Castledaly Manor Retreat

July 8, 2014Leave a comment

Now that the clock is officially ticking down our last days in Ireland, I’m starting to feel the pressure: the pressure to organize and pack and make appointments and settle accounts and say goodbyes. It’s crunch time, yet I’m still in a bit of denial about the whole “I only have 3 weeks left in Ireland” thing. It was wonderful, then, to escape last weekend for some much-needed respite. Our church was taking a retreat in Castledaly, a “town” (there are only a couple of houses and a shop, so I don’t know exactly what to call it) near Athlone right in the middle of Ireland. Since Jon is still in Korea I was a bit nervous to go alone with the boys–but then I heard that there would be babysitters available. That was all the convincing I needed, so we loaded up the car for our last Irish weekend getaway.

We left Cork early Friday morning so we could spend the day in Dublin before meeting up with our friends in Castledaly. Friday happened to be the 4th of July, American Independence Day. Not surprisingly, in Ireland there are no community parades or firework shows on July 4th. And, even though we were the only ones celebrating here, we still dressed in our red, white and blue with pride.

I decided that we needed to do something special to celebrate the 4th of July. Something American. And there is nothing more American (nay, anything more Seattle) than good ‘ol Starbucks. So, on our way out of town we stopped by the only Starbucks in southern Ireland for some hot chocolates.
With our tummies happy, we were ready for the road. We arrived in Dublin at about lunch time, so we stopped by Avoca on our way into town. Avoca is a foodie paradise, a bit like a gourmet cookery shop meets country farm shop. The store downstairs sells everything from kitchen gadgets to specialty foods to handmade charcuterie from their on-site butcher. Upstairs there are two cafes that offer all sorts of mouthwatering nummy-ness. We all enjoyed a tasty lunch–that is, after tripping people with my stroller on three separate occasions, having David nearly lock himself in a bathroom, spilling a tray of food and breaking a glass bottle of lemonade, and calming Jacob down from a minor meltdown over a dropped M&M. I’m pretty sure they won’t be inviting us back to Avoca any time soon, so I’m glad I got to enjoy at least one meal there.

The whole drive up to Dublin I’d been holding out hope that the incessant rain would let up a bit so we could spend the afternoon at the Dublin Zoo. Unfortunately the weather had other plans, so I had to change mine. I have made a pact with myself that, whenever I have the kids with me, I must choose the easier option. Not the thing I want to do, but the easier thing. In this particular case, dragging two already-tried boys through the zoo in a rain storm was not the easy option. Thankfully, I had a Plan B: the Dublin Imaginosity Children’s Museum.

Thankfully, the children’s museum was wonderful and the boys loved every minute of it. We spent several hours playing in the an post (post office), the supermarket, the restaurant, the bakery, the doctor’s office, the construction zone, the T.V. station, and the costume stage. We also played with toy trains and climbed a 3-story tall rocket ship jungle gym. The rain even stopped for a good 15 minutes so we could check out the rooftop garden:

After our fun afternoon at the children’s museum it was time to continue our drive out to Castledaly, about an hour west of Dublin. Our final destination was Castledaly Manor, a gorgeous 18th century manor house.

Up until a few years ago, the house was being used as a posh hotel. Now the house is owned by Bible Centered Ministries, an international Christian ministry that focuses on reaching out to children and developing churches. They also host camps and church groups at Castledaly Manor, which is how we came to stay there.

Now, I’ve been to my fair share of church camps and retreats–and most of them involve sleeping on a worn out mattress in your sleeping bag and eating reheated food from a can. Castledaly Manor could not be further from that church camp stereotype. The “house” (what do you call a mansion with 25 bedrooms?) is set in an idyllic country setting. The absolute peacefulness of the area is what struck me first. The kids, on the other hand, were taken with the slides that were built into the hills…

…and the tire swings hanging from centuries-old trees

…and the swings in the gardens

…and the fields to play frisbee in

…and the secret gardens to discover

…and the pitches for playing soccer

…and the ponds for throwing rocks.

The house itself was incredible. It was built in 1780, which makes it the same age as the United States of America (ironic, since we arrived here on the 4th of July!). The interior was luxurious with marble fireplaces, grand staircases and picturesque window seats. They were even kind enough to include four-poster beds for the children to jump on.

There was a huge industrial kitchen where we prepared our meals (and by we, I mean the few brave souls who are, in my mind, miracle workers). Keeping with the “living like kings” theme of the weekend, we dined like royalty. Every meal was incredible and everything was homemade (including the best salsa I’ve had in Ireland. Hands down.).

Our food was served in the grand dining room (Jacob is the only one in this photo because we were the only ones up at 6 AM eating our breakfast. Sigh…).

