A family at our school made arrangements for us to spend a night at Carlton Landing on Lake Eufaula tonight. It’s a short fall break, less than 24 hours altogether, but it’s so peaceful here, it’s worth it. Here’s to a little break from the tyranny of the urgent!
After a tiny family birthday celebration at home, Millie and I headed south. We checked into Great Wolf Lodge and have been having a super great time. She wanted to get the ear piercing out of the way, so we took a swimming break and went to the mall for a bit. Then back to the lodge for more swimming. Then dinner. Then more swimming.
The meaningful and the fun are both happening. The rest? Not so much. But that’s okay. She’s having a blast and that’s what matters.
We finally made it! It took all summer to get here and we’ve been looking forward to it all summer, but we’re here: Great Wolf Lodge in Grapevine, Texas. This is our second time and we have high hopes for a fantastic couple of days. I have slides calling to me now, or kids calling to me from the slides, rather, so peace out for now.
I drove a van full of kids (most of whom were my own) and followed another (none of whom were my own) all the way to Six Flags and back today and this is the reason I did it. Right here. True confessions. Okay, this and the Superman ride. And their version of the Tony Hawk which they call The Pandemonium, but which I really know is just the Tony Hawk.
And it was worth it. Okay, so I shared this with three of my kids and even the four of us couldn’t quite finish it, though we gave it a really good effort. I think that was the first time in history anyone in my family let some perfectly good funnel cake go in the trash, but what to do? They don’t allow you to take it with you on The Sombrero which is where we were headed next…
Today is the day we leave for an attempted family vacation. If you haven’t followed along for very long, then you don’t know we don’t usually have very good luck with said attempts, but here we go again. Our destination is familiar: The Dunham Family Farm in Illinois with a stop in St. Louis to visit old friends first. More trip, than vacation, we’re hoping for rest and rejuvenation. Crossing my fingers…now.
So much about this weekend was good and so much was hard. I have another post brewing about how things went down with the boys leaving and DHS “passing the buck” of responsibility on that to someone else and how really nobody takes responsibility and they don’t have to – this is just their job. I have more to say on that, but for now I want to focus on how thankful I am for my girls. They knew I was losing it and that I needed a little getaway. They came up with this packet of encouragement and sent it with me on my trip.
I have good girls.
And I’m thankful for them.
Today I found a municipal beach about a 15 minute walk from my hotel. It provided more of the “beach experience” I was hoping for. No waves, but it did have the sound of moving water and a swimming area, so I was able to get in. I was surprised by how warm the water was. I spent a lovely afternoon out there today and enjoyed watching families and beach food vendors and just soaking it all in. And seriously too, as I did forget to pack my sunscreen and the gift shop was closed, so I managed to get myself burned today.
And I also managed to stuff some emotions in because I simply slept and swam and watched way too much HGTV. And then a storm checked in for the rest of the evening. This was totally okay with me. I had nothing else I needed to do.
It was nice.
…vacation, had to get away.
I was kind of the brink of losing it last week. It’s a long story that is probably better suited to a live conversation and not so much an online one, but suffice it to say that Craig thought I could use a weekend away. By myself. He cashed in some frequent flyer miles and sent me to Tampa.
The beach isn’t really ocean-front in the way I was hoping for. There are no rolling, crashing waves, and there’s really not much of a beach front here at all, but I did manage to find some sand tonight and I’ll take it. The point of the weekend is that I rest and regroup and return better than I left.
As I got news this morning while in Chicago that DHS decided to pick up the boys TODAY, with no notice and while I’m out of town and Maddie and Chloe are away for the weekend too, I’m not sure how restful this weekend is going to be. Because I’m sad and hopping mad.
And there’s not a single thing I can do about it. I’m in Florida.
We took the boys up Little Baldy Summit and that was about as much as they could handle. After lunch, Craig took the girls back out to hike Elk Mountain while I took a nap made sure the boys took a nap. Ahem.
In what can only be explained in the file, “Proof the Dunhams are Crazy,” we decided a little Spring Break Camping Trip was just what the doctor was ordering for our family. We’ll see how bitter a pill this is going to actually be…
Half-Pint House 