Tag Archives: traveling with kids

Who says moms can’t be spontaneous?

Posted on by
5

Um, that would have been me.  Since Vivien’s birth I’ve been saying that I’m a borderline shut in.  Partly due to the fact that until she was well over a year she would SCREAM if put in the car.  The walking helped me lose weight, but hard to go more than a couple of miles at best.

Then Little Rex comes along and the thought of trucking with two little ones seemed to hold more planning than I could muster.  You pack the entire house, make a little space so I can back the car up and, oh, forget it, we will stay at home.  Add to the equation that trying to get some free time on my husband’s schedule is pretty tough and I am back on the couch watching cartoons again.  How can I handle two kids on my own out of town?  Can’t be done.

Or can it?

I have been wanting to take Vivien to the Santa Barbara zoo since she was about 2. I realized this past Friday was the one day that NOTHING was scheduled.  No shots, no work, no preschool, no nothing.  So I said, that’s it, I’m not even going to think about it, let’s go.  I said to Mark I would love it if he could come, but of course he couldn’t.  The one good mommy sense I had was that I packed extra clothes for the kids and even an extra shirt for me.

Lot’s of traffic on the way up, but Rex sleeps most of the way (not the screamer his sis was) and Vivien has her DVD.  The zoo is great.  Compact unlike the overly large LA Zoo.  Well landscaped and easy to navigate.

What did I do right?  I grabbed the zoo food as soon as we walked in.  We all control the dipping blood sugar.  The whole journey I put my picky, foodie tastes aside as there was NO way I was going to be able to ingest anything desirable with Rex.  I have to feed Rex like he is Helen Keller before Ann Bancroft showed up.  Chasing after him or letting him grab a bit as he runs off somewhere.  The food there was totally edible.  The other helpful tool was my bugaboo with the standing board.

Added bonus I got a work out pushing them up hills.

The other great thing about the SB zoo is that they have wide swaths of green and a little stage the kids can play on.  The greenery is jarring to an Angeleno. Don’t forget the TRAIN.  A big reason I had been wanting to take them was the zoo has a little train that rings the park.  Sweet.

We saw EVERYTHING.  Then went to the beach area and I ate some pizza with the speed as if the Russians were down the street.  We came to a great park that delighted the kids so much I didn’t even pine for an espresso like I usually so when I’m standing in sand.  Vivien was saying something over and over to me that I have thought since the ’80′s, “Why don’t we live in Santa Barbara?”

Sigh, it’s like going back to LA 60 years ago.  Less people, orange groves on the edge of town, Spanish tile roofs, albeit no affordable housing or plentiful jobs, but look at the water!

“Vivien why do you like it here more than at home?”

“There is more air.” Out of the mouth of babes.

The sun was almost gone (just after 8pm) when we left the park (mostly because some large adults had shown up to play on the slide which I thought not right) and crossed over to another large expanse of green, this one next to the beach.  I just sat as the kids ran around.

At one point Vivien suddenly started meditating like a yogi. I didn’t even know she knew about that. It was the magic of the trip and the magic of summer.  Where you are still out playing long after you would normally be in bed.  Why hustle them to bed?  Did we have anywhere to be in the morning?  No. In fact Vivien kept begging to stay.  Well, I don’t know…

I was tempted, but we had no toothbrushes, no clean underwear for mom, etc.  But, we got some great Mexican at Le Super Rica while I thought about it.  Then we got in the car.  ”Ah, mom,” She said with disapointment.  I called Mark.  I was still clinging to this idea of Rex’s crib, toothpaste, change of clothes in the morning.  Then I when I spoke to Mark he said, “Not the best night to come home.”  He was dealing with a pretty serious mental health situation in his family and his Saturday would be occupied with that.  At Carpenteria I turned the car around.  ”Vivien you got your wish!”  Yeah, she yelled as Rex slept.

Hmmm, where shall we go?  I drove up State street and hoped to rent a room at a motor lodge that former flame of mine and I used to get naked at quite a bit.  I thought it would seem ironic, yet safe.  There were no vacancies.  More irony.  We got a room at another serviceable place and I got the price down since he had no crib for Rex.  Oh, and there was no soap in the shower, but I wouldn’t know that till the next morning. There was a mini mart next door where I bought some toiletries and we were set. It helps that I still nurse, which makes me feel more self reliant.  Although I did have a bottle and it’s pretty easy to get extra milk.

Vivien can sleep standing up, so she was fine.  Rex took a little help.  I think he was looking around at the room thinking, “Really, we couldn’t stay at the Biltmore?” Or maybe I was projecting.  I woke up a fair bit as I know how strong he is and was thinking my wall of pillows I ringed the bed with wouldn’t hold him.  I made a blanket on the floor bed, but that only lasted a while.