There were also beautiful sitting rooms where we could relax and hang out together:

Perhaps my favorite part of the house, however, was this huge window at the landing of the grand staircase. All I could think about every time I saw it was, “how much would it cost to replace this thing if my kids throw a ball through it?”.

Every morning and evening we gathered for prayer, worship and teaching. This weekend our theme was “Jesus is greater” and we went through Matthew 12 where Jesus declares himself to be greater than three things (the temple, Jonah, and King Solomon, if you want the Cliff’s Notes version of the teaching). It was a rich time of teaching, learning and reflecting.

While we grown ups were busy doing our grown-uppy things, the kids went off to “kids camp” in another part of the house. An amazing group from a church in Dublin came over just to watch our kids and help us out for the weekend. The kids had a wonderful time playing games, reading Bible stories and making crafts with their new friends from Dublin. They even took our kids outside to play in the afternoon so we parents could have a little time to ourselves. It was pretty much the best thing a parent could ever wish for.

At night time we put the kids to bed and then had a little more fun (shhh, don’t tell the kids that we actually have fun after they go to bed or they may never go to bed again). On Saturday we had a table quiz night. Each round had trivia questions or activities we had to complete in a set amount of time–and it all ended with some rousing renditions of popular songs being performed with–ahem–gusto. We were having so much fun that I didn’t even mind being up past midnight (well, at least I didn’t mind until 6:00 the next morning when Jacob decided it was a good time to start our day).

After three days of playing, resting, learning, eating, visiting, exploring and enjoying it was time to say goodbye to Castledaly Manor. I would have been happy staying there for a few more weeks, but it was time to head back to reality.

Since the manor is out in the middle of nearly-nowhere, there was no cell phone or internet connection available outside of one room in the house that had a wifi hot spot. So, I went into the wifi room and set my GPS for “home”, and we started driving. I got about half an hour away from the manor when my GPS decided it was tired of trying to think without direct access to a satellite, and the screen went blank. I had no idea where I was, and all I could see were cows and grass and bushes and the empty little one-lane road I was driving on.

I had paper maps in my car that had never been opened because I rely on technology too much and don’t really know how to properly read a map. So, I opened the map and realized that “middle of nearly-nowhere” was not on it. I knew that I wouldn’t be able to find my way all the way back to the manor through the windy country roads, so I just decided to keep driving. I didn’t know where I was going, but I knew it was somewhere (or, at least, would eventually be somewhere). I finally got to an intersection that had a road sign (Good! There are places somewhere!). One of the towns listed on the sign was not on my map, but the other one was. I decided to drive toward “place on my map”–and it worked!

As soon as I got to the “place” my GPS made contact with her satellite again and we were back in business. I would have loved to stay and explore the town we were in, called Birr, as there was a HUGE castle and a quaint town center. I couldn’t convince the boys to get out of the car, though, so we kept driving (with my SatNav happily refreshed!):

The next town we came to was called Roscrea and, again, there was a huge castle and all sorts of fascinating ruins to explore. The boys still wanted to sit and smash Cheerio’s into their car seats, so I just parked the car outside an old church and snapped a few quick photos. I love the juxtaposition of this scene: a 1,000 year old round tower and church facade with a Tesco grocery store in the background. It’s just so…Ireland.

Shortly after leaving Roscrea we connected with the motorway and we made it back home in time for dinner.We had a great time at our little retreat, and I’m so glad we decided to go. This weekend was just what I needed right now–a last reminder of the people and places that make Ireland so special.

Canary Islands Vacation

June 17, 20142 Comments

Last week was a big week for us with much to celebrate: my birthday, our wedding anniversary, and Father’s Day. With all of these big events happening in the same week, we thought it would be exciting to take a once-in-a-life time family vacation. Our destination: Lanzarote in Spain’s Canary Islands.

We left for Lanzarote in the wee hours of the morning on Sunday, June 8th. Our taxi to the airport picked us up at 4:00 in the morning and we boarded our plane before the summer sun even had a chance to greet us:

We decided to try out Ryanair, a budget airline, for the first time. We’d heard mixed reviews about the airline: yes, it’s cheap (we’re talking $15 tickets from Dublin to London…CHEAP) but it comes at a price. Ryanair has very strict baggage requirements and you pay extra for every little thing, so we’ve been hesitant to fly with them and our kids and our 5 billion things that our kids require every time we leave our house for even 5 minutes. In the end, though, they were much more lax than we’d heard, we had comfortable flights and, most importantly, we saved ourselves loads of money.

