You can read about Part 3 of 4 here.
Originally, we weren’t sure if we’d drive back home on Friday or wait until Saturday. On one hand, we didn’t want to deal with the weekend traffic, but during the summer, it’s always weekend traffic. On the other, my hubby’s brother has Fridays off, so we decided to stay the extra day and spend some quality time with Uncle Wah.
What follows is absolutely hilarious. It’s really hard to explain without some back-story, but let me boil it down to this. Uncle Wah was 7 when my hubby was born, and he’s never quite gotten over having a baby brother swoop in and steal all the attention, and not to mention, break all his toys. He is now 41, and I really think he’s a 12-yr old boy trapped in a man’s body. It doesn’t make any logical sense, but he’s extremely jealous of Claire. He often refers to himself as a “second class citizen,” and actually pouts about things. If you were to see him in real life, you’d think I was lying. He’s a big man. He’s a welder-dude. He’s 41. He is single and doesn’t have any kids of his own, so he adores Claire, but he’s really jealous of the relationship Granny and PaPa have with her.
Anyway…Uncle Wah called the house Friday morning to see what the plan for the day was. My hubby told him to come over. He hemmed and hawed and said he was going to be working on his yard. (What? This is the last day we’re here, and we stayed an extra day so we could hang out with you…and you won’t see us for months…and you want to work on your yard??) So, my hubby says, “Uh, okay…but we were going to go take Claire to see the trains.” You see, there is an intricate train exhibit at the Botanical Gardens, and Granny and PaPa thought it would be a fun outing for all of us.
So, what does Uncle Wah say? Picture the most whiney, sing-songy voice possible, “But I want to see the trains!” Ha! So, my hubby told him to get a move on and get over here, and we’d all go see the trains.
Needless to say, Uncle Wah thoroughly enjoyed himself at the train exhibit. Claire thought they were cool, but she’s not a 12-yr old boy trapped in a man’s body.
After the trains, PaPa took us on another spontaneous tour of the city. Oh! Speaking of this, I have to interject with another funny thing that happened. As we’re driving around, Claire begged to see my purse. So, I handed her my purse and then focused on what the Tour Leader was saying from the driver’s seat. All of a sudden, out of the corner of my eye, I notice Claire is chewing on something. She’s making a funny face. She’s sitting in the car seat, which is between Granny and me, but neither of us saw what she put in her mouth. So, I said, “Claire! What’s in your mouth?! Give it to me!” So, she politely took it out of her mouth and handed it to me. I couldn’t tell what it was. It was a lump of something. Was it glue? Was it plastic? Did she get it off my purse? Did she get it off of something in my purse? She didn’t have my purse open, and I couldn’t tell what it was. As I was rolling the sticky mess around on my finger, I said, “Claire? Where did you get this?”
“Outta my nose,” she said, matter-of-factly.
Awesome. Thanks for sharing.
Anyway…as the tour went on, Claire finally fell asleep. I’ve never been able to transport her from the car to the house without waking her up in the process. She hadn’t been asleep long, and she was in desperate need of a nap, so I carefully unbuckled her and hoped for the best. This time, I was successful! I was able to get her downstairs and into the pack-n-play without waking her! Uncle Wah, Daddy and I had planned on going out on Friday night to dinner and a movie, so I quietly and quickly went upstairs and told them we had to go! Right now! As much as I hate to ditch my child and run, we’d better go while the gettin’s good!
So, we left Claire with Granny and PaPa and we escaped.
The three of us when to a really nice BBQ place and then we went to see Transformers. We actually loved the movie. It was action-packed and not too cheesy and the effects were awesome. Both my hubby and I grew up around the Transformers, and I think they did a good job of telling the story.
So, we get back to the house around 10:30, almost 11pm (Central Time, which is an hour off from our normal time…). I had told Granny not to even bother trying to put her to bed, because of the time-difference and not being able to see me when waking up from her nap. I see Claire through the window, and she’s fresh out of her bath. She’s all happy and waving and greets us at the door. So, I ask Granny how it went. “Oh, when she woke up, she just cried her little heart out. She was so upset and kept asking where you were,” Granny said with a completely straight face. My heart sank and I felt sick to my stomach. “What??” I gasped, actually clutching my chest.
“NO!” she said, beaming, having pulled off the joke. “She was totally fine, and she slept for THREE HOURS. I had to wake her up for dinner! And, she was all cheery and happy when she woke up, like she normally is. She asked about you a couple of times, but I told her, ‘Momma and Daddy went bye-bye, but they’ll be back later.’ And she would just say, ‘Okay!’ and keep playing. She’s such a good girl. And, then, we played in the bath until her little toes turned into prunes.”
Granny thought it was pretty funny that she’d nearly given Momma a heart attack. My mother-in-law is a sneaky one. Ya gotta watch her like a hawk. 
So, that’s pretty much it. The only thing missing from our saga is a re-cap of Saturday, and that day was a complete blur. We spent another 8 hours in the car, every hour getting us closer and closer to our own beds. This time, we went directly out to eat, because we knew the fridge was practically empty and the thought of unloading the car on an empty stomach was daunting. So, we had a leisurely meal and then drove home from the restaurant. The house was still standing. The kitties were happy to see us. The trip was a success. A good time was had by all.
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