Ethan's Visit

The first few days of our visit with Maegan and Ethan were quiet and spent mostly outside. On Wednesday we spent the day at the secret park by the administration building. The kids enjoyed playing with their new friend. And Ethan thought that Asha was the cat's meow. On Thursday while Joel and Kezia were at school, Maegan and I went shopping for maternity clothes - for Maegan. It was fun to go along and pick thing off the rack and entertain Ethan and Asha. I was amazed at all the deals and was a bit sorry that I didn't come here this time last year! They even offered me free orange juice!

This past Friday we took a little overnight trip down to Monterey to go to the beach and Aquarium. We left on Friday a little later than we had planned to because the pictures at the preschool for Joel and Kezia took FOREVER...well not really, but it certainly felt like that when you have a place to go to. Well, we got going around 11 a.m. and the ride there was pretty good. The kids traveled well probably because we kept them busy with 6L of popcorn.

Once we got to the beach, we realized it was a bit windy but we decided to head down to the water anyways. Well, once we got closer to the waves, the wind was really strong, but not too chilly...yet. Poor Ethan fell into the water right away and was chilled to the bone by the cool wind. Joel ran after the seagulls and kept warm for a bit, Asha huddled against me, and Kezia sat very still and tried not to shiver. But we stayed for just a bit, eating our greek salad and trying to keep the sand out of our eyes. We didn't anticipate a weather system coming in. We were here for an experience!

After 12 minutes, we packed up and left to go back to our hotel. We managed to get a great little hotel for $65 instead of $200 which is the average price for a hotel in Monterey. Thank you Priceline! We put the three older children into a hot shower and then Ethan and Asha went for a nap. I took Joel and Kezia to the park and then I wimped out and picked up hot chocolate and tea to take back to the warm hotel room. I think it was 16 degrees, but it felt like closer to 5 Celsuis.

We got ready for supper, Joel, Kezia, and Asha in their new Mexican outfits (I'll post pictures of their outfits soon, okay?). It was fun to dress up for supper. We walked across the street to the Sushi restaurant and quickly got a table. I love sushi and Maegan loves it even more. We ordered some tempura right away for the kids and then ordered a whole bunch of sushi rolls (with rice) and sashimi (pieces of raw fish). I was really looking forward to the scallops, which are my favourite. The kids ate their tempura and then we ordered some chicken, noodles and salad for them.

I was pretty proud of Joel, Kezia, and Asha because that night they all tried something new. Joel tried the scallops and the tuna, Kezia tried the mackerel and Asha tried avocado. Joel tried the sashimi and said he'd rather just finish his chicken, Asha smiled after the avocado, but Kezia raved about the mackerel and wanted more! I couldn't believe it. She's the one in the family that isn't that keen on trying new things, but that night she surprised me.

Once we got back to the hotel, we got the kids ready for bed, shut off the lights, and then Maegan and I sat in the dark until our kids were sleeping. It was 9:00. We looked at each other and then realized, hey, I guess we're going to bed too. Sigh, the benefits of sharing a hotel room with your kids.

The next day we got up and went across the street to Grandma's Diner; we decided sushi for breakfast probably wouldn't be the most appetizing! Then we headed for the Monterey Bay Aquarium. We were fortunate enough to borrow two adult passes for the day, so I only had to pay for Joel and Kezia. The Aquarium was amazing. Some of the tanks were huge, others close and beautifully lit and there were so may different kinds of fish to see. My favourite was the kelp tank with all the schools of fish and the otters. Upstairs there was a new area made just for the kids. It was the neatest thing I have ever seen. They had little tanks where kids could crawl through and look all around at all the fish swimming around them. There were squirting tables and a huge clam and manta ray slide and even a little section for babies. It made sense to me that they charge you $25 for admission!

After 2.5 hours, the kids were tired, and we decided to head back, even though we had a whole section left to see (well, Carl and I and the kids will have to come back!) We had 15 minutes left at the meter, so we quickly fed the kids leftover chicken and noodles on the curb. Maegan and I packed everything up and then we headed back to Fresno. All the kids fell asleep and it was quiet and peaceful.

We decided to stop just eat of Gilroy at Casa de Fruita to buy an apricot pie. When Maegan came back to the van, she told me that the clerk said the road up the way was closed because there was a fatal accident and traffic was stopped. Oh no. I went and spoke to another person and he said that there was no point in trying to go around that highway 152 was blocked and it would be at least a 2 hour wait. Well, at least we were at a place with a playground, restaurant, pie shop, and about 300 0ther tourists. We took the kids to the bathroom, played at the park and had supper and killed about 3 hours. I told Carl we probably wouldn't be home until 8 p.m., about 4 hours past our estimated time of arrival.

Well, we got on the highway and drove at 70 miles an hour for about 5 miles before the traffic became more dense. Then we were going 40 miles an hour and then after about 2 miles, we slowed down to 20 miles an hour....and then around the bend we stopped. We sat there for a bit before we accelerated to a racing 10 miles an hour. And that was our average for 2 hours....Maegan said at this rate it would take us 15 hours to get home.

To pass the time, we sang songs, passed around an entire package of gold fish crackers, took Joel and Kezia for a pee on the side of the highway (Joel misunderstood me when I said turn around, no one wants to see your pee-pee and turned to face about 70 cars downhill of us while he peed!), switched drivers so that I could feed Asha.....it was a bit agonizing. Thankfully the kids were pretty good and we Moms were able to keep our cool. Finally at 8:15 we passed by the third and last accident; a mini-van who was probably gawking slammed into the back of a police cruiser, witnessed the worst, most maddening merging of vehicles into a single lane, and finally got to a comfortable cruising speed of 70 miles an hour again.

Maegan, the kids, and I got back to Fresno at 10:00 and we were all so tired. Our beds never felt so good.

So that was the first part of the visit. It's getting late and I think I need to get to bed. I'll be back in a few days to tell you how the rest of the visit went.....stay tuned!