Landing at the Lanzarote airport feels like you’re going to crash into the ocean. It was quite thrilling. The runway is only a few meters from the beach, so as you’re dropping down from the sky at 100 MPH it feels like you’re actually dive-bombing into the sea. Luckily we landed on solid ground and our vacation could continue as planned:

We rented a car for the first few days so we could explore a bit of the tiny island before retreating to the confines of our resort and the beaches for the second half of the week. As we were driving from the airport out to the resort I was struck by the landscape. The whole island of Lanzarote is volcanic, and in the late-1700’s there were non-stop volcano eruptions for 6 straight years. As a result, the topography consists entirely of volcanic rock and, when you approach the ocean, sand. There are no plants (except for the palm trees the resort-builders have planted) and almost no native wildlife (except for fish and bugs). I kept getting the sense that we had actually landed on Mars rather than being 78 miles off the coast of West Africa:

The land is so barren, in fact, that there are no sources of fresh water on the island. This could pose a problem for anyone who, you know, wanted to survive for more than 24 hours. Thankfully the resort builders thought this one through, too, and they have built desalination plants all over the island. These desalination plants turn the plentiful salt water from the surrounding ocean into clean water (well, clean enough to wash your hands with and take a shower in…you still can’t drink it or anything). I’m pretty sure the island also keeps the bottled water companies in business year round with the demand for drinking water.

When we got to our resort (the Lanzarote Gardens, if you’re keen to know) we checked in and dropped our bags off in our room. We had a bungalow, a nice two-level place with a kitchenette and two outdoor patios. It was perfect for our family and right across the way from the swimming pools and children’s areas. Then, after we’d gotten settled in, it was time to explore Lanzarote!

For our first full day in Lanzarote we decided to go out on a glass-bottomed boat tour. We met our boat in the nearby town of Playa Blanca (Well, actually every town in Lanzarote is “nearby”. You can literally drive from one end of the island to the other, in any direction, and be there in about an hour).

The boat ride itself was lovely. We had a jovial captain who grew up on the island in the pre-resort days when there was nothing on the island but a few fishermen’s shacks down on the beach. He gave us a brief history of the island as we sailed past beaches and towns and soaked in our often-missed sunshine.

Unfortunately, the “glass-bottomed” part of the boat was a bit disappointing. We saw a few fish and sea urchins and a starfish when we were close to the harbor where our boat docked. Other than that, though, there was not much to see in the water. Despite the lack of underwater viewings, we thoroughly enjoyed our little boat ride.

The next day, Tuesday, was my birthday! It was definitely one of the most memorable birthdays I’ve ever had. We spent the day exploring Timanfaya National Park (also known as “Fire Mountain Park”):

Upon entering the park you are greeted by hundreds of camels, just waiting to give the obliging tourist a ride up into the lava-rock hills:

We were more than obliging, so we saddled right up and went on our first family camel-trek. Our camel (who we nicknamed “Rocky”) hated us. He kept glaring at us and trying to sit down when his camel friends were scurrying up the path. Sorry, Rocky–I wouldn’t want to carry four heavy people (including two squirmy, kicky, hair-pulley little people) anywhere, let alone up a mountain. But we thank you, anyway. It was an epic adventure:

After our camel ride we drove to the top of the mountain where there is a visitor center and restaurant. It being lunchtime on my birthday, we decided to go into the restaurant for our afternoon meal. There were floor-to-ceiling windows surrounding the restaurant for a 360 degree view of the park. It was breathtaking:

Amazing as the views were, though, that was not the best part of the restaurant. No, the best part was the food–or, rather, the way they cook the food there. You see, instead of cooking with a boring old stove they cook over the heat of a volcano. That’s right, a volcano BBQ. The volcano we were perched upon still produces a good amount of heat and fire, so they set up their cookery right over one of the hot spots. I’d never seen anything like it before (and, by the way, everything was delicious!):

While we were dining we could also look out the windows from the restaurant and watch a steam show. One of the park rangers would dump water into special vents that were placed over some of the hot spots in the ground and steam would burst out, kind of like a geyser. Cheap thrills, folks:

After lunch we hopped on one of the waiting buses for a 40-minute guided tour of the park. We gazed down into calderas and marveled at the 30 different types of lichen growing on the volcanic rocks and drove through the middle of ancient lava floes:

Our tour of Timanfaya concluded our exploration of the island. There were a few more sites we could have visited, but we really just wanted to spend the rest of the week relaxing at our resort. So that’s exactly what we did.

