First of all, my MUCHO THANKS to those fabulous folks who guest posted for me! It's a fun, running tradition some of us have been doing. So, thank you to Dark Damian, Laurie, FreshAirLover, Howard, and of course, to Frychk, who was willing to coordinate the whole shebang. I didn't have much in the way of internet access (which was really kind of nice) so I am catching up on my blog (and others) now.

So, on to the vacation.

In a nutshell, we were gone nine days. NINE DAYS. With a two and a half year old boy, five pieces of luggage and a carseat and pack and play. We were THAT family you see in the airport. Stressed out mom. Dad pushing an inordinate amount of crap around on a cart. The screaming child. Oh yes, we owned that title this last week.

I give you the first round of the trip: Denver to Portland:

Saturday:

We are standing in line at DIA's security. The three people in front of us had purchased a big bag full of Panda Express to eat later. And it smelled like rotten egg farts. That's the best description I could come up with, really. It was awful bad.

On the flight into Portland, my son threw a giant fit on the plane. Likely, it was nap time and he was too out of sorts to just FALL asleep. As we are leaving the plane, the attendants said, "Make sure you gather all of your luggage AND CHILDREN when you leave". Pretty sure that was meant for us.

We dropped off our son with the grandparents and headed to dinner with some friends that have the coolest house and backyard ever in the entire world. We sat out on the patio, had fish they'd just caught in Canada, drank a bunch of wine, hung out in front of the outdoor fireplace, and I dreamed I lived in Oregon.

Sunday:

We stayed at a hotel this time because my husband's dad and his stepmom now have three cats, and my husband is really allergic to them. Plus, those cats are bat shit crazy. And his dad and stepmom are bat shit about the cats. (for my son's second birthday, they gave him a picture of their second cat in a cat frame)

While at the hotel having breakfast that morning, my son runs over to the railing to look at the little koi pond/river they have. He goes to hand my husband his pacifier, and it falls in the water. The nasty, stinky ass water. My husband dutifully rolls up his pant legs, climbs over the railing, with breakfast crowd watching, and retrieves the Nuk.

On our way out of the hotel about thirty minutes later, we're walking through the revolving door and my son gets his foot stuck UNDER the door. And it's still moving, and it's attempting to jack up my baby's foot. My husband pushes the door back and breaks it. Kind of. It was fixed when we got back, so I'm going with "temporarily fucked up by the HDFamily" for 200, Alex.

And then to his side of the family's reunion. Great spread. Lots of kids. Lots of fun. No neuortic cats. They are locked up in the room because (according to grandma), "They just don't do well with large crowds of people and Barney will run away". One less, if you ask me.

Monday:

We drove to the Oregon Coast, and I absolutely LOVE that drive. You duck in an out of little towns with tons of great little (and big) wineries along the way. The scenery is beautiful, too.

I took this picture on the way to the Coast because, unless I take photos of myself on the trip, they don't get taken. So there.






We had a great lunch at Mo's. Except for the part where I picked up the cup full of crayons to give to my son and someone's wine and chew residue came spilling out onto my hands. Yup. That wasn't good. Quite nasty, actually.

After lunch, took HDToddler out back to see the ocean and let him run around on the beach. HDHusband was walking with HDT, and I guess HDT tripped and fell in. Took a big drink of the ocean, according to my husband, and was none too pleased with it all.

We drove down to see the Aquarium and checked out all the crabs. We stopped for Tillamook ice cream on the way home and every single person in there topped 300 lbs. On the way out of town, there were signs everywhere saying, "Porn Hurts" (which I found funny, very) and a woman walking a raccoon on a LEASH.

We drove back to Portland and my son fell asleep in the car. He didn't sleep that long. He didn't eat that well that day. So, by the time we got into Portland, he was awake and hungry and pissed. We were trying to get to the restaurant to meet up with the grandparents, but traffic was kicking our ass.

We get there, and my kid is LOSING IT. We sit down and offer him whatever, and no, it won't eat it at all. In fact, he begins to scream so loudly when he sees we're going to strap him into the high chair A-GAIN. I take him outside, where he continues to have a meltdown. And this, my friends, is when I about killed a man.

Him: Hey, you need SuperNanny 911.

Me: I'm sure she's good, but today, my kid is just tired and hungry.

Him: (shaking his head) NO. YOU NEED SUPERNANNY 911.

Me: NO, YOU NEED TO MOVE YOUR ASS RIGHT NOW AND WALK AWAY FROM ME!

And then, his wife pulls him away, bitching him out. Now, I get the fact that there are kids who don't mind and have great issues. But then are kids who are tired and hungry and aren't fully equipped yet with WORDS to use.

We take our food, box it up, and finish eating back at the grandparent's out. And then I cry. And I get a raging headache that lasts well into the night and first part of Tuesday.

Tuesday:

I leave my son with my husband and go out for lunch and shopping with a girlfriend in the Pearl District. She is a local artist there and had a good idea of some neat little shops to go into.

We were having some iced coffee outside of one little place, and believe me, the place itself was probably very classy, but we were not. We were pretty casual. As we're sitting there, this car turns a corner. We've been watching people for a while sitting there (did you know man-skirts are REALLY in there??), so this car was no different. Just someone new to look at while we drank our coffee. BUT NO. Crazy Lady is hanging out the window yelling this exact tirade, "I LOVE TIM McGRAW!! I WILL MARRY HIM!!!" (sees us staring at her) "FUCK YOU! STOP JUDGING ME YOU SLUT!!!" It was the slut bit that had me laughing.

Met Husband and Son at a local fountain, watched some bag lady with the shirt 'Addicts Can Recover' try and pick up my son, yelled at her, and watched some homeless guy try and chat up a kid and have the dad go ape-shit on him.

We went back to the hotel, packed to leave the next morning for our flight into Reno.

I'll post on that tomorrow, I think. For now, I have a kid to feed and a house to clean up.

It is SO good to be home.