We started our last day without Daddy pretty early. We had plans to meet up with yet another friend from my Mom Group. This particular friend and I hadn’t every actually met in person before, but I was pretty excited. After a little discussion, it was decided we would meet at a splash pad, in a park in Mountain House, CA. We chose this location, because it was sure to be a nice, quiet play date, where the kids could play and we could sit and chat while watching them play. We wouldn’t need to be following behind them, unable to enjoy the company!
We were right. This was the perfect place for a play date. My friend, L, has a set of twins a bit older than mine, and also a daughter who was just turning one. She’s my hero. A fantastic mother, someone I look up to for so many reasons. She is open, honest, caring, spunky, fun, loving, kind, and isn’t afraid to be herself. She has fantastically well behaved littles, and it was a pleasure to get together!
Sure enough, she found us a perfect little home base, where we could watch the kids in both the splash pad area, but also the playground. It felt as if we’d been scheduling a weekly play date since babyhood. We each kept an eye on all the kids, and it was lovely to be able to leave Z playing, to take G to the potty.
Mountain House is not exactly close to San Jose- It was just about an hour to get there. Knowing this, I was hoping the kids would be able to get in a car nap on the way back.
Part of this plan was eating lunch before we got back on the road. Lucky for us, we were having such a great time, L agreed to join us for lunch! Things got a little dicey, since my kids were definitely tired and ready for their naps, but if anyone understands how quickly they can go from happy to overtired, it would be another twin mom, wouldn’t it!
Even with the overtired kids, it was still so difficult to drag me away from my time with L. It helped to know we’d be together again soon- in Vegas!
As hard as it was, I had no choice. We had to get in the car so the kids could sleep a bit before our 3pm appointment at the CVS Minute Clinic. Yes, our boy had been tugging on his ear and was being super cranky. Normally, I’d just keep an eye out and give it a chance to work itself out- but we were hopping on a plane in a couple of days, and I really wanted to avoid another screaming flight. If there was something going on in there, and we needed medication- I wanted to give it enough time to kick in before we boarded that red eye.
For those of you keeping score at home- yes, this is becoming a trend. Our last trip to Urgent Care was just about a month prior, and the poor dude had a double ear infection. This visit, however, it was determined to be fluid, but no infection. The doctor thought it would clear up on it’s own, and no medication was necessary. She encouraged me to bring him back if it seemed to get worse, instead of better.
Phew.
Remember that car nap? I don’t. It’s true. The kids were long past car nap. they fell asleep about 3 minutes before we got to CVS, and that was that.
We made it back to the hotel in time to meet up with the workers, and then we were off to Original Joe’s for a celebratory dinner- They were officially on vacation!
Of course, you can guess how that celebratory dinner ended… With my overtired kids coming close to losing it at the table. They were toeing the line when I made the executive decision to get them out. The food was delicious- and the portion sizes were HUGE. I was disappointed to have to leave with the kids, but it was really the only option at that point.
We did a quick bedtime, and I fell asleep with the kids.
We had a big day planned for TT Dad’s first day off, and I was really hoping we’d all be rested!