can see, Brian is a little nervous about this new game.

But, it still is so much fun to watch.



(Notice Little Miss Sadie? Yep, ever since Kate and Emily came to visit in their pretty dresses wearing nice hairbands, Sadie has walked out of her room every morning with a dress in hand insisting that she put it on immediately. She also brings me her brush and hairbands so I can fix her hair. And here I thought she was a mini me...the last time I wore a dress was at my wedding.)

Storytime

Another favorite weekly pastime in our house is heading to the library for Tuesday storytime. When we first started going there weren't too many participants and the handful of kids who were there weren't that interested in paying attention. But, it was something to do on Tuesdays and I was determined that Sadie and Linus would be exposed to some structured circle time if it was going to kill all of us.

After awhile, more kids started coming, and the librarian livened things up with songs and puppets interspersed between the books she read. Sadie and Linus started talking about storytime enthusiastically, which contradicted their stone-faced expressions while we were actually "participating", but who's to judge?

Several months later, the librarian left to join another library and we were left without a leader at storytime. Enter parent volunteers.

What? You think I volunteered? Give me a break - the thought of trying to lead a bunch of kids under the age of 4 is giving me heart palpitations as I write this.

Now, despite risking this blog turning into a Jessica love-fest, I'm going to rave over how much better storytime is now that the parents (aka Jessica) is leading the group. Don't believe me? See for yourself:



Word is spreading...pretty soon you'll have to buy tickets to get a seat for the show. This is just one more thing that we're really going to miss when we move.

Our last visitors

Now that everyone knows we're leaving San Diego, we've had a few last minute visitors wanting to get in some quality beach time. (Who can blame them?)

First, Heidi, Joey, Nick and Mo dropped in for a few days. Even though Heidi is turning into a regular visitor (which we love), this was Joey and Nick's first time to California. What better way to welcome them than with a trip or two to the beach...

...and Legoland?



Then Bruce, Laurie, Kate and Emily stayed with us for a few days too.

Of course we had some quality beach time

and an obligatory trip to Hodads.

But it was just fun watching the kids all play together at home too.

Thanks for flying out here to visit everyone - it was much fun to see you! We love having people stay with us, and it was pretty easy to twist some arms while we're here in Southern California. I'm not to sure it's going to be as easy to convince friends and family to take a trip to Chicago for some winter fun...

...maybe we can entice you with sledding at the park?

Or we can just get a vat of hot chocolate at Costco and play Scrabble inside where it's warm.

The 3rd year

Yes, it's about that time...

Time for Linus and Sadie's annual video. (Grandparents, check your mailboxes soon).

This last year has gone by so quickly. It's amazing to see how much they have changed in the past year. I hope you all enjoy it as much as I did making it!

Make an on-line slide show at www.OneTrueMedia.com

Life line

After spending 14 weeks in the NICU and another 7 months at home taking care of the kids, I was really going stir-crazy. When Sadie and Linus reached 10 months, I finally left the house with them for the first time (that wasn't a doctor appointment) and went to a twins club event.

There was a New Mom's Tea in which all moms who were pregnant or had twins a year or younger could get together and commiserate. I don't remember exactly how many moms were there...maybe 40 or 50?...But there were a lot.

And it was completely overwhelming.

Needless to say I parked my two crawling/cruising kids in the corner so they wouldn't smother all of the babies and looked around in horror. Thinking this would probably be the last time in my life I would leave the house because it was proving to be too much for me, I was getting ready to pack up the kids and head back home. Then, the greatest thing in the world happened.

I met two moms who invited me to join their playgroup. (Insert a chorus of angels singing Alleluia here).

And my life changed for the better. (Thanks Marie and Jessica!)

For the next 2+ years, the kids and I spent at least one day a week with the best group of women you could imagine. At first we would bring blankets and toys, spread out under a tree in the park, and chat about anything and everything. (Well, since I had the crawlers/cruisers I would get snippets of conversation, but hey, I'll take what I can get). Occasionally we would also have playgroup at someone's house.

Then we graduated to a little fenced-in grassy area once more and more kids started crawling away. Then a fenced-in basketball court, which had more room for them to roam. And now we spend most playgroups at a park watching all of the kids climbing ladders or riding bikes.

I honestly believe that having this group of women to talk to kept me sane these last couple of years.

There's nothing better than to share triumphs, problems and stories with people who care about your kids as much as you do. And vice-versa.


Well, a couple of nights ago I went to my last monthly Mom's Night Out with them. (Sniff, sniff). They joked that I would have to teleconference from now on...I'm seriously considering taking them up on that. (Especially since being singled out as the "birthday girl" so I could be serenaded and have dessert brought to me with a candle is more than a little embarrassing - joining them on the phone is safer). I'm not sure what's in store for us in Chicago, but I don't know if I could win the lottery twice and meet up with people as great as these.

Thanks for literally keeping me afloat the last couple of years, ladies! I'm really going to miss you all.

Time flies

These past couple of weeks have been so much fun with family and friends in town (more posts on that to follow), but now we're back to cleaning out our house before we move. It's amazing how much random stuff you can find while going through closets:

I've found a whole stack of stuff that I had in my hospital room while on bedrest including books, puzzles, and huge cards decorated with pictures from family and friends.

I've found random pictures of the kids taken while in the NICU tucked inside various preemie books.

And when I cleaned out the kids keepsake box, I found little preemie diapers, tiny preemie pacifiers, wristbands and the smallest blood pressure cuffs you've ever seen.

I can't believe that just a few short years ago, Linus had more than enough room in his bath bucket...

...and now look at him.

Time really does fly.