An Evening with Viv

After dropping Lindsey off for the wedding she
was attending,  I was now adding a baby to our crew.
Five children would not normally be a daunting task for me,
but when you are away from home without a spouse 
and a baby at the separation anxiety stage,
it's more of a challenge.
But I was eager to take it on,
and couldn't wait to plan our fun evening!


Vivien is the cutest little girl with tons of personality.
She reminds me so much of Isabelle's energy at that age.

The challenging part with Viv is that she 

doesn't let me put her down for anything

and won't go to anyone else.

I am literally holding her the entire time I babysit. 

Snuggling babies is my favorite thing in the world
so I would never complain, 

but it just means my other kids have to help a lot.

I'm not the kind of Mom to let a baby cry,
especially when it's not my own.
It's hard enough when babies don't have their Mommy,
so when I babysit they get spoiled with attention.

I knew being cooped up in a hotel without room service

with Vivien was not an option, and would have looked like this:
(I only put her down for a second to snap a quick pic
and she was already in tears!)


I decided we would have a night 

on the town instead.   First we headed back to our hotel 

(hitting insane traffic as we entered Laguna Beach)

and I let the kids swim at the pool.  

Thankfully I had remembered Isabelle's life jacket

to help lessen my burden. 

The only kid friendly place I could think of to take 5 kids and

my double stroller was Downtown Disney.  ;)

I had set my sights on the 

Rain Forest Cafe 

and headed back to our room to get us all ready for the night.
I had eaten there once before and loved it.
It's even fun to just go for the gift shop and fish aquariums.

I think it was around 8pm before we finally headed out. 

Vivien would cry anytime I put her down so it was 

next to impossible for me to get myself and the kids ready.

Once we arrived and parked, it was 9pm and we still 

hadn't eaten dinner.  The Rainforest Cafe gave 

me reservations for 9:45pm, so we window shopped while we waited.
Lainey snapped most of the pictures on this post. 

We also waited in a 30 minute line for that yummy 

kettle corn that had tempted us many times the last three days.

I remember it being really cold outside and 

having to bundle up all the kids with everything I had, 

even my coat.  
(and we were already dressed in warm clothes)
Cold weather is torturous for me!

Once we were finally seated in the restaurant, 

the kids were pretty grumpy and tired. 

I was already regretting the trip by this point, 

and starting to lose my excitement for the 

RainForest Cafe.

By the time our food was served, half the 

kids were slumped over asleep. 

Viv was still goin strong though.

 

The food was good, but I didn't enjoy it with the headache I now had. 

Having to take 5 tired kids back to the car was an ordeal. 

My older 3 were all fighting and whining
for the extra seat in the stroller 

(which became available after Isabelle
screamed for me hold her all the way back). 

Normally I wouldn't give in to those demands, 

but it wasn't worth the public spectacle.  

Exhausted with a sore back and neck, 

I headed back to Laguna Beach

feeling disappointed at our night.  

And that was the good part of our evening......

As I pulled into the hotel parking garage at midnight,
I turned around and saw all 5 kids asleep. 

I realized there was no way for me to 

carry 5 sleeping children back into our room 

without another adult to help watch the others. 

I wasn't about to risk leaving any of them in the car 

or the room

while I took turns carrying them.
What if one of them woke up looking for me?
Plus there were two men in the garage hanging
out by their car, which made me nervous.

I sat in the car for a minute trying to find 

a safe solution for my problem.  

In hindsight, I should have kept driving around 

LA until Lindsey made it back to help me but
I didn't know what turbulence lay ahead.....

Instead, I woke all the older kids up and made them 

walk.  

They protested. 

They cried. 

They fought.

Meanwhile I've got heavy Isabelle 

on one hip while 

holding Vivien's car seat with my other arm.

Keep in mind that we are in a very small hotel.  

As we entered the building, Baila began fighting 

and whining really loud with Luke. 

The last few years, Baila has been our sweet, and obedient mellow child.
(you would never believe it after watching her earlier years)

But she has a very feisty stubborn streak
that sometimes gets the better of her, 

and this was one of those terrible moments.
This girl can out cry/whine any child. 

I quietly and sternly pleaded with her to be quiet
or we would wake the hotel guests. 

More importantly, I didn't want 

Vivien waking up.

She refused to let it go, and continued to 

escalate her voice despite my warnings. 

As we entered the room, I was now begging Baila to stop

or I would be giving "strikes" for her behavior. 

The punishment would be losing her special 

Jasmine doll from Disneyland if it came to 3 strikes. 

