I gladly took a few days of leave to hang with the kiddos and we had a great time! Some of our adventures are chronicled below in (bad) iPhone photos:
1. Ant attack!! The ants in this area are bad regardless, but the recent heat wave drove them inside...again. We've been fighting them for the last year, as do all the residents in the area. I'm sure the interior walls of all the homes here are just crawling with the little black ants. They don't seem to bite, but they are SOOOOO annoying. On Wednesday morning, we discovered that RJ's room had been the latest target. He and I noticed a the ants before he went to school. They were coming out from under the baseboard in his closet and then had spread around his room. I put out some ant traps which work pretty well if you give them time (a couple days), but I wanted them gone so in the end I sprayed them all with ant killer and then had to clean up the carnage. I'm guessing that I cleaned up 4-5 thousand ants in the end. Here are a couple grainy photos of them.
2. Potty training. Ryleigh is doing very well with potty training, except for going #2. She has some serious stage fright and tends to still want to go off by herself to take care of business. For that reason, we've been keeping her in a pull-up for extended periods vice just underwear. She tends to want to go "pee" about a dozen times in a couple hour time period which is the indicator that she needs to do more than just #1. We've mistakenly left her in underwear a few times despite these warning signs in hopes that she'll make progress...and we've paid for our mistakes more than once. She's getting there though and it won't be long before we are completely free from pull-ups. She does tend to like to go pantless (only underwear or pull-up), though, as you can see in this photo of us playing out in the backyard.
3. Birthday party. We (RJ and Ryleigh with me as their designated driver) were invited to a birthday party for a couple of the children we know from the neighborhood pool. Two of their children have birthdays very near to each other, so we joined them at John's Incredible Pizza (Chuck-e-Cheese-like place, but better) for a combined birthday bash. It was fun but a little hectic. And RJ needs to work on his limbo skills (see below).
4. On Saturday, we went to the Living Coast Discover Center which is best described as a local, lower-budget, passionately-operated conservation center. Located on the water here in Chula Vista, it has birds, reptiles, fish, turtles, sharks, and rays on display. There are some other things there, too, but that list pretty well sums it up. It's the type of place that can be fully explored in about an hour. Regardless, we had a good time. We got to see them feed the rays and sharks and could have petted the rays if we'd been a little more brave. Maybe next time. RJ asked questions of the presenter/speaker during the presentation and made up stuff about sharks and fish which he shared non-stop with a little boy that he hijacked from another family (hidden from view in the fourth photo below). Here are a few photos and a quick video.
5. Time around the house. I did some experimenting with getting kids to bed without a parent in the same room. Typically, when I'm gone for a night or on travel, Amy has to resort to the kids sleeping in our bed with her. It's too hot to do that so I tried to get them each down in their own beds. I was semi-successful with RJ and had a couple successes with Ryleigh. I found that I could sit on a chair looking into each of their rooms and that was enough assurance to let sleep overcome them. Hopefully, this trend continues.
All-in-all, we had a great time together and am happy that Mom got to spend some time with Grandma doing something fun in New York. I'm looking forward to another opportunity to hang with them munchkins...not sure if they share the same sentiment, though!
-Jip
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