We set out on our trip to the George Bush Presidential Library for their I <3 America celebration. We got about half way there before I realized I had almost no gas. Oops. No big deal we had enough to get where we were going and we were headed to a big city so I could fill up when we got there. It was quickly put out of my mind. We got close to the library parking area and I realized it was a park and take the shuttle situation. I figured that out via the cranky guy directing traffic to the parking garage who barked "Keep Going!" at me when I slowed and rolled down my window to ask where I was headed. Thanks for your help mister, You're a real peach. Maybe his white gloves were too tight. Anyway, as I came to terms with the shuttle idea I realized my giant stroller was out of the question, I wasn't going to be able to lug that sucker on the bus. Well I could have but I didn't want to be that lady rolling over everyone's feet and hitting people with my bags as I passed. You're welcome shuttle passengers. So I crammed all the stuff we needed into our back pack and I left the stroller in the van. Farewell stroller I shall miss you, you complete me. My son should actually be named stroller, that child doesn't get in a hurry for anything. He is 20 months old and curious beyond belief he had to stop and investigate every blade of grass and piece of trash on the way to the shuttle. I couldn't take it anymore and I snapped him up, threw the back pack on my back and hoofed it with the other two kids trailing close behind. We made it to the shuttle, however it is July 4th in Texas and I am now a giant sweaty mess. Gross. So we are on the shuttle and we are all settled in. Peaceful right? Nope. It was at the 2nd bus stop that I remembered, oh yeah, I get motion sick really easily. So I spent the next probably 3 stops trying to hold onto my wiggling son for dear life and not throw up all over this fancy shuttle bus. I've never prayed that hard to not barf in my life. That's actually not true, I pray not to barf a lot. Anyway, we made it to the library, Praise God I didn't throw up! We head on in and it was a lot of fun, or at least to most people it probably was. We got to the kid area and the kids start eating sno cones and plotting their attack on the bouncy castles when my daughter announces that she has to go pee pee and she needs to go right now. She had a fever for a couples days and so I had been pushing the fluids really heavily, when she said "right now" I believed her. She started heading for the Presidential Library and I started heading for the row of giant purple port-a-potties. This isn't going to end well. We are now standing in front of the port-a-potties like some kind of old west stand off, only I have hand sanitizer and baby wipes in my holsters instead of pistols. She is arms crossed determined she isn't going in there. I on the other hand am drenched in sweat from the giant heavy back pack on my back and stressed out from trying not to lose the curious 20 month old who wants to put everything he finds in his mouth. I was batting away random food scrapes and ground trash faster then a NBA point guard. I am much more determined then she is at this point. We fight over the port-a-potties for way too long and I give in, knowing eventually I would win this battle, and we go back to play however the Sprite and the Sno cone get tossed out. No more liquid until you pee missy! We go back to the games. The kids get all kinds of patriotic nik naks and have all kinds of fun. I on the other hand am still trying not to lose my baby who I cannot hold because we are both sweating so badly and he won't hold my hand because he has things to do and I am holding him back. I am so sweaty I have to wipe my brow because it is beading up and about to run down my face. Grosser. The bouncy house worked in my favor and my daughter finally admits she has to pee again. So back to the port-a-potties we go. We are back in our dueling positions. She is starting to do the dance of a child that must pee and so this time there is no coming back later. Now, her arguments for not wanting to go in the potty are valid and I think we all kind of feel the same way it's dirty, it smells weird, there is no soap. I understand that and I tried to reassure her that everything would be OK. Then it takes a weird turn and she is telling me that there are monsters and slime in the potty and if she sits on it they will bit her in the butt and suck her in forever. *shake my head*. After some cleansing breaths I try to convince her there are no monsters or slime. The slime was considerably harder to prove given the blue slim-esque liquid in the bottom of the potty. So I finally strike a deal. Let's go in the handicapped stall. I will hold you over the potty so you don't have to touch anything and it will be fine. That at least got her into the potty. So now here we are in this giant hot box of a port-a-john and we are still fighting over going pee. Sweat is now dripping down my back and face and I am seriously annoyed. I snatch her up to demonstrate how I will hold her over the potty in a hovering type position. She goes rigid and starts to scream, and climb up my body like a terrified little monkey. She acted as if I was going to throw her in the toilet or something. I can only imagine how all of this seemed from the outside of the port-a-potty, high pitched little girl screams, NO, MONSTERS! "There are no monsters! Just quit screaming! Go pee! I know you have to pee! If you don't pee we are leaving young lady....more high pitched little girl screams about slim. It was terrible. We come out of the potty, and she still hasn't peed. My hair is stuck to