Tag Archives: vacation

On camping with small children: A compilation of Haiku, and a contest for you.

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Matt says, “Five hour drive.”

We go on and on and on.

There eight hours later.

 

Mosquitos abound.

They stalk me and consume me.

My flesh, bug manna.

 

Lost in the forest,

Children say, “I can’t go on!”

First family bike ride.

 

Please go to bed now.

There’s no time to brush your teeth.

Smores are good for smiles.

 

Day Two: Must shower.

What? I forgot underwear?

Heaven help me.  (Sob.)

 

I say “stop!” a lot.

My voice echoes through the air.

Children don’t listen.

 

Old people like quiet.

They go to camp in nature.

Then my kids arrive.

 

Oh, Summer Solstice,

Sunny day is long and bright.

Children wake at five.

 

Scripture reading time.

Sorry, Mom’s gasp interrupts.

Her foot has a tick.

 

Four days, four state parks.

Dirt roads and pop-up trailer.

All hail DVDs.

 

Laughing, playing days.

Little children get so tired.

It is all worth it.

 

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So how was your weekend?

 

I think it’s time to ressurrect the Diapers and Divinity Poetry Contest.  Write a Haiku* or two about summer vacation with children.  All entries must be in by Saturday night, and on Monday, I’ll put up a poll so you can vote for your favorite.  The winner will get a summer spot on my sidebar  (It’s a great honor, trust me.) and I’ll send you some kind of summer treat…. to be determined.  This is an easy one; haiku doesn’t even have to rhyme. 🙂  Hit me with your best shot.  Leave your entry/entries in the comments for this post.

 

*Haiku is a Japanese form of poetry, short and simple.  The Americanized version is only three lines long:  1st line is 5 syllables, 2nd line is 7 syllables, and 3rd line is 5 syllables.  No need to rhyme.  For amazing examples of how this works, scroll up and see the masterpieces above.  Each little stanza is one complete haiku.

 

(I’m sorry I missed posting for the GCBC this weekend.  We just rolled into town tonight and I’ll try to get up this week’s article very soon along with my comments on last week’s.  Thanks for your patience.)

Financial security and other mini-vacation lessons

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We took a mini-vacation this past weekend because Matt has about two weeks off of school in between semesters.  I found a great hotel deal online, which simply required us to participate in a 90-minute time-share sales pitch,* and came with free food vouchers and everything.  So we packed up the kids, a few bags of clothes, and a variety of road trip entertainment items (read: DVD player, Leapster, junk food, and a pile of library books).  Before we left to come home this morning, I made the mistake of looking at some Webkins at a store.  This, to Grant and Clark, was a bona-fide contractual offer that a Webkinz purchase was in our near future.  Grant could not understand why the purchase was not made, and spent most of the trip home speculating about when we would go to a local store and pick up the Webkinz that I had cruelly and carelessly forgotten to purchase this morning.  I told him we’d take a look at the bank account when we got home and see about the possibility.

He immediately corralled me to the office upon arriving home.  I had transferred a vacation budget into my checking account right before we left town.  I didn’t do a great job of keeping track of spending, so I cringed a little when I looked it up.

“Uh oh, Grant, we have a problem.”

“What?”

“Well, it says here that my bank account has -$18.73.”

“Is that enough for a Webkinz?”

“Um, no.  It means I have $18.00 below zero.“
(Long pause.)
“Don’t worry, mom.  I know where we have thousands and thousands of dollars.”
He ran across the room and came back with this:
DSCF2027Wow.  If only I had known, we could have vacationed in New Zealand.  Just leave it to a six-year-old to solve all your problems.  Verdict: Chores for Webkinz.  Hopefully, he won’t get done until the next payday.


On Sunday, we met up with my good friend Molly and her family.  I’m stealing pictures of Grant, Clark, and Natalie from her blog because she’s one of those moms who actually thinks to bring along a camera when her family has a little outing.  It was great to see her.  She’s on my top-ten cool list.
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p.s.  Indoor water parks are really fun, but they have way too many stairs for out-of-shape people, especially the adult variety that are forced to carry all their children’s inner-tubes over and over and over again.
p.p.s.  Even if you look over your things 7 million times, you will always leave something behind in your vacation locale, like a portable DVD player power cord that is still plugged into the wall behind the dresser, and the library book that is still in a booth at the local Pizza Pub.

