Death of the Freebie

This weekend we booked plane tickets to go to Arizona for Spring Break. This is the first time since Merrick turned two that we have flown. That means that this is the first time we have had to pay for a plane ticket for him. That is SOOOO depressing and it is not just the plane tickets.

Everywhere I turn it seems like the freebies are vanishing. I don't know why the universe decided that two is the magic age where the child is now a human being and needs to pay for all food and activities. Is it just me or is this crazy? Why can't we stagger it a few months and maybe loose one free thing every couple of months. Instead overnight the cost of raising a child sky rockets. There is a chance I am being ever so slightly dramatic, but it seems to me that the "terrible twos" are terrible enough without losing my free admission to the children's museum.

The one place that is still free...Disneyland. That freebie does not end until three so I guess it is still "the happiest place on earth" for another six months anyway. I am absolutely determined to take advantage of this before September. I'll keep you posted.

Sleep(less)

The biggest event of this past week was Merrick deciding that he no longer was going to take naps. This all started last Saturday when we were going to go to Washington and Merrick was so excited about the trip that he decided a nap was not necessary. Since I was determined that he was not going to get up without some type of rest, I instituted "quiet time", which consisted of him sitting in his crib reading books.

Well, since that fateful day, he has only taken one nap in his crib. Instead, when we put him down for his nap, he plays, takes off his clothes, and yells for "quiet time". He even somehow (with lots of yelling) manages to get out of quiet time after just a few minutes.

The problem with this, aside from the fact that I really enjoyed my time during naptime, is that Merrick does not sleep enough at night to make up for his lack of nap. The result is that we have a VERY tired boy by the end of the night,a boy that melts down and almost falls asleep at the dinner table.

One night I was trying to get him upstairs for bed and he was melting down. As part of his tantrum he said "Fine! I will just sleep on the stairs!"

As a result I had to get him entirely ready for bed while he laid on the stairs and refused to get up.

Something is definitely going to have to give here because he can't continue with such a lack of sleep. If only I knew I baby sleep coach who could help us...oh wait...

Highlights

By all accounts this week was fairly uneventful. I spent the week working my two jobs and wrangling Merrick and Jeremy spent the week studying and at class. There were a few key moments of the week though.

Like Merrick putting on the froggy costume at his cousin's house.

Or Merrick becoming obsessed with taking a bath in the laundry room sink.

Or Jeremy and Merrick using Jeremy's tools to "fix" and legitimately fix things around Merrick's room.

There was also a trip to Washington that was extremely uneventful, but apparently the most exciting thing to happen to Merrick in a long time (that is a whole other story that I won't go into right now).

Maybe nothing earth shattering happened this week, but all in all it was a good week.

Vacation Day

Today was Stake Conference at church. Growing up I remember lots of families that treated Stake Conference as a vacation week from church, but my parents thought it was important for us to go and we always went. Jeremy and I have also always thought it was important to take our little family to Stake Conference and today was no different.

We all got up, and got ready, and drove to a church building where the conference would be broadcast. As we pulled into the parking lot (just a minute or two late) we saw lots of people leaving the building. We parked and got out of the car only to find out that the feed was not working. We got in car and had a discussion. We could leave and go to the stake center for the second half of conference or we could take it as a sign and go for a drive as a family. At first Merrick said he wanted to go to church, but then he changed his mind and decided he wanted to go bowling instead. Since that was not on the table we decided to go for a drive.

The drive was awesome. We saw horses, cows, sheep, goats, donkeys, llamas, and Shetlon ponies. The horses, llamas, and some calves came up to the fence and Merrick got to see them up close and talk to them. We also drove through the nearby town of Canby and took a ride on the Canby ferry. It was Merrick's first time on a ferry and he was excited because there is an episode of Caillou where Caillou rides on a ferry with his family.

The right thing to do was probably to drive to the stake center and see what we could at Stake Conference, but in a way we had our own kind of church. We spent time together as a family and saw lots of Heavenly Father's creations. It was a nice way to spend a Sunday morning.