We spent countless hours at the resort’s 3 pools. David and Jon are part-fish, so they are right at home when they’re in the water:

The water was a bit cool for my comfort (If the water’s not warm enough for me to fall asleep with a pina colada in one hand and a good book in the other, then I’m just going to stay on dry land). Jacob felt a bit the same way as me, so we set up shop on the lounge chairs. We had a good vantage point from our poolside perch to watch David jumping and splashing and sliding to his little heart’s delight:

Just across the street from our resort was Las Cucharas beach, a lovely white sand beach with a swimming area and plenty of space for water sports (windsurfing seemed to be the most popular choice). We spent a few afternoons at the beach building sandcastles…

…and frolicking in the ocean:

There is a beautiful promenade that follows the coastline. I followed the promenade for a few miles one day and couldn’t see the end of it, so I’m not sure how far it actually goes if you want to walk/run/cycle the whole thing. We had a great time walking down the promenade and taking in the stunning views:

Another favorite resort activity we enjoyed was Kids Club. Kids Club is a magical place at the resort where parents can drop their kids off so they can run off and enjoy a few hours swimming or beaching or napping. While Mom and Dad are off doing boring grown-up stuff the kids play games, make crafts, and get hyped up for the World Cup (alright, I’m sure that’s not the case most of the time, but this being the first week of the World Cup–and Europeans being obsessed with soccer–it was kind of a big deal):

There were also two playgrounds at the resort where we could take the boys to run around and burn off some of their boundless energy:

After playing hard all day, we were usually pretty hungry. We had a half-board package at the resort (breakfast and dinner included), so we enjoyed most of our meals at the on-site restaurant. Everything was buffet-style–lots of meats, potatoes, pastas, salads, and international cuisines:

There was even a separate childrens’ buffet with kid-friendly fare like hot dogs, chicken nuggets, spaghetti, and Jell-O. Lots and lots of Jell-O:

We all agreed that the best buffet in the restaurant, though, was the dessert buffet. Ice cream, pies, cakes, cookies, fresh fruit and even a chocolate fountain. Yummmmmmm….

Each night there was entertainment at the resort. There were shows for adults–Chinese acrobats, musicians, dancing, theater–but we didn’t see any of them because they didn’t start until 9:30 and, well, we’re old and that’s our bedtime. We did, however, go to the kids’ dance party “Daisy Disco” most nights after dinner. David and Jacob loved singing and dancing and parading around the room with clowns and throngs of other children:

On Thursday Jon and I celebrated our ninth wedding anniversary! It was a special day, so we celebrated with some special activities. We went for a family walk on the beach and re-created one of our favorite wedding photos. My how our family has grown in the last 9 years!

Jon and I also treated ourselves to massages at the resort. The spa is located in a cave behind a waterfall–pretty incredible:

For our final anniversary celebration we went out to a nice dinner in town. The menus–as with everything in Lanzarote–were written in three languages: Spanish (because we’re in Spain), English and German (the last two languages being for the tourists. There are LOTS of German tourists in Lanzarote):

We went out for Mexican food and it was delicious. We drank margaritas and ate burritos and jalapeno poppers. We had a wonderful time, despite having our third- and fourth-wheels (our children) with us for our romantic evening out. And, just so we wouldn’t forget this memorable anniversary, the kids also decided to get sick at dinner. Jacob threw up all over me and had a diaper explode with diarrhea (sorry, TMI?) but, like I said, it was…memorable.

Our poor kids spent the last couple of days going in and out of yucky sickness. This meant that they also had a hard time sleeping–which meant none of us slept. One morning Jacob was up almost all night so, at about 5:00 AM, I decided to take him for a little walk to see if I could get him to fall asleep. We ended up walking up and down the beaches for two hours–my poor sick baby never fell asleep, but we did catch a beautiful sunrise over the Atlantic Ocean:

Despite everyone feeling a bit yucky, we still managed to squeeze in some fun during our last couple of days in Lanzarote. We even found “The Fish Spa”–a very unique experience, for sure! You basically put your feet in these giant fish tanks where swarms of little fish nibble dead skin off your feet. It sounds weird…and it is. But it was fun and kind of tingly and I’d do it again!We blinked and then it was Sunday again, time to go back home. Sunday happened to be David’s day to be sick, so we stuffed plastic bags in our pockets (to contain the inevitable sickness), packed our bags, and headed to the airport. Poor little David was so sick that he fell asleep in the airport waiting for our plane…and he didn’t wake up until 5 hours later when we touched down in Ireland:

Volcanoes, camels, beaches, swimming pools, boat rides, sunshine, and some good quality time with the people I love the most–I couldn’t ask for a better vacation (well, maybe minus the sickness). Many memories were made, much fun was had, and much joy was celebrated. It was definitely a vacation none of us will ever forget!

