Oog

Wow. Sorry it's been so long since I updated here. I've been wanting to blog for a long time but this summer is BUSY!

First I was waiting until I had time to do a big long birthday post for The Bug, but you know what? I did the same thing last year. I *will* write that, but there has been a lot more going on since the beginning of the month.

Last Friday we went to Asilomar with my brother and his family, in from Virginia, and one of my sisters & her hubby, as well as Mom and Dad, to celebrate Mom's birthday. We had a lot of fun being together but it was EXHAUSTING too. Sleeping away from home was a challenge - the girls are used to sleeping on a full sized bed together but there they only had a twin, and the last night Sweet Pea fell out of bed three times. Additionally, the bed Slipshod and I were on was crap, so we didn't sleep very well. We also kept the girls up too late every night and they are still trying to recover from that. AND then there were the daily hikes. Unless you're carrying your two-year-old while she is sleeping, this is what hiking with a two-year-old looks like. Every five steps she does this:

MUST. PLAY. WITH. SAND. MUUUUUUST PLAY WITH SAND.

But there were two other hikes during which I carried her, sleeping. Never did catch up with the main crowd on any of those hikes and in fact on the one pictured above, I just stayed at the rocks with The Bug and let her play until the rest of the family finished the trail, turned around and came back.

While we were hiking (or not, as the case may be) at Point Lobos on Saturday, an electrical storm came up off the ocean and swept over us rather suddenly. It was the first time I have actually been afraid to be outside in a storm. It was CLOSE. We saw lightning strike the hills not far off. The park rangers were driving around saying over their speaker systems, "the safest place to be right now is in a parked car - not under a tall tree." We were running back to our cars during pretty much the whole storm, though. We got pelted with big, fat raindrops and were soaked by the time we made it back. And by then the lightning had ended as well. Thankfully, none of us got zotted. It was quite the adventure! After that we drove back to Asilomar and dried off and ate lunch at the very nice living room connected to Mom & Dad's room.

Anyway, despite how exhausted we all got it was a really fun time with family, especially my brother and his family, who we don't get to see very often.

We drove home on Monday and on Tuesday Slipshod flew out to Minneapolis for work for the rest of the week. We'll see him tomorrow after work. The girls and I have been trying to settle back in to life at home but we're not really there yet. All the laundry from our trip is clean, but not folded or put away. We finally went grocery shopping yesterday to replenish the kitchen, which we had tried to eat clean last week before we left home. Today we need to shop for birthday presents for THREE cousins (siblings - we missed the first 2 birthday parties & the third is this coming Saturday). Tomorrow I'm probably going to drag the girls shopping with me in Tracy because the Bass outlet is having a huge sale and considering my usual small collection of cheap T-shirts is starting to show holes, I think I need some new clothes. Thankfully my sister (who has the coupon for the big sale) will be accompanying us.

But really, the big thing I've been meaning to tell you?



Yeah. I'm going to a conference, AND that means I'll be away from the girls for THREE nights! I've been away from Sweet Pea for one night at a time before - well, rather, she's been away from us, having occasional sleepovers with her Grandma and Boopa - but I've never been parted from The Bug for longer than five hours, and never overnight.

I'm really excited about this, and nervous, and scared. I know the girls will be fine with their daddy and grandparents but I also know I will miss them and they will miss me. And then there's the part about how I'm a Country Mouse going to San Francisco for a few days. Eeep!

More on all of this later. The girls are fighting over the toilet (seriously)! Just wanted to finally end my silent streak and say HI!