*Those people who do time-share pitches are tricky, tricky, tricky.  If Matt had his way, we would now be the proud owners of 40-years-worth of tropical vacations and an Alaskan helicopter skiing package.  Since I am only slightly more disciplined, and withstood their amazing deals and plummeting prices, for four– yes, FOUR– hours, we are instead only the proud owners of a pre-purchased vacation to Disney World that we had already planned on making when Matt graduates in the spring.  Call me a sucker if you will.

p.p.p.s.  If you are a careless packer, you might have to use your husband’s deodorant, and it’s a weird, unpleasant kind of feeling when you find yourself smelling manly.
p.p.p.p.s.  That Excedrin Tension Headache really works.
The end.
(I have just a few more Women’s Conference classes to review over the next several days, so watch for those, and then we’re back to our regularly scheduled . . . um, stuff.)

Vacation can kill you, and other random thoughts

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chuck27e20cheeseThis vacation in Atlanta has been fairly laid back, but I still feel exhausted.  Here are a few important lessons I have learned this time around:

  • If my children are given the choice between going to heaven or going to Chuck E. Cheese, it’s a no-brainer.  (Oh, and apparently exchanging wads and wads of tickets for a one-inch Laffy Taffy and a mini Tootsie-Roll pop is much more rewarding than I would have imagined.)
  • Lots and lots of rain is only slightly better than lots and lots of snow.  You still get cabin fever.
  • When your mom asks you to help her shop for jeans, wear comfortable shoes and pack a lunch.
  • An air mattress does not count as a bed, I don’t care what anyone tells you.
  • If you go on a leisurely walk with your dad in a hilly neighborhood while pushing your 2-year-old in a stroller, it’s possible that your leg muscles might combust.
  • If your husband loves to browse eBay and Craig’s List, it may not be a wise budget move to leave him unsupervised at home for eight days.
  • If you would like to renew your faith in your children, just listen to your parents talk about them to their friends.  You’d think they were national treasures raised by a herd of angels.
  • Vacation makes your children lose their will to sleep.  No matter how hard you try to maintain a routine, they go to bed late and wake up too early.
  • When your mom thinks that homemade play-doh would be a fun idea for your kids, she’s right.  It will entertain Clark and Natalie for more than an hour and the mess is at her house instead of yours.
  • Note to self:  Do not save all of your children’s old books and toys for 35 years so that your grandchildren can play with them some day.  Chances are only about 23% that said grandchildren will survive the dust, mildew, small parts and 274 broken modern safety laws.  If you choose to break this “rule,”  keep plenty of band-aids and Benadryl on hand.
  • I really like Springtime, and really dislike Arctic wintertime.
  • It doesn’t really matter much how many years have passed or whether the homestead has changed location, spending time with parents and family always feels like home.

Well, that’s about as deep as I’m feeling today.  I’ve got to get some sleep so I can survive that 3 kids on the airplane thing tomorrow.

Tomorrow’s the last day to enter a limerick in the limerick contest.  There are some fun ones so far.  Watch for voting starting Wednesday.

And also Wednesday is the day you’ll need to reset the RSS feed for this blog as it switches to www.diapersanddivinity.com .  From what I understand, Google Reader, your sidebar post-updater-thing, or any RSS feed won’t pick up any new posts unless you re-subscribe.  Please come back and find me again or I’ll miss you.

And I’m going to Women’s Conference at BYU at the end of April… is anyone going to be there as well?  Might be fun to meet up for lunch one day or something.

Oh, and guess what?!  I actually won something in that giveaway at Mormon Mommy Blogs— a cool photo book.  Plus a bunch of other people I like won stuff too, so I was so excited when I saw the big announcement.  They also invited/approved for me to guest post there soon and I’m anxious about what to write… heavy on diapers or heavy on divinty, or a clever mix of both (that’s trickier sometimes).  Any advice?  Feel free to throw out a topic, too.