portugal part one: no one from vancouver, canada has a six hour layover in seattle, except for us!

so this whole lack of wanting to plan any part of "our trips" (it's really greg's trip, i just come along) is starting to not work in my favour.  our flight from bellingham left at 5am only to land in seattle (27 minutes later) for a six hour layover...wth, why?  oh right, you don't want to drive that far "back home" after the trip...FINE greg!  ok, ok... no complaining, you planned the whole thing, it's still six hours without any responsibility... right!  problem, i can't sit still and i don't sleep up right very well and seeing how greg has a seriously strange travel disorder which i shall name as "do all his shit at the very last minute, disorder" (he mowed the front lawn at 9:30 pm and shaved his head at well...12am, then finished packing at 1am), nope i can't make this shit up.  so guess how much sleep i got? yep, your right "bagel" (as my nephew would say). after a failed attempt and slumbering, i coast the hudson news stand for what feels like hours only to be reminded of people and things around me. here's what my left brain was thinking while i was killing time...

my girl kassie.

i should have shaved my legs last night!

my mom, who for sure has been praying and not sleeping since 3 am!

my dad, who more than likely needed to escape the praying and went fishing!

so grateful we live in canada.

amara's birthday party with the uninvited but really welcomed neighbours cats!

what my wonderful, kind, every so giving mother in law will be dealing with for 17 days.  THANK YOU again for allowing us to go away!! and good luck..eek!

how my poor little people looked when we left this morning!

tammy.

me currently.

what i wanted to do to greg last night.

no words needed!

" i will not waste athers t i m e s again"

so i pulled out an old school parenting technique today...my eldest daughter made me wait for 40 minutes after school today with no care that I was standing outside waiting!  i'm rather busy and that inconsiderate behaviour really irritated me... so i made her do "lines" when we got home, for real... old fashion lines. "i will not waste others time again"  ...75 of them, which took about 40 minutes!

I then asked if she liked using up 40 minutes of HER time doing lines...she said "NO". Well then "tickles" I found your achilles heel haven't i.

alice, this is your last wonderland...

first borns get so much awesome stuff , seriously!  they got all the one on one parent attention, they were doted, cooed and coddled over...they could write their name,  knew every animal and could count to 10 in another language by the age of two and a half. do i even need to mention the loads of unnecessary retail products we purchased for them, probably not! then theres the second child, well your just pleased their accounted for in the car with pants on inside out, hair unbrushed,  day old snack in hand and their shoes on duckfeet style....asking "mom, what comes after the number 5"?  now, this in no way implies that you love them any less then the first, your just WAY busier.

same goes for birthdays, my first born got home based, mommy made fondent cakes with hours of prep going into decorations and goody bags.   hours and weeks where spent on THE BIRTHDAY.

the second got (drum role please), the YMCA party. done and DONE.

what's the problem you ask, mommy guilt! i keep hearing my european mother say "yu du evereee ting fair" (you do every thing fair) between your children that is and i could say with clarity it wasn't "fair" in my house when it came to the birthday parties!

this is my last year of hanging with my second born...soon to be a full time "student".

kindergarden...sigh.

i broke.  well, she broke me (actually), with requests of tea, cookies and a riveting game of freeze dance all to be done at home with her closest friends.  FINE CHILD! (i screamed)," you will have your birthday at home" (but between you, me and the fence post i secretly desired to make a special birthday at home for her, to make it fair!).

and so began the alice in wonderland prep, as i suspected...many hours were gobble up to make this birthday special (between the research,  sourcing, buying, hunting in my garage for props and setup). finally, we were ready to have the party only to be postponed on the eve of her big day due to her sister catching the stomach flu...bummer.

four days later it was back on (thank god).

it wasn't the fanciest, nor did i make the cupcakes (thank you dina neil of red velvet cakes) but it was just about perfect for a wee little alice and her tea attired posse of preschoolers (ohh.. try saying that 10 times fast)!

and my mommy guilt is done and DONE!