The next day we had a great diner bfast and I took them to the Mission.  More great expanses  of green they could play in.  More wishes that we lived here. Living like a hobo was yielding lots of good moments.

I will say I am a good traveler in that I keep my ears open.  I had figured out that today SB was having their Summer Solstice parade.  It’s a big deal there.  We parked near our shelter and walked down toward where people where lining up for the parade.  Pushing my own float, our big stroller.  We bought cookies and coffee from the local church and waited.  And waited, waited.

It was hot.

“Mommy, let’s go to the shade”  All the spots are taken, Viv.  But, I have to just keep listening to her.  Once we packed up the chuck wagon and walked toward the park where the parade ended there were PLENTY of places in the shade.  No as good a vantage points as before, but we got the gist.  And more expanses of land to frolic in and buy garlands and tye dye.  It was a hippie throwback and it was fun.

After a snack I pushed them up the hill to the car.  I saw an open house sign.  It looked like a fab house.

“Do you mind if I indulge my fantasy of living here?”  The realtor was so sweet.

“Come in, everyone is at the parade.  No one has come.”  As she showed me my future perfect home, save that it’s 100 percent more than we could afford, but other than that it’s awesome, I told her what my husband did.

“Mark pppp?

“Peel, yes”  I thought, oh, she probably thinks we do have the money for this house.

The drive home contained no screaming and I felt the way you do after you take a dip in a pool on a hot day.  Refreshed.  I was proud of my kids for being good travelers and for myself for going for it.  I am really excited to think that unlike my previous post, fun anecdotes don’t have to end or be delayed while raising children.

They just might not include clean underwear.

Utah Fun!

Posted on by
5

When Vivien and I awoke in Provo I sensed that sweet, lack of sound that snow fall can bring. I looked out and said, “Vivien, it snowed last night!”

WAAAA she ran from bed to look below. I loved seeing my little desert dweller’s excitement at the blanket of white outside. Then it ran through my mind that I might be driving on ice, and this scared the long underwear off of me. I did my “I must be brave; I’m the mom” mantra and pushed out to our complimentary breakfast downstairs.

My sister emailed that the LA Times had come out with their review of The Tar Pit.  They had done a “first look” review, which had been a rave. This would be the bigger review. The one that happens when their writer comes 4 or 5 times. Here is the review. It was good, but not a rave. So that was kind of bugging me, but I pushed it to the side.

I called Heather Armstrong (Dooce.com) who lives SLC.

“It snowed,” I said happily.

“How you doing?” she said with suspicion. She knew I was a weather wimp and might be flipping out.

“Well, I’ve decided to be brave.” She assured me they are great about clearing the roads.

After we procured some much needed gloves at a large store called Shopko, we had the standard battle:

“I want a toy.”

You can’t get a toy every time we walk in a store.

“I want a toy!” ( I caved/compromised and said she could have something if it were under 5 dollars.)

One bunny later we were off. All was going well. Vivien was strapped in the back watching her mini dvd player as I drove, proud of myself that I could still travel like before I was a mother. I could still adapt to any place, get along with whomever I met. I still had a good sense of direction (and GPS) and driving in cold weather with a light snow falling was a piece of cake.

But as I was driving up into the canyon toward Park City, the snow really started coming down. I was on the road with two big trucks and all my fears.

“Momma, strawberry shortcake is over,” Vivien called.

“I can’t do ANYTHING about that now honey. Mommy can only drive.”  Heather’s earlier, “Are you okay?” was going through my head as I white knuckled it up the hill.  ”No, I’m not OKAY!!” I thought.

Finally I saw the turn off for our sledding/tubing park that was our destination. I had decided trying to get Viv on skies for the first time might be too much in our rushed day. And I hadn’t been on them in 12 years, so I Lindsay Vonn I am not. I was aching for some non-bland food but didn’t want to risk driving into the heart of Park City with the nice restaurants.

“This will do just fine,”  I said as we walked to the bagel bakery, the closet place to eat near the tubing park. I couldn’t get on that highway again… not yet. The food was awful and everything was white or pale yellow, but I shoved it in anyway.

We got to the tubing park, and Vivien was a little afraid. She didn’t really get it. I didn’t either, but I kept acting really plucky so my daughter will not grow up to the be the timid dilettante that I am.

We got on our round tubes and some hardened ski bum attached us to the pull rope. ”Because she is under 6 you can only go as far as the first hill.”

I looked at the rope operator like, “Bummer” when really I was thinking, “Cool, that big hill scares me.” Our second bit of luck was when we got to the top of the hill that we were about to launch ourselves from and the worker said, “Sorry, it’s really slow today.”