Weekend “Staycation”

May 26, 20145 Comments

Lately we’ve been spending most of our weekends out exploring Ireland, so we decided that this weekend it was time for us to regroup and spend a few days here in our own home. Even though we were staying home, we still wanted to plan something fun. So the idea of the “staycation” was born. Jon cooked up a plan for a little father-son back yard camp-out, and I planned a little getaway to the spa. It was the best weekend ever.

On Saturday morning Jon and the boys prepared the campground (i.e. our back yard) for the boys’ camp-out. We’d brought our little 2-man backpacking tent with us from America and we haven’t used it once. There is no way I’m going to bring something half-way around the world to not use it, even once. This being Memorial Day Weekend–one of the busiest camping weekend of the year in America–we thought it would be the perfect excuse to dust of the little tent and let it breathe the fresh Irish air. The boys had fun scouting out our yard for the perfect location to pitch their tent (I believe the criteria consisted of flat ground, soft grass, not too mushy, and not on top of dog poop). David and Jacob watched on as Daddy expertly raised the tent and, most importantly, covered the whole thing with a rain shield. Then they piled blankets and pillows and stuffed animals and Buzz Lightyear action figures inside. The tent was complete.

After the tent set-up was finished I sneaked out of the house (er…campground…) for a little mommy TLC time. My Mother’s Day gift this year was a massage at a local spa, and I’ve been dreaming about it ever since I opened the gift certificate. Now it was finally time for my dream to materialize.

The Maryborough Spa was–how do I put this?–heaven on earth. Seriously, the most luxurious pampering I’ve ever experienced. Upon my arrival I was greeted and then given a brief tour of the spa. I had an hour until my scheduled massage so I was able to take advantage of the Thermal Suite. This was an area that included saunas, steam rooms, heated lounge chairs, a multi-jet shower and the most incredible hot tub I’ve ever seen. The hot tub was huge–big enough to swim laps in–and it had all of these water fountains and jets you could turn on and loungers to sit on and lighting that made it look as if you were swimming under the stars. It was incredible, and I would have been happy if the whole spa day just ended right there. But I’m so glad it didn’t, because there was much more incredible-ness to come.

After I was nice and serene from my hour in the Thermal Suite I was guided to my treatment room where I received a relaxing massage. I have had many massages over the years, but this was the single most relaxing massage I’ve ever had. I got to choose my own mix of calming body oils, the mood lighting for the room, and the precise adjustment of my contouring massage table so that everything was perfectly suited to me (and isn’t this all about me anyway?). During the massage I drifted off to sleep and I’m pretty sure I drooled, but they must expect that when they go to all the trouble of making everything so darn perfect.

When my massage was over I was led to the “relaxation suite”–a peaceful window-lined room overlooking a waterfall in a courtyard. After I was settled in my plush lounge chair and covered with a warm blanket they brought me a refreshment tray with juice, smoothies, and a bowl of fresh fruit to munch on while I read a magazine or finished my nap. Note: at this point it had been nearly 3 hours since I’d changed a diaper or winced at a whining child. It was truly surreal.

But, wait! There’s more! After I was good and relaxed I was led to my next room-of-paradise: the tea lounge. Here I was served afternoon tea, which is just another way of saying “towers of cakes”. This exquisite stack of scrumptiousness spoke to my very soul.

I took my time nibbling each little delicacy set before me: warm ham and cheese pastry, almond cake, chocolate chip cookies, scones, raspberry napoleons, fruit tarts, scones with jam and cream. I didn’t really intend to eat the whole tower of food, but it happened. And I relished every single calorie I consumed.

After my tea/gorge-fest I returned to the relaxation room to sleep off a bit of the tryptophan from my dainty turkey and brie sandwich. When one of the spa staff members came to check on me I told her I was moving in to the spa forever. She must have thought I was joking, because she laughed and walked away. While I was scouting out the relaxation room for the best after-hours hiding spot I was awakened by a sense of duty to my family. I decided to go back home after all. Besides, I really didn’t want to miss out on the camp-out dinner (sheesh, I’m starting to sound really gluttonous here…).

When I got back home Jon had already started the “camp fire”, a disposable charcoal BBQ set that he found at the grocery store. Despite having to use it in the rain, our little BBQ worked perfectly for roasting sausages:

And marshmallows for s’mores:

We had to improvise a bit with the s’mores based on the availability of ingredients in Ireland–you can really only find pink marshmallows here and we had to use tea biscuits in place of graham crackers. In the end, though, they were every bit as good as the s’mores you eat in the dirt at any American campground.

After dinner we had a family movie night (the feature presentation was “Toy Story”) and then it was off to bed. Since the tent is only big enough for two (and *maybe* because I didn’t want to sleep outside in the rain) I sacrificed my place in the tent so that Jon could sleep out there with David. Jacob slept in his crib inside the house because nobody wants a toddler who wakes up at 5 AM sleeping right outside their bedroom window when 5 AM rolls around.

