Holidays plus

The plan was to leave at 10am. As usual, there were attempts to thwart the plan, but this time by some miracle, we still got away by 10:30. Are we getting better at this or are the little "thwartees" less intent on their mission?

Unfortunately, most good holidays begin with some transport time and this vacation was not to be any different. We all climbed into the car and headed west. The trip to Gunnedah was uneventful. Cutie and Percy behaved themselves and hubby and I had "quality time".

Percy accepts his chauffer driven fate stoically

We spent our first day with friends at their farm. We enjoyed the peace and quiet of a country property after 6 months in the city. While Percy inspected the back of his eyelids, Cutie found the trampoline, the chickens, and the family dog. Both Percy and Cutie were quite impressed by the chickens especially when they got to feed them.

Chickens are much safer when daddy holds them

We had a wonderful time catching up with friends and enjoying a sunny winter day.

The world got even better when we stayed with friends who had a trampoline. Other than staying in a hotel with its own playground and swimming pool, this is the next best thing as far as Cutie is concerned. Each day started with a request to "go trampoline?" whether the sun was up or not. She bounced as often as we would let her, only stopping to share with the other children.

The trampoline theme runs through our holiday. Hubby and I had job interviews for three of our "holiday" days. One of our interviews was with a family who had a trampoline (and a nice daughter who volunteered to take Cutie for a jump). Percy and Cutie held up well despite the constant moving about which was a relief for us. Yay! for the bedtime routine. Its portability really helped keep things calm at bedtimes.

The prize for achievement, however, goes to Percy who managed to take his first steps while we were away. We think he may have been inspired by a friend's twin boys who have been walking for several months now (same age), but he may just have been desperate to make a getaway. Whatever the reason, he plunged on ahead and there is no turning back now. Stay tuned for video when I can figure out how to put it on the site.

It seems we weren't the only people making a break from the city. Hubby's parents came out to the country, too. We took advantage of this neat arrangment by foisting a few cute kidlets on them one afternoon while we had yet another interview. When we returned to great grandma's house, we found her dining room chairs being used to barricade children into the "safe" zone with all available adults on dining duty. The kids, of course, were loving it.

Eventually, all good things must come to an end so we packed up the car and headed back home. Although Cutie was asking to "go home" from about day five, she must have changed her mind in the car. We had repeated requests to go to great grandma's house (even with tears a few times). When this didn't work, she resorted to diversionary techniques. Being 2 years old, she hasn't figured out the subtler points, but it did get my attention when she asked for help to get the paper out of her nose. Our sweet little girl, who had been using a piece of paper to make a "bandage" for her owie, had apparently become bored with that activity and moved on to more exciting things. A quick inspection confirmed the placement of more than one little flake so we pulled off at the next stop. Daddy and Percy went to explore a house on a truck while mommy extracted a pea-sized piece of paper from aforementioned orifice. The biggest challenge was not the actual procedure, but maintaining my "this is serious" mommy facade through the extraction and the "time out" that followed. When all was said and done, I just had to send her to daddy while I leaned against the car and had a good laugh.

Cutie plotting more diversionary techniques