Without thinking I said, “That’s good, because we are scaredy cats.” Oh, bad mom, don’t transmit fear to young daughter.

Which why I stayed calm when the worker pushed Vivien down the hill, by herself. There went my 4 year old down the hill.

Now, if you have grown up being the least bit outdoorsy in your life this is no big deal. But I was raised by intellectuals who thought that reading was a sport and TV was a sacrament, and I’ve been trying to make up for it since.

Vivien went down the hill, but it did not carry her all the way. She stopped. Just sitting in her tube.

The ski bum “Um, yeah, she needs to get out of the way.’

Me: “Well, you didn’t explain that to her before you launched her.”

I plopped into my tube on the path beside her, and the ski bum pushed me. “Vivien, mommy’s coming to get you.” She thought that was really funny.

The lady who sold us the tickets had warned me that Vivien would not want to do the kiddie park part where kids sit in tubes and go around and around. “Oh, you don’t know my kid.” Sure enough, she loved that, and she had huge piles of soft snow to frolic in just like I had told her about. Now we were in our groove.

We did the run about 5 more times. I could have kept going, but Vivien was pooped. “Mommy, my pants are soaked.” Yeah, no ski pants are a drag. Next time will have those.

We drove out of the area, and fortunately I did think to have a change of clothes. Thankfully Heather and her dear family received us so we could change and I could pump. Lovely people to visit with. They also directed us to a restaurant with spices in their food that was on the way to the airport. Yippie. Red Iguana (we ate at Red Iguana2 as the first one was busy). I even had a very un-Utah-like Margarita. The flight home was easy, and we didn’t have to wait for a cab. Who says you can’t travel with kids? This is fine.

As the cab pulled into our driveway, “Momma, PICK ME UP!” I stared at Vivien while I held my pump, my purse, her cap and gloves and about to grab the suitcase the cab driver had just dumped on the driveway.

“Whaaa? Vivien no, I can’t.”

“PICK ME UP!!!!!” she wailed.

“Sweetie, I still have to grab your booster seat, I can’t.”

“Waaaaa!”

So here it was. The final breaking point. I somehow got her to continue her fit out of the cab so he could leave. I took a few things to the porch, then carried her up and went back for the rest. It was a hard next hour getting her to bed while I also greeted Rex.

“I know honey, it’s hard to have to share mommy again.” I said as she tried to pick Rex off of me.

When she finally passed out I did as well. The next day I felt so burnt. I think traveling is like drinking, I just don’t recover like I use to. Although now that I have, I am really glad we took this trip.

Airplane People

Posted on by
7

I can really get in a lather over people who complain about babies on airplanes. It’s a public place. Air travel is NOT a luxury these days. I am far more disturbed by the loudmouth who is YELLING their conversation into the phone before take off (there are no secrets we are just pretending not to hear you), or the loud talkers seated the row behind.

Also, no one feels worse about a crying baby than the parents who are trying, and trying everything to calm it down.

Years ago I was in a geology lecture in college, there was a woman with a baby in the class, and God love her for going on with her education while being a mom of a young one. She didn’t have any help caring for the child and I often saw her with a notebook and baby in hand. One day the baby was fussing, I noticed it, we all did, but we kept on with the lecture. It was a bit distracting finally she chose to get up with her child and walked out of the lecture hall. The professor, who was the sweetest guy, stopped his lecture and said to the class, “did she leave? Oh no, please someone go and get her. She needs to be in class, the baby wasn’t bothering me, was it bothering any of you? (No one was going to raise there hand to that),” “we were all babies once.”

That is the truth.

Where It All Started

Posted on by
2

It’s not often you can take a child back to the place where her mom was conceived. This summer I was able to do just that. On our way out of Yosemite we stopped for a snack in Tuolumne Meadows. Tuolumne Meadows is an area in Yosemite National Park, and incidentally a place where my folks told me years ago they decided to “start” me. I always liked that, thought it was cool that I could visit a beautiful place that inspired my parents to expand their family. I remember a friend of mine whose parents were teenagers when she was born said, “I’d have to go in the back of a ’65 Volkswagen.”

In college a rock-climbing friend of mine showed me a map of Tuolumne, and on it there is a “Daff Dome.” Whata ya know?

Now here I am with my daughter in Tuolumne taking an ice cream break.

I am still not exactly sure where “it,” happened but they said it was in a cabin.

Vacation Rehab

Posted on by
Reply

I was so excited there was water on our vacation at Yosemite this year, because for many years our butts have scraped gravel while we tried to raft.

