Monthly Archive for June, 2008

As you may know, we just returned from our most recent trip, The Tour of the Midwestern Trifecta: The Spring 2008 Version.

Over the next few days, I’m going to be sharing stories and fun things about this trip, and I thought I’d take the time to explain the ever-growing cast of characters here at The Casual Perfectionist.

If you’ve read the About Page, you’ll know that I go by Momma and my hubby goes by Daddy. You’ve met Claire and Merlin and Jasper.

Last year, we took a Tour of the Midwestern Trifecta in July, and I introduced my four nephews. At the time, I was calling them by their ages, but I wasn’t thinking ahead. This will be confusing going forward, so I’ve decided to recast their parts. The same actors will be playing them, and their roles are the same, but their names have been altered.

So, without further ado, here we go!

Momma: Me
Daddy: My hubby
Claire: As herself

Daddy’s family:

• PaPa: His father, Claire’s grandfather. She named him PaPa.

• Daey: His mother, Claire’s grandmother. Daey wanted to be called Granny and when Claire started speaking, she pronounced that as “Day.” Granny altered the spelling to be unique, and Daey has stuck ever since.

• Uncle Wah: His brother, Claire’s uncle. This is what she called him when she first started speaking. She calls him by his real name now (with the title of Uncle, of course), but for the purposes of the blog, he’ll be known as Uncle Wah.

• Auntie M: She isn’t really an aunt; she’s PaPa’s cousin. It’s long and complicated and involves grandparents that were siblings…or something like that.

Momma’s family:

• Grandpa: My father, Claire’s grandfather. We actually call him Grandpa Momma’sMaidenName, at times, but for the purposes of the blog, he’ll be known as Grandpa.

• Grandma: My mother, Claire’s grandmother. Again, we use a longer version of this for clarification purposes at times, but we won’t for the blog.

Before I go on, I need to explain something. I’m the oldest of four children. I have two younger sisters and a younger brother. One of my sisters has four boys. This is how the following numbers come into play.

• Aunt Two: I was the firstborn in the family, and she is the next child in line. She and Uncle Two are the parents of my four nephews. My nephews are One (the one who is 8), Two (the one who is 6), Three (the one who is 4) and Four (the one who just turned 1.) Claire, of course, says all of their names…this is just for clarity and privacy sake. I mean, Google is a powerful force and I’m careful not to doubt its abilities. Unique names when used together can be very searchable…and I’m trying to keep this all on the down-low. Who knows, one of my nephews may want to be a Senator someday.

• Aunt Three: This is the third child in line. She lives in another state. She’s the one we met at the airport.

• Uncle Four: This is my baby brother. He lives in the same state as Aunt Two, but he lives in a different town, which happens to be pretty much in between where they live and where my in-laws live. He is married to Aunt Four.

Confused yet? It will all make sense when used in context. And, if not, I wouldn’t consider it rude to just smile and nod. And, to be honest, if I used our real names, you’d probably be even more confused. We may or may not be named practically the same thing. My mom swears they didn’t do that on purpose.

If you were reading Jasper’s posts, you know the basic breakdown of the trip. We were gone June 2nd thru June 9th (Monday to Monday). We took the same pattern as the July 2007 version of the trip, so not much has changed.

With one exception:

For years, whenever we’d make this trek, we’d stay with some friends of ours, who we will call Drew and Dani. Their house was in a town about an hour away from the farm where I grew up. Then, about a year and a half ago, they went and had another baby, and we were booted from their guest room when it became a nursery. (The nerve! Just kidding!!)

So, this year, when we were planning our trip, I made hotel reservations again. Because a major event was going to be in the area the same week, all of the hotels were full, so I had to make reservations in a different town. This was a hassle, but not a deal-breaker. Dani emailed me about three weeks before the trip saying that they were going to put their house on the market and see what happened. She wasn’t anticipating anything actually happening, but she wanted me to know that they were looking for a larger abode. I jokingly said that if they were moved into their new house by the time we left, to let us know. We’d gladly cancel the reservations at the Podunk Inn to stay at Chez Freeloader.

(Sidenote: Our house is known as The Hotel OurLastName, and we’ve always called their house Chez TheirLastName. I think the Podunk Inn is pretty self-explanatory, and I’ve replaced TheirLastName with a good description of how we like to travel.)

Long story short, they found a new house, sold their old house, closed on the 29th and then got everything moved before we arrived. I couldn’t believe it! They told us to cancel our reservations and stay with them! The amazing part about all this (besides the way things worked out on their end, and the fact that the new house is located really close to their old one) is that it looks like they’ve lived in the house for years. There wasn’t a moving box in sight. It’s completely decorated. Everything is in its place. It has to have been the fastest move in the history of moves. I’m so impressed. Plus, the accommodations at Chez Freeloader were awesome.

They’d been there FOUR DAYS and they look a little more settled than we do, and we’ve been here SEVEN YEARS. I’m still in awe.

Speaking of settled, I’ve had something happen that I’m almost afraid to admit out loud. I actually have my bags (Claire and I share a bag and a small tote) totally unpacked, clothes laundered, and items put away. The bags are back where they belong in my closet. The fact that this is done is not the amazing part. The fact that we got back Monday night and this was done by Tuesday afternoon is the shocking part.

This has never happened.
I’m still amazed.
Luckily, my hubby didn’t hit his head when he fell over.

Anyway, I’ll be blabbering on and on all week about how much fun we had on our trip. Hopefully, with this cast of characters, you’ll be able to follow along like a pro.