The Trip From Hell: Part One

A little background: Before this trip, a lot of things were changing in our family. My MIL, who had lived with us for 5 years, was moving in with my SIL the weekend before we left. This was a big emotional and financial upheaval for our family. Because her dementia was progressing and it was no longer safe for her to live in a house with small children, she had to move out. It was a tremendous amount of guilt...and relief for me. Oldest Boy was particularly upset because she had become a very integral part of his routine - especially at bedtime. I thought that Disney would be a great distraction for him through all of this.

The day before we left was Baby Girl's first birthday party and the weekend after we got back was Oldest Boy's 5th birthday party. Yes, I am insane. I know this was a lot to try to do at one time, but February is an absolutely beautiful time of the year to visit WDW. I thought it would be completely wonderful for Baby Girl to have breakfast with Winnie The Pooh on her actual birthday. Timing is everything!

Baby Girl's First Birthday Party:

You may remember that I mentioned the noise being a factor for the boys during our last trip. Mr. MOTH doesn't like to leave anything to chance and he didn't want their vacation to be ruined by the loudness, so he procured these little numbers:

I'm not exactly sure why shooting range mufflers come in little girl colors and sizes, but we went with it...

The trip really started off with a bang. We were travelling solo (no other adults), which meant that we were outnumbered by one. Youngest Boy has a penchant for wandering away without the slightest care. He sees something that interests him and he just goes to investigate. And he's very, very quiet about it. Like most little boys, he enjoyed watching the airplanes through the glass at the terminal while we were waiting to board. Because we had folded and checked the double stroller at the little kiosk they were roaming around a bit. As we got ready to board, we were all scrambling to be first in line (This is something that irritates the crap out of me about my husband, but I'm learning to live with it. Really? Do you think you're not going to get where you're going if you're not first?!?! And then you have to wait - which causes even MORE frustration! Ahem.) We also had to have boarding passes for the boys and some sort of "certificate" for Baby Girl (she was a "lap child" - which makes me think of lap dog but anywho). Needless to say, there weren't enough hands to hold all of the documents and all of the children. We were in the "tunnel" about to board the plane when we noticed someone was missing.

Youngest Boy was not with us. He was not in the tunnel. It was probably only a span of a few seconds, but it felt like HOURS before some nice mommy brought him over to me. And he wasn't the slightest bit phased (Side note: I told this story while visiting my grandma yesterday and he was DEVESTATED that we lost him. At first I felt bad because he was crying REAL tears, but I turned it into a HUGE learning opportunity: What To Do If You Become Separated From Us. Point taken, as he has repeated the lecture verbatim more than once today).

When we arrived in Orlando, they were in the middle of Record! High! Temperatures! Yippee. We were certainly glad to be out of the ice and cold, but honestly? I could have done without 85 plus degree heat with 99% humidity. My body was in winter mode. And my hair was NOT HAPPY.

And because I'm in the middle of packing for our upcoming trip and also because this was enough trama for me for one day, we'll leave this as a cliff-hanger. Up next? ER visits, blizzards, and puking on cheerleaders.