David was so excited for his camp-out (and so confused by the daylight that lingered until nearly 10:00) that he didn’t fall asleep for a good long while after he and Daddy went out to the tent. Jon told him stories and they snuggled and eventually the sky darkened and they slept until 7:00 the next morning. Jacob woke up at his usual 5:00 but, since I was the only other person in the house, I decided to let him whine in his bed for a good long while before I dragged myself out of bed to get him. I decided to bring him back to bed with me and as soon as we were lying down he fell back asleep until 8:00. I’m not gonna lie, I kind of loved it.

If I could change anything about this weekend, I would make it longer. Longer to have my family together, longer to roast marshmallows in the rain, longer to watch my son and my husband bond in a tent, longer to relish in pampering at the spa. But I know that all good things must come to an end, and so did our weekend. I’ll tell you one thing, though. If I’m having a rough time this week I’m just going to close my eyes and go to my happy place–that magical place where the only thing interrupting my sleep is a tower of cakes.

Dingle

May 19, 2014Leave a comment

When we first moved to Ireland almost a year ago we made a bucket list of sorts with all of the places that we wanted to visit while we were living here. We’ve made a pretty good dent in the list so far and have already crossed off most of our “must see” locations: The Cliffs of Moher, Dublin, Newgrange, Belfast, Killarney, the Ring of Kerry, Kilkenny, the Rock of Cashel. However, there was still one Big One–maybe THE Big One left on our list. It seems like every person we’ve ever talked to who has visited Ireland or who lives here says the same thing: You must, must, must go to Dingle.

It’s supposed to be spectacular–in fact, National Geographic once cited the area as “the most beautiful place on earth”. That’s quite a statement from anyone, let alone National Geographic (because, you know, they’ve actually seen a lot of the earth). We were saving our Dingle trip for nicer weather and a special occasion, both of which lined up perfectly this weekend. We decided to continue our celebration American Mother’s Day this weekend with our special trip out to Dingle (I say continued the celebration because I actually thought Mother’s Day was this weekend when I booked the trip–that’s what I get for celebrating a holiday in a country where nobody else is celebrating said holiday).

We knew that Dingle was going to be incredible when the drive into town was a treat in itself. When we were a few miles out of town we crossed over Conor Pass, the highest mountain pass in Ireland–which, coming from the Cascade-rimmed Pacific Northwest, is a bit of a deceiving term. By “highest mountain” pass, they actually mean that it’s just the tallest hill on the island. Regardless, the views from the top of Conor Pass weren’t too shabby:

We arrived in Dingle at about noon on Friday and checked into our AirBnB apartment in town. The apartment was over a shop, both of which were run by Kathleen McAuliffe, a relatively well-known Irish designer and milliner (her shop had lots of cute hats, jewelry, dresses, and artwork made by herself and my favorite Irish designer, Orla Kiely. I exercised great restraint in not sneaking down each day to buy up her stock). That’s our apartment on the top floor of the blue building:

After we got our car unloaded we walked into town for lunch. There was a small farmer’s market set up in the middle of town so we booked it over there for some local fare. Jon and I ate lamb burgers (the lamb came from a farm up the hill, the bun was made in a bakery in town, and all of the veggies came from farms in the area). The boys, however, went with a less-conventional approach to lunch. They both passed up crepes and sausages and bread and cheese. Why, you ask? Because they wanted to eat the world’s largest carrots. David literally ate his carrot all weekend–we just carried it with us wherever we went and he kept nibbling away at it. Here’s Bugs Bunny in action:

After lunch we walked through the little town to get our bearings. The blue shop on the left is called Murphy’s Ice Cream and we stopped by there for a treat. It was some of the most delicious ice cream I’ve ever eaten (on the same par with Mallard’s and Molly Moo’s for you Seattleites who might be reading). I had the Dingle Sea Salt ice cream (kind of like a rich salted caramel flavor)–the cream came from the local Kerry breed of cows (they are more rare than Giant Pandas!) and the sea salt came from Dingle Harbour. Yes, they actually go out to the harbour, collect sea water, and produce their own sea salt for the ice cream. If you ever find yourself in Dingle, stop by and give it a try–you won’t be sorry!

