Lemon Smile

Alayna's personality is really starting to come out! Whenever we go out to dinner, Alayna always wants the lemon from my water to eat...she loves lemons. There have been times when she eats the rine. Anyway, Alayna put the lemon in her mouth and smiled at us...we had to get a picture of it!

3 1/2 Hours of Sleep....Uggg!

I have been wondering when this night would happen. Alayna has been so fussy lately. I don't know if it is because she is growing or it could be an early on set of the, dare I say it, "Terrible Two's"?

Anyway, Alayna has been sleeping through the night since about 9 months old. The only nights she had a hard time sleeping straight through have been the teething moments. She has all her teeth so no more sleepless nights, unless she is getting sick right.

Last night was the night. Alayna went down at around 7:30 and woke up crying at 1:00. I have had the alergy thing going on so I put off going to bed till 11:30 BIG mistake. We spent 3 hours sitting in front of the t.v. I don't like doing that, but I was bored rocking her in the dark...so I gave in. Finally, I told her it was time for bed, "No no!" It's her favorite word right now. She laid her sweet head on a pillow that was on my lap and fell asleep within 4 minutes. I went to bed right away and slept from 4:10-7:21.

Alayna isn't sick or at least I don't think she is...maybe the alergy thing too. Otherwise I am blaming it on growing pains.

Camping...Really?

So for the Labor Day weekend, Pat and I decided it would be fun to take the girls camping for their first time. The plan was laid out and we were ready. We had all the gear and food...all we needed was Arianna to get out of school so we could get on the road.

The camp ground we reserved was about 2 hours drive. We knew we would hit some traffic, but of course, it took us about 4 hours to actually get there. Everything was going pretty smoothly. Alayna didn't like being in her car seat after about 3 hours of driving, but it wasn't too bad. Then Arianna tells us she needs to go to the bathroom. So we stopped off at a little town called Copperopolis. This town was about 20 minutes away from our campsite.

As we get out of the truck, we could hear a band playing the good ol' tunes of Billy Joel...can't complain too bad to take a restroom break and get a concert with it. Then we get back in the car to head out. There was still a lot of sunlight left for us to get there and set up our tent and scout out the area. Pat goes to put the key in...nothing. He tries again...nothing. The battery died!

We call a tow since we weren't quite sure what was wrong and our insurance paid for road side assistance (and we might as well get our money's worth). The guy tells us he will be there within 30 minutes. So we wait as we listen to the great music.

Finally the guy arrives and it is determined that the battery was the problem. We are told that we need to buy a new battery and we should be able to find a Kregan's in the little town we are headed to. 30 minutes after we leave Copperopolis, we arrive at Kregan's to buy a new battery for the truck.

By this time, the sun has set. It is still light out, but not for long! Pat and I actually had to take out the old battery, and put in the new one. Finally at about 8:00, we are done. The girls are hungry and Alayna is tired of being in the truck. We decide to just grab a hamburger from Burger King since it was dark now and we would need to spend our time setting up the tent rather than making dinner.

We make it to our actual camp area, set up the tent (as Alayna sits in the truck and cries), and then we got the girls ready for bed. I don't know if Alayna got her second wind or what, but man was she excited about being in the tent. She would not lay down and relax to even consider sleep. This went on for about and hour and a half. Climbing over us, somersaulting here and there, then climbing over us again. Pat finally said, "The Best Western is sounding really nice at the moment!" I just responded, "I am fine with just packing up and going home."

So guess what we did? I would love to say I was determined to camp, but I was more determined to have a good nights rest. We packed everything up, in the dark of the night, and went home.

I love to camp, but I do not think I will be taking any little ones for a long time!