We’ve now been in Dublin two whole days and have knocked a lot off of my initial “Must Do” list (follow me on Instagram to keep up with all our doings!) And while I can’t say we’ve done a lot of cultural things nor learned a whole lot (the obvious choice for our European country this week), I have really enjoyed the time back in our former home with my kids. And I’ve actually learned a lot about them.
I’ve learned that Sugarplum has grown up a lot in the past few months. She is constantly asking very inquisitive questions and works really hard to think about and answer all the questions I ask them. She is also much more cooperative and has spent most of the time walking without whining even though I have the double buggy just in case (she only asked this morning right before throwing up all over the table soon after arriving at our breakfast destination, my fault for making her wait so long to eat). She’s only had one meltdown which was on the way back to the hotel tonight and she dropped her used train ticket and I refused to go back.
I’ve learned that Honeybun hasn’t changed much at all. While she is physically much more grown up, she is still the way she’s always been, stubborn and snotty and purposefully mean. She is helpful when she wants to be and downright nasty when she doesn’t. She still doesn’t like walking and will let me know every second she can. She likes being the biggest but doesn’t like the responsibility of it though she is constantly trying to boss everyone around. She is hot and cold, here and there, she is my Honeybun!
I’ve learned that Doodle is starting to settle down. I noticed before our trip that his has mellowed and is not nearly as particular and moody as he once was but it has been even more apparent on this trip. He no longer screams for food as soon as we sit at restaurants, he is content coloring with his sisters. He isn’t screaming “Nnnnno!” at me nearly as much as he was a week ago and is starting to use more words (one of his recent additions is “whisper” which he says with his finger to his mouth but still with the scream voice he uses for everything else). He is horribly curios and distractible and getting 5 feet down the road can take 5 minutes but he is also perfectly content riding along in the buggy screaming “bus!” and “choo-choo” every other second. And he is starting to smile for the camera (when he wants to be in a picture) which is the coolest thing!
I’ve learned that I have really awesome kids. That they are generally cooperative and easy to get along with and they amazingly get along with each other most of the time. Undertaking a 29 hour trip and 3 days alone with three young children in a foreign city is certainly not for the faint of heart but I took it on because I knew we’d survive and it would be an awesome experience.
After waiting an unusually long time for our initial plane in Orlando without screens, books, toys, anything (they kept announcing we’d be boarding any second so we made the kids stay packed up) the woman who was sitting near us in the terminal stopped during boarding to tell me “You have the best behaved children I have ever seen.” I wholeheartedly said “thank you so much!” But sometimes I want to say “I know” not because I’m cocky or because I’m an awesome mom but because I’m lucky. I really do have great kids and I couldn’t be more excited for the rest of our trip (both this one and the lifelong one we have ahead of us!)
(And I’ve also learned I have no way to get any of the amazing pictures I’ve taken off my camera and onto any of the myriad phones, tablets and computers I have with me, WAH!!!)