I pushed the stroller and carried Vivien up to Bridalveil Fall so she could take in the wonder of the huge, beautiful, glorious falls. See how excited she is? Yeah, that was worth the effort.

Vivien in Yosemite

When I called my sister Cecily on Sunday and she said, “I am so tired.”

“Thank God,” I said, “I thought it was just me.” I came back from my whirlwind, blended-family vacation in Yosemite and Mammoth on Friday the 4th, yet still felt pooped and hit the ground running with work Monday. Also, a National Park vacation means days of laundry upon return. I also had my assisted-living-bound dad over which takes some energy… and clean up.

What’s the vacation people come back refreshed from?

But it all went great. There were 11 of us: sisters, step-children and more. Hiking, biking… and we weren’t camping, we stayed in cottages. I CAN’T camp anymore, I’m too old. (God, then I’d really be tired.)

More favorable than the waterfall, later that day I asked Vivien, “How do you like your hot dog?” Here’s her response.

Vivien gives the hot dog a thumbs-up

Even Fun Makes Me Tired

Posted on by
Reply

Here is Vivien in a dress that hasn’t been worn since the ’60s, as we were walking to dinner in Chelsea last Friday night. My brother-in-law Mark’s sister was in some kiddie beauty pageants and would get dresses as prizes. One dress was presented to her by none other than the girl who played Buffy on “Family Affair.”

Vivien in NYC

When I go to NYC, I always love it. The excitement, the energy… to a point. I have about 6 or 8 friends I really like to see out there, so even trying to see a few of them takes up some time and it’s stimulating catching up. Plus, I am often doing press for whatever TV show I’m on at the time–which is fun. This trip, most of my press calls were for Cool Mom. Also, I usually do a 48-hour child-free trip… yeah, I’m free and not gone so long I feel guilty.

This trip, I had 36 hours solo and then Mark and Vivien arrived. By the third night, I started to slow down. Mark went bar hopping with friends as Vivien and I met up with a friend at a nice restaurant, walking distance from where we were staying. (Sidebar: instead of a crazy-expensive hotel room we were lucky to be in a two bedroom apartment in Chelsea of friends who were out of town. The best.)

As we walked to dinner, Vivien said, “Mommy,” pointing to the sidewalk, “This is dirty.” I’m sure she was wondering, “When is the clean-up time?”

Um, that was Giuliani, I guess, and he only got so much done. I still saw not one but two gentlemen brazenly peeing on the street. And mind you, not homeless guys with shopping carts, but people who probably had an option.

Sadly, I figured out why I am still dragging even now that we have been back home for a bit. 1) I’m not a spring chicken and 2) I have to exercise. It does help my energy level. But if I don’t do it before 9 am, forget it. I like the recreational exercise of being home, not that constant walking-in-shoes-that-hurt NYC thing. It makes me so tired.

Hanging with Clifford The Big Red Dog!

Posted on by
Reply

Remember when you were in elementary school and you got to order your Scholastic books? Well, they are so much more than those sweet little anticipated books in your first-grade hands. They have a big, rad store in SoHo. Who knew?

Daphne at the Scholastic store in Soho

Next time you are in NYC, forget the tourists traps and go there. The beautiful, modern building is probably courtesy of Harry Potter, since they had a piece of that which has accounted for about 50% of their revenue. But, of great interest to me is their part in Clifford the Big Red Dog. They have a coin-operated Clifford. Which sadly wasn’t working. But it’s a big, beautiful, child-friendly book store.

Vivien and Mark reading at Scholastic

I had a meeting upstairs while Mark and Viv scampered downstairs. Nice to do something for Vivien before I dragged her to a few stores to shop. But I ended buying more stuff for her, per usual. It was an honor to wear a tag with Clifford on it. But that Chloe, she is such a pushy little dog.

Travel You Pay For

Posted on by
Reply

Not in the money sense but in the exhaustion, dirty house, cranky child way.

We got back to LA from NYC late last night. God, was I glad to leave. Love NYC, but when the urine on the street mixes with a heat wave, the smell fills your nostrils and makes you wonder why people pay so much in rent to live there. (More later on plane travel with a toddler. Oy vey.)

I got up early for work today and was looking forward to that nap with Vivien. Prior to her nap she was in a fit state I have rarely seen. As I was trying to deal with her, my stepson was watching TV and I thought, hmm, no wonder he rarely brings friends over here. You know when your kid is really wound up and you can’t figure out why? Except for the fact that her time clock is off? And there it is, yes, snot out of the nose; Viv has a little cold. It made me stay calmer. I didn’t lose my cool.

Finally got her to sleep and I drifted off to sleep for a few glorious minutes. Then the phone rang. Twice. I understand murder.