It was a big mistake for me to threaten her doll, 

(as usual I threatened something
I didn't want to do out of desperation)

and it threw her into a full on temper tantrum.

She began screaming "NO Mommy!!! No!!!"

I'm not sure how thin the walls are at this hotel, 

but I was a nervous wreck about the noise. 

Since I couldn't yell at her,
I tried yelling with my facial expressions. 

Nothing worked.

Baila was so inconsolable that it woke up Isabelle and Vivien. 

Then they both started crying,
while I tried calming Baila down.

  It was a nightmare. 

After 45 minutes of 3 kids crying, 

I began to worry that we would be kicked out of the hotel!
The last thing I needed was a hotel manager
knocking on our door and discovering
we were over our room capacity. 


Meanwhile, this was Lindsey's wonderful evening. ;)
She said it was the most beautiful wedding she's
ever attended.
Every detail was planned to
exquisite perfection thanks
to her talented wedding coordinator and the
lovely Rancho Las Lomas.

When Lindsey arrived back to our room and walked 

in, she had never seen me so frazzled.
I was walking the room holding a crying Vivien,
Isabelle pounding on my legs to hold her,
and Baila in the bed bawling about losing Jasmine.

I'm known among my friends and sisters as the patient Mom,
who rarely gets irritated by loud kids.
I can go hours listening to children do annoying things,
fighting and whining, temper tantrums, etc.
without it breaking me.
 If I tell them I sometimes yell at my kids too, 

they don't believe it.
So it was a big surprise for Lindsey

to see me such a mess.
Really, the only reason I was losing my cool
was having it all happen in a hotel room at midnight, worrying
that these kids were waking up people,
and having a hotel manager knock on my door.
(which means finding out we were over our room capacity)

After Lindsey rescued me,
I forced myself into bed on a time out.

I lay awake for about an hour

stewing over the terrible night that
could have gone so much better had
I done things differently.


What I really needed was this hot tub in our room:

I hope this hotel doesn't get any negative ratings from 

all the noise those kids caused that night! haha


Aunt Lindsey took Baila out on the balcony
for a loving talk and it really soothed her.
It's funny how the person who misses all the chaos
can swoop in and save the day with their
calm and patient manner.
I've been that person before when Travis
has watched the kids all day and
is fed up with them.
I walk in wondering why he's being so
short and stern,  and I'll take over
with so much patience and understanding.  

This was one of those days to say 

"Tomorrow is always new, 

with no mistakes in it yet." 

-Anne

Trolley Ride

On Friday we did a little sleeping in for the first time on this trip, 

and then headed out for the beach. 

I hadn't seen downtown Laguna yet, 

so we hopped on the free trolley service, 

one of my favorite memories of this trip.  

There are many stops along the road to catch the trolley 

and it's the perfect way to see this beautiful beach town.

Luke Man

Isabelle age 3

Ahhh..... the ocean air blowing through the trolley was wonderful.

                   We decided to check out the main beach in Laguna Lindsey had visited the day before

almost there.....

Time to get to work!

I love how my kids will work for hours
digging sand and making castles. 

Peaceful play.
They seem to be so quiet and happy together, 

but it's probably because the ocean drowns out all their noises. 

Lainey really took her project seriously.  When a big wave came
and destroyed all her work, she was pretty bummed out.

 

I zoomed in to this rock mass out in the ocean

Lainey age 9

see that boat in the distance?

here it is on zoom

Baila age 6

I loved watching Luke run back and forth to fill his water bucket. 

It was nice to see him and Lainey getting along so well for a change.

Luke age 8

Lindsey soon left the beach after Vivien had 

a blow out all over her legs.  Even though we had everything 

to clean her up well,  it had been too overwhelming for her. 

Sometimes only a shower can remedy a situation like that.

Time to go

The time went too fast. Although we had packed our short time in LA with Disneyland and Laguna,

Lindsey's purpose for going on this trip was a friend's wedding.  

She had to be there early to help another friend with her baby, 

and I needed to be back at the hotel to watch Vivien.  

We had to catch the next trolley and head back quickly to drive Lindsey.

The kids were ticked about having to leave the beach!

The only consolation was the hotel pool and hot tub awaiting us!

The trolley service was not spaced properly.
We waited forty-five minutes for pick up 

but saw many trolley's passing on the opposing side.
Lindsey also had the same problem.

We were starting to worry about getting Lindsey to the wedding on time!

At last!   Lindsey was very stressed and worried when we showed up late 

because we didn't know how long it would take to drive there.

Although we hit some traffic going to her friend's hotel, 

she was half an hour early!  Phew