Our trip to Aberdeen

My mom and I took the kids to Aberdeen this past weekend.  It was primarily a work trip for me to visit sites but we made sure to keep the kids entertained so they thought it was all about them!

 We went to storybook land where we saw lots of huge exhibits modeled after nursery rhymes and stories.  The kids also rode on the train, the carousel and just ran around and had a great time.  We met my friend Kristen Hawkins there and she brought her little baby Jocelyn with her.  I got so busy talking with her that I forgot to take pictures of all of us.  Towards the end of our time there poor Emmy came running up to me from the playground to tell me that she had peed her pants.  I surveyed the situation and had no choice but to tie up her jacket and use it as a skirt.  We headed to the gift shop with the hope that I could buy her some shorts.  There were no shorts but each kid picked out their own item that I promised to buy.  Emmy picked a kaleidoscope and Bobby found a choo choo train that he loved and played with the rest of the trip.

We then met up with Kristen and Jocelyn later on at Max and Erma's which is a restaurant she and her husband have invested in.  The kids were mostly well behaved but had some trouble sitting still for over an hour.  Without naps and a regular schedule it was getting tough.  They both enjoyed ice cream at a station where you could choose your own toppings.  Having my mom there was very helpful and I was able to catch up with my friend since it had been a while.

The hotel we stayed at had a great kids pool that the kids swam in for hours.  They loved their time there but my mom and I had a tough time getting the chorine out of their skin and hair.  THe hotel bath was broken and we had to call several times before it finally was fixed. The kids had a hard time settling down and sleeping in the same room as us and I am a light sleeper so I could not sleep at all the two nights we were there.  The saturday that we left I was signed up to run the half marathon in Aberdeen.  The night before the race at 10:45 (an hour after we had all gotten to sleep) the fire alarm went off and we evacuated the building.  Poor Bobby was shaking like a leaf and crying as I carried him.  Emmy had been hot and in her sleep had taken her pj top off and my mom couldn't find it so she was carried out half naked.  It was a mess and it took quite some time to get the kids settled down once we were allowed into the building again.  I did manage to get 2nd place amongst all the women running and ran in the top 10 for all the runners of the half.  It wasn't my best time at 1 hour 35 minutes but the course was terrible and my garmin told me I actually ran more distance for that time than an actual half distance.  I decided that I would take 2nd vs killing myself for first this time around and try to enjoy running the race.  We came home and went straight to Robb's softball game.  He played great and made the all tournament team.  His team got 2nd place and played all day and into the night.  He didn't get home until after 7 and I was pretty glad to get some relief from single parenting.