my face and neck and now my back hurts from trying to wrestle her into a squatting/hovering position over the potty seat. We are back outside for further negotiations. Boy did I get the stink eye from 2 different moms that must have been in the potties next to us. I'm not totally sure what they thought had happened in there but they were not happy about it. Don't judge me dreadlocks lady just because your kids pee in a public toilets better then my diva of a child, doesn't mean I'm a bad mom. Crazy mom maybe but not bad! Finally my daughter can't take it anymore and I have reassured her that I can hold her and we head back into the potty. I get her hovered over the bowl and nothing happens. I keep standing there hunched over with 45 lbs of squatted half nude child in my hands dripping with sweat praying to hear the sound of pee pee, and nothing. She is pee shy. Really?! So I continue in this position for as long as my poor back will handle while talking to her and reassuring her she is OK and that she isn't touching anything. I was 2 seconds from busting into a rendition of Warm Kitty Soft Kitty when I hear that glorious noise of Pee Pee in the port-a-potty. Hallelujah! She has peed and we can now leave this sweaty box of doom and tears and go back trying to redeem this trip. By the time I got out of this port-a-potty I needed a beach towel to wipe the sweat from my body. Grossest. We are back to the bouncy houses and my daughter doesn't look good. Uh oh. I bust out my thermometer and take her temp 102. Time to leave! We went through all of that only to have to leave 10 minutes later. I could have taken her to a gas station for petesakes. Whatever, no big deal my poor baby doesn't feel well nothing else matters let's get outta here. On our way out I remember we bought food tickets and they are none refundable. I am NOT leaving here with un-redeemed tickets that's un-American. So I grab 4 sprites and toss them in my already way too heavy bag and 3 sausage on stick. My oldest tries the sausage and decides on the way to the bus he doesn't want his because it's too spicy, I had already finished mine so I eat his too, I also eat part of my 20 month olds because he couldn't eat through the sausage casing. By the time we get to the shuttle I have 2 1/4 spicy sausages in my stomach and I am drenched with sweat. I sit down on the bus with the kids and immediately remember I get motion sick and now I have fresh sausage in my stomach. I hate myself a little right now. As we hit every stop on the way back to the parking garage my son is asking me what's wrong over and over again. I'm pretty sure I was turning green. I made it off the shuttle and the sausage stayed were it was supposed to. Woo. If I accomplish nothing else today that was a win.
We were finally on the road and heading to a different town to go to the fireworks and relax. I get just to the outside of the city before I remember, I have no gas. So I find a place to turn around and head back. We are now already late to meet friends at the fireworks but what am I gonna do? So I find the first gas station and whip in, of course I pull in the wrong way and don't realize it until I get out of the van and walk around and go, where's my gas cap? Oh yeah dummie on the other side of your van! I get in and correct myself. I start pumping gas and for some reason it is pumping snail slow. It took me about 5 minutes to get 1 gallon of gas. That isn't an exaggeration I started timing around the 1 minute mark. So I did some quick math, figured out how far 1 gallon would get me and we headed down the road. I found a proper gas station filled up and set out. Now we are very late and I am irritated, but eh AC is cranked and my daughters Tylenol had kicked in so I'm feeling better. We get to the lake and everyone is trying to get to the lake at the same time, no big deal there is plenty of room so I relax. About the time relax kicked in I get the call that the people I was meeting aren't coming... I could have stayed at Presidential Library for fireworks and skipped all this rushing business after all. Ah! No use being mad these fireworks will probably be better anyway right? I get to the entrance and I am informed that it is $2 a person to get into the fireworks. What? Who pays for fireworks? I didn't bring money because I spent it at the Library on life altering spicy sausage and heavy Sprites. By some miracle I found $6 in my wallet and gave it to the gal. I told her apologetically that was all I had and I didn't think a 1 year old counted as a person yet anyway. Sorry baby but you won't remember these fireworks anyway so I'm not paying. You can be a person next year. I think the poor gal could tell I was having a rough night and simply waved me through with my $6 paid. I think she feared for her safety. I must have looked crazy by this point. We get in and find a great spot, we set up our lawn chairs and all is right with the world. I had just sat my fanny in a lawn chair when I hear "Mom, I have to pee" my heart sinks. To my relief it was my son who is far less high maintenance when it comes to where he pees. We load everything back into the van, load the baby in the stroller (thank God) and lock up the van and make the trek to the port-a-potties. My son is good with port-a potties I think because as a boy you have to touch practically nothing in them, lucky, his only concern was that he would walk in on someone so I had to knock on each perspective port-a-potty for him to make sure there was no one in it. I had to knock on a couple because the first 2 were pretty darn gross and even I wouldn't have gone in. By the third it must have looked to an outsider like I was knocking