After our walk we drove a few miles out of town to Ventry Harbour where we could play on a nice sandy beach. We spent a couple of hours building sand castles, climbing sand dunes and dipping our toes in the Atlantic:

When we’d had enough of the beach we decided to get back in the car and continue driving out of town along Slea Head Drive, a scenic road that makes a 40-Kilometer loop around the Dingle Peninsula. A few miles into the drive we came to a tourist stop at some famine cottages (cottages that were abandoned in the 1850’s during the Great Irish Famine). While walking up to the cottages we visited several animals: horses, sheep, rabbits, and a very friendly donkey:

The cottages themselves were very interesting. There were three cottages set up so you could see how people might have lived in them (let’s just say I’m glad I wasn’t born in 19th century rural Ireland…). There were displays with information about the famine and how it affected people in the region–about 2 million people died or immigrated during a time period of about 10 years as a result of diseased potatoes and the starvation that ensued. Learning about the famine is terribly saddening, yet strangely intriguing. From the cottages, we continued along Slea Head Drive. We made a quick pit stop at a little roadside cafe so we could use the toilets and eat some pie. I don’t know if it was the stunning view or the home-baked goodness, but that was some of the best darn pie I’ve ever had: We took hundreds of photos and videos along Slea Head Drive, but none of them do it any justice. We were there on a rare day of perfect weather with sunshine and blue skies that reflected off the ocean water. It was almost magical. Every turn we went around was more stunning than the one before and I literally had my breath taken away several times.

Besides the incredible views, the drive was also uniquely Irish. We were stopped several times to allow livestock and cars to pass on the single-lane, cliff-lined road:

When we got back home from our drive around Slea Head it was dinner time. We made pizza back at our apartment and enjoyed a relaxing evening lounging around. At 8:00 we heard the church bells ringing at the church across the street from our apartment and we told the boys that was their “bedtime bell”. So, off to bed we went.

We decided to do a little experiment this weekend having the boys sleep together in the same room (they’ve always slept in separate bedrooms due to their strange sleeping patterns and my unwillingness to deal with cranky sleepers). The sleeping part actually went remarkably well. They enjoyed sharing a room. In fact, they enjoyed it so much that one night they were playing together after bedtime, but it was so cute and harmless that we decided to let them play until they fell asleep. Harmless. Right? Wrong.

Jon went to do the nightly check-in on the boys before we went to bed only to discover that the door to their room was locked. LOCKED. With two sleeping children inside. It wouldn’t have been such a big deal if it wasn’t our house and we weren’t worried about actually having to break down the door to get them out. Or if we could have woken David up to coerce him to try to unlock the door. Or if we thought the boys wouldn’t completely FREAK OUT when they woke up in the morning and realized they were locked in their bedroom-dungeon. Or if we could have found a key to unlock the door. Or if we could have made anything–a clothes hanger, a paperclip, my earring, the inside of a pen–that would budge that dang lock. So, after about half an hour of trying everything we could think of to open the door we were ready to give up and call a locksmith. I said a little prayer and decided to send a quick text to Kathleen, the lady who rented us the apartment, to see if she had any ideas. Just as I was about to hit “send” I heard Jon yell, “Hey, it’s open!”. For no apparent reason, he tried to open the door one more time and it just opened. The only explanation I have is that my prayer was answered…and the kids slept through the whole thing:

The boys woke up bright and early the next morning (per usual) so we decided to walk around the corner to the bakery for some breakfast treats. Colleen’s bakery had the best doughnuts I’ve had in Ireland, hands down. They were on par with Laffeen’s, for those of you in the know. The apple turnover was also delicious. So was the coffee cream puff. So was, I’m sure, every other edible thing in that bakery:

After our doughnut gorge-a-thon we walked over to the town park for some wiggle time (see our “bedtime bell” church in the background?):

Then it was off to the marina for a special excursion. We managed to (by luck and by prayer) score another perfect-weather day in Dingle (seriously, if you’ve ever been to Ireland, you know how very, very rare this is). I’d heard about these boat tours that take you out to the Great Blasket Island and I reallllllllyyyyyy wanted to go. The remote Blasket Island is the westernmost point of land in Europe. The island had been inhabited since prehistoric times by up to 200 people (and many more sheep) at a time. When the Great Famine hit, however, almost all of the inhabitants perished or immigrated. By the early 1900’s only about 20 people remained on the island. In 1953 the government deemed the islands unsuitable for human habitation and they moved the last residents off the island. Today you can visit the island to see what remains of the village and the abundance of wildlife that have made the island their home.

The thing about visiting the island, though, is that the boats that get you out there only sail on perfect-weather days. Which are oh-s0-very-rare. In fact, right up until 20 minutes before the day’s scheduled sailing we were unsure if the boats would be running due to high-wind warnings. But, we lucked out and they decided to go ahead with the sailing. Hooray!

