Travel Itch

I am itching to travel. I don’t say it out loud to anyone because then I get the very unsympathetic, “but you just went to Hawaii and Paris” comment. Yes, I did just go to Hawaii and Paris, but I want to see Thailand and Australia and South America and Greece, to name a small few. There is so much to see and so many cultures to explore, but that will all have to wait a little while.

My sister and I have been talking about a weekend getaway for many months now, and with our new babies it just hasn’t happened yet. I texted her yesterday and asked her where we should go. She texted back “Italy”. She was speaking my language. I immediately put myself in Italy with the Mediterranean sun beating against my face, sipping wine and eating cheese, salami and slurping homemade pasta. It was exhilarating for about 10 seconds. When I got home I told Chris about the text exchange and he said, “you should just go! Take our airline miles and go to Italy.” What? First of all, he is far more generous and giving than I am. Secondly, my sister and I can’t go to Italy right now. It just isn’t realistic in my life or hers. But I thought that was such a sweet and giving thing to say in response to a dreamy text message.

In light of my travel itch that I cannot scratch, I have picked up Eat, Pray, Love to read . . . again. The first time I picked it up the babies were very little and after reading a little less than a quarter of the book I gave it up. Elizabeth Gilbert and I were having a hard time relating to one another at the time. I couldn’t relate to her free spirited life of travel and leisure and her inability to see herself as a wife and mother. If she were reading my blog, she would not be able to relate to my life with newborn triplets and their sleepless nights, countless poopy diapers to change each day, not to mention laundry, bottles and a strong-willed overly-verbal three year old red head with an attitude. As I am getting back into the book with more sleep and less diapers and laundry, I am very much appreciating traveling with Liz through her cultural experiences and personal crossroads.

If I were to write my own book about cultural experiences and personal crossroads right now it would go something like this: I have no cultural experiences right now but my personal crossroad is how to take care of four puking kids with the stomach flu and still maintain a good attitude. Luckily, when all four kids were throwing up all over the house (the stairs, the playroom, the cribs, the bed, the couch, and even down that little crevasse in my bed between the mattress and the footboard – that hard to reach area) this last weekend, Chris was still in good health. We tag teamed the quadruple stomach flu all day on Sunday. While one of us stripped the kid that just threw up and bathed them or wiped them down, the other stripped sheets or cleaned the carpet and started yet another load of laundry. I didn’t have the stomach flu myself, in fact I was the only one who didn’t get it (even Nanny Laura got it), but let me tell you that I believe t hat I was just as miserable as the puke pack. Chris got the flu Sunday night and was down and out until Tuesday. Monday Nanny Laura called in sick with the flu, which left the mothership to manage a crew full of ailing and weary passengers . . . alone. Woes me.
We are finally all feeling better and there are two fun things happening around the house as far as almost 2 year old and their development. One is that Preston can repeat almost any word you ask him to. Ava, our speech therapist, has Preston repeat words that she says and he can repeat anything. Now, because he is a quite little man, he doesn’t talk a lot throughout the day, but it is exciting to know that if he is asked to talk, he can.

Also, we have been puzzling like crazy these days. It brings back memories of doing puzzle after puzzle with Ava starting when she was one. I think we have every Melissa and Doug puzzle ever made and at least half of the Ravensburger puzzles in existence. Doing these puzzles brings back mixed emotions: I loved spending this time with Ava doing puzzles, but I wished I wasn’t spending all my days doing puzzles. But now Ava will do puzzles with the babies and they all enjoy it very much. It is really wonderful to watch them work on these puzzles together and witness Ava be so proud of them and praise them when they get all the pieces into their proper spots.

So in my last email I mentioned how Violet perseveres. Well, she was determined to learn the right technique to doing puzzles and the other night she figured out just how to turn the puzzle piece to fit it in the spot perfectly. She must have done about 15 puzzles perfectly. This is what I love about her. She will keep trying to do something until she can do it well. She is starting to do this with speech. Before she wouldn’t even try to say something because I think she wasn’t ready, now she attempts to say so many words. I tell the speech therapist (the real one, not Ava) that she says a lot of words but it isn’t always pretty, and the speech therapist said it doesn’t matter if it doesn’t sound right, what matters is that she is trying to say the words.
As it rains and pours here I long for the sun. Oh sun how I love you so.

Until next time, the mothership is signing off.