in the hopes of finding someone. Like some kind of sick hide-n-seek adventure. We found a "good one" if there is such a thing and in seconds we were done. I had to look at my daughter and just say "was that so hard?" She didn't care in the least and started walking back to the van with her head held high. We head back we set up our chairs again and wait for fireworks. Now in Texas it hasn't rained in a long time so the grass is totally dry and brittle and I just didn't see how these people couldn't possibly care about that. There were people on all 4 sides of us lighting off their own fireworks. It was annoying and loud and all of them had a beer in their hand so I know they were being super careful. My mom senses were going wild. I was like a cat with it's hair all standing on end and on my tip toes waiting for the moment when I would have to throw my kids in the car, chairs and all, to get away from a wild fire breaking out. Thankfully nothing bad happened that involved fire. We did however have to deal with grass hoppers jumping on our faces, mosquitoes the size of Buicks, and gangster rap with some pretty awful lyrics and the kids next to us that screamed bloody murder every time someone set off a firecracker. There really was no peace here so it didn't shock me at all when my daughter tells me she has to pee again. Oh Course You Have To Pee. Why wouldn't you have to pee? I sat there quietly for a few seconds too long screaming my head, I know it was too long because my daughter got right in front of me and said "Mommy did you hear me? I have to pee. Right Now." I don't know what came over me must have been the cloak of darkness and the caliber of red neck we were hanging out around because I just told her to pee in the grass. There was No way I was doing the port-a-can again in pitch black darkness. My back hurts, I'm tired, it's dark just go pee in the grass. Do you think the Queen had a problem with this? Heck no, she thought that was great. So she goes over around the van and goes pee. Easy right? Well kinda, she came back around the van and tells me she's done but that she peed on her legs...and shoes...and underwear...and dress. At this point my head could have been a firecracker. I can't really get mad either because she isn't a pee outside professional. Usually she needs a full blown facility in order to go so I was just impressed she went at all. After lot's of hand sanitizer all over her body we were as good as we were gonna get till we had a shower and sat back and wait for fireworks.
The fireworks were surprisingly good for such a small town and I took some relief in knowing they were lite off over water and on a beach so there was less of a chance of fire in my eyes. It was fun but it was time to pack up. I wanted to leave a few minutes early so as to beat some of the traffic all heading for the exit at the same time. I began loading the van as the kids are still watching the show in the sky. I went to put something in the van and a critter bite or stung my toe on my left foot. Based on how bad it hurt and the swelling involved I think it was a scorpion. My whole foot was swelling and it hurt So bad! I couldn't say anything because I didn't want to freak the kids out, they would have surely lost their minds and hid in the van somewhere. So I silently screamed and hyperventilated at the front of the van while the kids are blissfully unaware. The Minnesotan in my was seriously cursing out the state of Texas. I get to a point of tolerable pain and I come back to the back of the van to get more stuff. I tripped over the jogging strollers long front end. I didn't fall, although I have no idea how, but now I think I have broken my toe on my right foot. I shouldn't be allowed to wear flip flops. Only a couple weeks ago I tripped over my baby gate in flip flops and gave myself two black eyes and busted lip. Thankfully there were some very nice people next to me that made sure I was OK and offered me some ice from their cooler. Based on the type of music those guys were listening to I was surprised at how gentle they were. Just goes to show ya not to judge based on how loud someones gangster rap is. So now I have very painful toes on both feet within 3 minutes of each other but I'm still loading stuff in the van but now it looks like I am doing it in some kind of pee pee dance fashion because it hurts to put pressure on either foot. It was a sight to see that's for sure. I managed to get everything in the car including my kids and my swollen feet I said good bye to my new sweet friends and we headed for home.
I was never so glad for a day to be over in my life. It defiantly seems that in my life when something goes wrong at the beginning it just seems to snow ball out of control. I just keep trudging through because that is what I have to do. I learned things from my day, lot's of things actually like, leash train my son for next year, take Dramamine just in case, don't eat spicy sausage before a bus ride, Always make sure I have enough gas, pack a mosquito net to hang off the back of the van hatch at the lake. I should not be allowed to wear flip flops or accomplish things in the dark, and teach my daughter how to properly pee out doors. See I learned lot's of stuff. I am usually a hard learner but I figured things out real quick this day. This fourth of July was a learning experience like no other, I am grateful for the knowledge but now I have to figure out how to sleep through the nightmares this day has caused. I felt like I had scorpions on me all night long. So maybe we will stay home and watch fireworks on TV next year, seems safer that way. All in all, God Bless America...and gangster rap.
