Rodeo and Parade Fun

Marc was  on call most of the week the cousins were here visiting and that included the weekend. There was all kinds of fun going on down Grandma and Grandpa way, where we just moved from at the beginning of the year, so I decided to sleep over with the kids at their house so they could have as much fun with their cousins as possible during their short stay.

Am I crazy to try sleeping over at my in-laws by myself with 3 crazy kids? Nah!

So Grandma Lynne watched the girls while I took Brother to the Rodeo with his cousins, Grandpa and his Aunt Amy and Uncle Frank. (Oh and don't mind the dates on some of the photos, Gary needs to reset the date on his camera...)

Brother was so happy to be there, and especially happy that Kelsey was there (as always). Still a lot of "sibling" love there, I think.

Brother wanted to get in on our "boot" picture

Brother always has a flair for the dramatic

Then later Uncle Joel and his kids joined us on the bleachers to watch the rodeo.

It wasn't much of a rodeo this year but the scenery was fantastic and it was fun to be together. It has almost become tradition with the California cousins because they are usually here this time of year.

That's Brother at the bottom. He is running with the horse...

Then, because I didn't have the girls with me, we were able to stay and watch the fireworks. They were really cool and Brother thought they were amazing.

We got home and Lynne had the girls asleep and Brother was all excited to stay up and watch a movie with his cousins.

Baby ended up being awake pretty much all night and since me and the girls were all sleeping in the same bed it was a VERY long night. Thank goodness Sister slept through all of it. I couldn't even get Baby to fall asleep when I took a long drive with her in the car at 1:00 am. Thank goodness the parade wasn't until 10am so she was able to sleep for a bit since she finally nodded off at 4:30am.

So, although it was 7:30 when Sister decided to greet the day, I still woke up bright-eyed and bushy-tailed and took on the challenge of bringing the 3 kids to the parade. All the kids came equipped with their plastic grocery bags for the candy they were to collect and they were all very excited about it. I was actually surprised that the kids all stayed together by the side of the sidewalk to wait for candy and I only had to grab Baby a handful of times from running into the parade floats... ya, that is actually good.

Brother loves to wave to the "princesses"

 

My favorite part, though, was when Uncle Joel's Credit Union entry came by, Brother ran out to join them to pass out candy. I was so proud of him for wanting to do something so out of his comfort zone. Jessie and the kids were passing out candy too and that helped having them there. Jessie told me later that Brother was smiling and waving to everyone he knew, and because it was in our previous home town there were many who knew him and were happy to see him too. I am so proud of Brother and all the new things he has been doing!

Brother is the one in the black shirt behind the car

Well, as good as all that went I was still VERY tired and, frankly, a little edgy from lack of sleep so when we went to the carnival after the parade to pick up Brother and see my sister's booth she had set up for face painting you can imagine who frazzled I was as Baby continued to scream, flail and run around everywhere uncontrollably. I had to wait for Sister to get there because she had gone home with Grandma and Grandpa for a quick potty run. So while Brother sat at the face painting booth with Jessie I took Baby to the playground hoping that that would help out. It was nice for a few minutes as I was able to talk to some friends that were there and it was good to see there faces, but Baby was quickly finding more and more ways to make my life miserable. So when I heard that Lynne and Gary were back with Sister, I took Baby in tow screaming and flailing. My forehead was breaking into a sweat, tears were welling up in my eyes, and I am sure that I was forgetting/unable to suck in my sloshy tummy (sloshy from the snow cone Gary bought me earlier) and low and behold I see another old friend ahead of me. I want to say "hi" to be nice, but I am desperate to get out of there in one solid mommy piece. I thank everyone for the "fun" weekend, grab Sister by the hand, she starts screaming, Brother is whining because he doesn't want to leave his Aunt Jessie's side and Baby is now trying to pry my arm from around her and his wailing and starting to get slimy because she is also sweating in the heat and exhaustion of the fight.

But, the old friend (who does NOT read this blog) I was trying to pass by ended up right in front of me and she wanted to catch up on how everything was going and tell me about the news in her families life. I was trying to hold it together as we talked amongst 3 whining children but I finally just had to tell her that I really needed to go. So I turned to leave and she grabs my arm, looks at my stomach, and says very excitedly, "Are you having another one?"

...

It must have been the "glow" (you know how when a pregnant woman sweats they call it a glow)

Maybe it was the emotions written all over my face.

Or maybe, just maybe, I haven't lost as much weight as I should yet, because as much as I'd like to blame a snow cone for my tummy overflow, it just doesn't work that way.

...

I politely bob my head toward the flailing, screaming, writhing Baby in my arms and say, "Nope, she's our baby."

And I walked away.

Got in the car.

And tried to practice sucking in my tummy on the entire 40 minute drive home...