Well, it's Friday night and Winter Break is officially over.
I think Winter Break is a grand idea. In the middle of February, it sounds so idyllic to escape the final cold days of winter and lay on a beach somewhere tropical. I'm all for it! But sadly, we didn't have the funds for such a vacation. So I really think they should have cancelled Winter Break in honor of the recession. Apparently, though, we are just about the only family in Scarsdale who is saving their ca$h right now, because everyone else got out of town for warmer weather. Lucky ducks.
So I made the most of what I had (a zoo pass!) and decided we'd do fun things in NY that we rarely have time to do otherwise. Thankfully on Monday, the big kids went into the city with Trav. He had some work to do [cleaning out the office] and they were going to work on Calder's 100 days of school project. Cros and I had a day of fun, which involved not much of anything besides a trip to Stew Leonard's and a baby adventure in the cold and muddy backyard. We drove in to pick them up, and all the stuff Trav cleared out, around 8 PM. Crosby wreaked havoc around the office while we loaded things in the car, and then we stopped by the American Girl store to get Scout "Steps High". It's a horse that's the size of a dog, in case you don't know. Her plan is to get the doll that rides it for her upcoming birthday. [Nana, hope you are writing this down in your Daytimer... her name is Kaya.]
The next day we headed to the Brooklyn Aquarium. If I could give this week a theme, it would be: Crosby is really hard to take places. Catchy, no? He loved the aquarium, as we knew he would [he's a big fan of water], but once he got to an attraction, he'd refuse to leave. I'd have to forcibly pick him up, kicking and flailing, and move him to the next spot. He also spent a lot of time trying to figure out how to touch the water he was seeing, but luckily, he couldn't get to any of it.
This is the only picture I was able to get. I was too busy trying to make sure I didn't lose the kids [I actually did lose Scout for about 5 minutes, but that was her fault, not mine.] It was super stressful, so I was relieved we had the dryer repairman coming the next day so we couldn't go far from home.
Wednesday and Thursday were mostly playdates and frustration. The Sears man informed me it would cost $475 to repair the dryer, making it pointless to fix. But I still had to pay him $80 to tell me that. Nice! Plus I've been out of clothes for a few days now, and was really banking on having the dryer up and running by the afternoon. No such luck. So I ended up washing several loads of clothes (Scout had an incident the night before that required ALL her bedding to be washed, along with the entire bathroom, at 3 am) and taking them over to Palmers to dry. Super fun.
Today the new dryer arrived (I didn't waste any time ordering a new one, once I had checked Consumer Reports) and luckily, the guys who delivered it charged me very little to hook it up. [It was all "under the table... just between us" as Pepe told me over and over. Got it. Sears will not be held responsible when it turns out to be a bad electrical job and the whole thing explodes]. So since we got that done in the morning, and Scout had a playdate and Calder got to hone his Lego Star Wars skillz for about 6 hours, we were ready for another outing. Destination? Ikea!
I have a real love/hate relationship with Ikea. Today I was returning several items Travis had bought a few months ago, that didn't work out. It seems as if every time we go there, we end up with a few things that have to be returned, which is a major pain, and then we end up spending way more than the value of the items we returned. I'm happy to report that I broke the cycle today. I showed miraculous restraint as I returned $130 worth of merchandise and only left having spent $27... on shower curtains, a child's tea set (we need it... we really do!), and some tea lights.
The real problem today was my fault. Crosby had refused to take a nap, so he fell asleep in the car on the way there, which was my plan. The problem being that I had taken the stroller that I always keep in the trunk out the day before, because we had taken bikes and scooters to the park to play (the weather was a balmy 45 degrees, so we had to make the most of it). Normally he'll transfer to his stroller and sleep for a while, which would have been lovely. We could have returned the stuff without incident and the kids could have played in the ball pit for a while, while I sat on the couches and chilled. But no such luck. He woke up the second we went into the store... maybe because I tried to lay him down in a shopping cart to nap. He turned into a lunatic, clawing at my face and throwing his body with force all over the place. There was no other option but to hold him as tightly as I could, to keep him from seriously hurting himself. This went on for about 20 minutes, no lie. It was a nightmare. Finally he calmed down and we were able to venture through the store. Here are my grainy pictures taken with my iphone:
Scout was the only one who wanted to stop in the cafe and eat, go figure. The rest of us played in the kids' area while she ate dinner #1.
Calder got eaten by several stuffed animals, but we made it out alive. Phew.
Crosby looks deceptively happy here. In fact, he was a total nightmare. This was the only period he wasn't screaming while trying to rip off my head.
I just thought these lights looked so cool. I love Ikea (when I don't hate it).
So in summary, Winter break: Over. I'm wiped out. If you made it this far, I can't believe you're still reading. You deserve a medal or something.
