Sunday, April 25, 2010

Back Home

Last week, we were on vacation at my parents' house in Arizona. It was a good trip- we got to see a lot of family and some friends, Pumpkin had a blast with her Mimi and Boppa, and Petunia got to see what its like to have enough grown ups around to ensure that she is constantly entertained (at home, she has to amuse herself a lot, while we deal with her far more vocal older sister). Hubby and I got a night away in a local hotel for our 5 year anniversary, too.

We drove over in our new Mazda 5, which was great. It easily held all of the gear we have to travel with these days. It was nice to be able to go out visiting relatives and what-not in one car. The "way back" seat in the Mazda 5 is not luxurious, but it was certainly comfortable enough for short trips around town.

Both girls did fairly well on the drives, too. The drive between San Diego and my parents' house (in the Phoenix area) is about 6 hours if you don't stop. On the way over, we left after dinner and stopped in Yuma for the night- Yuma is roughly half way between San Diego and Phoenix. Petunia slept the entire way, and Pumpkin fell asleep after an hour or so. They both did OK in the hotel, but Petunia started our day bright and early by waking up and refusing to go back down at 4:30 a.m. We were on the road by about 8 a.m., but had to take a couple of longish potty breaks, so didn't get to my parents' house until lunch time.

On the way back, we left after lunch, having convinced Pumpkin that the Birdie would find her if she took quiet time in the car. She slept most of the way to Yuma, and played with her magnetic doodle thingy the rest of the way. Petunia slept. We stopped for about an hour in Yuma at a really great park. Pumpkin had fun on the playground, and Petunia had a chance to sit in the shade and move around a bit. Then we drove to El Centro, which is about an hour from Yuma), for dinner. After dinner, we changed the girls into their PJs and headed home. Petunia fussed a bit but then slept the rest of the way. Pumpkin played with her magnetic doodle thingy a bit more, and then slept the rest of the way. Both transferred to their beds fairly easily.

All in all, we're feeling like we worked out the timing pretty well. Of course, we'll try to do it again sometime and it will go miserably wrong... we know this was more luck than anything else. Only luck can explain how both girls managed to sleep through the blindingly bright lights and stop and go traffic associated with the Border Patrol checkpoint we had to go through last night. (These checkpoints are an annoying side effect of our current approach to immigration and border enforcement- all traffic stops under bright stoplights and a Border Patrol officer looks into your car. We are always waved through almost immediately. I imagine that they are even more annoying if you have to stop for a chat with the agent. We went through one on the way over during daylight. I still do not have a good answer for Pumpkin's question about why we had to stop and talk to the nice man.)

I've got some trip stories to post, and more posts kicking around in my head, too- for instance, I have some more thoughts on feeding a picky eater that I want to write up. But Hubby has convinced me to take advantage of the fact that we've already disrupted Petunia's sleep environment to start the process of moving her out of our room. She's asleep in her crib, in her own room, right now. Since she's currently waking up 2-3 times a night, I should probably get to bed. I'll have to actually get out of bed and go down the hall to her when she wakes up tonight! (The cosleeper is still set up, and I suspect she'll finish the night in it- I don't want to undo all the good rest I got on vacation in one night.)

I know it is time to move Petunia to her own room. She is almost 7 months old now, and I actually suspect she'll sleep better in her own room- we seem to wake her up when we go to bed. But I can't believe my little baby is so big. Transitions are hard on me, too!

7 comments:

  1. Anonymous9:08 AM

    I covet a Mazda 5, mostly because it's a tiny minivan with a manual transmission. The husband thinks I'm nuts. How much cargo space is there when the 3rd row is used for seating? We are considering a third child, and I am concerned this car would be impractical for family road trips if we can't fold down the third row.

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  2. @anonymous- there is very little cargo space with the third row in use for seating- enough for a stroller frame, but that is about it.

    However, the two halves of the third row fold independently, so if you only need one of those seats, you might be OK.

    You might want to look at the Kia Rondo, too. It is more wagon-like. It also has an option of a third row, and gets similar mileage to the Mazda 5. However, the 2nd row is a bench seat, so you might be able to fit three kids in that.

    We went with the Mazda 5 over the Rondo because the captain's seat second row makes it possible to climb into the third row without folding any seats in the second row- which is nice if you have car seats in the second row.

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  3. Anonymous2:31 PM

    Ah, these comments are reminding me we are currently trying to decide on a car and a lot of it is based on cargo space. And I turn to blogging to relax!

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  4. Good luck with the new sleeping arrangements.

    Speaking of Yuma, did you ever see the remake of the movie "3:10 To Yuma" with Russell Crowe & Christian Bale? If you like westerns, it is definitely one worth seeing.

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  5. Found you via Moxie, and Petunia is almost exactly the same age as my BabyT from what I can tell :)

    I dunno what's up w/ baby sleep these days - we've had a ton of night wakings the last few nights, and more than usual in the last month or so.

    For a LONG time she was sleeping so well we thought we had an animatronic baby ;) But alas, no more. Good luck with moving Petunia into the crib!

    We just started cosleeping with ours on the bad nights because that's the only thing that will calm her until morning. I'm steadfastly ignoring the 'starting bad habits' idea and hoping it's just a phase :D

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  6. Sorry, @antropologa! If it is any consolation, I think you may have better options for reasonable size vehicles with good cargo space in Europe.

    @Anandi- Petunia will be 7 months old on Sunday. I don't buy the "starting bad habits" thing, at least not at this early age. They are changing so much right now, it seems like you can break any habit you start, so why not prioritize getting through whatever is going on now? I moved through a partial night cosleeping phase with Pumpkin (around 20 months, maybe?) and we moved away from that surprisingly easily- and she is not an easy sleeper. We also went through several phases where we had to actually hold her for the last hour or two of sleep. Those lasted 2-3 weeks each, I think.

    Anyway, tonight, we are going to start trying to move Petunia's first feeding back, to see if we can get back on a better sleep schedule. We'll see how it goes.

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  7. Sounds like a good trip! Isn't it great when the driving part goes smoothly? But you are so right: when we try to re-create what worked one time, it never goes as well! It helps to have one kid who sleeps easily in the car.

    I can't believe they slept through the border patrol stop!

    Good luck with moving Petunia and getting more sleep. Other than the recent bout of sickness, the Pookie's sleep has been going really well in his own room! Yeah!!!

    @Anandi - Ditto Cloud's response to you!

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