Our boat was run by a small company called Great Blasket Experience, and it was wonderful. There was room for 12 people on the boat, so it was our family, another family with two boys from Houston, two men from London, and a couple from I-don’t-know-where (they didn’t talk much). Once we all clamored aboard our little vessel we fitted the boys out with life vests, and then we were off!

On the way out of the harbor we stopped for a few minutes to visit Dingle’s resident dolphin, Fungie. By choice, this dolphin has lived in Dingle Harbour for over 20 years. He’s very friendly and came up to our boat several times. He’s a fast little bugger, though, so I only managed to snap a photo of Jacob pointing at the water where Fungie had just surfaced:

After our boat left the sheltered harbor and entered the open ocean I began to see why they only sail out to the Blasket Islands on perfect-weather days. The high-wind warnings they had been concerned with that morning had died down, but the water was still choppy. And by choppy, I mean that it felt like we were on a roller coaster. A wet and wild roller coaster on a tiny orange dinghy. I was white-knuckled the whole 45-minute ride out to the islands. The boys, however, thought that this ocean roller coaster ride was some sort of lullaby and they both (yes, even David-who-never-naps) fell asleep on our laps, life vests and all:

When we (finally) pulled up to the island our captain set anchor and we took turns piling into a little motorized raft so we could shore up on the island:Then we got to climb up this treacherous cliff that was covered in slippery algae. While carrying a squirmy toddler and an independent preschooler. We made it, though, and our time on the island was worth every terrifying experience that it took to get there.

We spent two and a half hours walking around the island. We went up in the lush green hills around the village:

Into 2,000 year-old stone “beehive huts”:

And we ate our picnic lunch inside an abandoned 19th-century farmhouse:

Although no people live on the island any more, many animals have made the rolling hills and beaches their home. There were herds of sheep grazing freely (leftover from the people-populated days, I’m guessing), sea birds dive-bombing into the ocean for fish, snails (lots and lots of snails. David and Jacob spent a good 15 minutes just sitting in one spot picking snails off a wall), and hundreds of seals basking on the sandy beaches:

We thought the seals had the right idea, so we did a little basking of our own:

As we were walking back to the boat launch (if you could really call it that) I snapped this photo of our waiting boat (ours is the small orange one on the left, the boat on the right was the other passenger boat that made it out to the island that day):

The ride back to the mainland was much less roller coaster-y and much more smooth sailing-y. We said hello to Fungie the dolphin one more time before pulling in to the marina. After our busy day on the island we were all pretty wiped out. We went back to our apartment to take naps. When we woke up at dinner time, none of us wanted to go out or make anything so we ordered Chinese take-out from the restaurant 2 doors down. It was a truly memorable day.

On Sunday we woke up (or, more accurately, Jacob woke us all up) before the church even rang it’s first “good morning bell” at 6 AM. Since it was Sunday in Dingle, a small town in Ireland, this meant that nothing opened until at least 10:00. Not a cafe, not a coffee shop, not a park…nothing. So, we spent a good 4 hours on Sunday morning just hanging out in our apartment eating cereal, watching movies, and packing up our things.

When it was a reasonable hour to venture out into the world we drove over to the marina to watch the big boats unloading their cargo:

Our last stop in Dingle was to the Oceanworld Aquarium. It was a small but well-stocked aquarium with sharks, tropical fish, touchable tide pools, genial manta rays and penguins. The penguins were my favorite. They were Gentoo Penguins, a breed found in Antarctica. There was a display near the penguins about Tom Crean, a locally-born County Kerry man who was one of the sailor/explorers on the Ernest Shackleton’s Antarctic exploration ship, Endurance. A few weeks ago I read the book about the 1912 exploration, appropriately titled Endurance. Spoiler alert, but Endurance shipwrecks and all of the passengers spend several months floating around on the Antarctic ice floes. The book talks extensively about the seals and Gentoo Penguins that the men encountered and survived off of, so it was fascinating to watch these creatures up close:

After our morning at the aquarium we walked down the street to a chipper for some fish and chips (or, in my case, chicken and chips!). Then it was time to hit the road and find our way back to Cork. We took a different route on the way home–not so much by choice, but because our SatNav likes to take us on new adventures every day. Instead of driving through the mountain pass we winded our way along the coast on the Wild Atlantic Way. It was a beautiful drive and the two-and-a-half hour journey passed quickly with the boys napping and playing in the back seat.

We had an incredible weekend in Dingle exploring all that the area had to offer. I count myself blessed that I got to experience such a remarkable piece of God’s creation. And, by the way, I think National Geographic was spot-on: Dingle is one of the most beautiful places on earth.

Home Alone

May 5, 2014Leave a comment

Today marks the end of the longest two weeks. Ever. Jon has been in Seattle on a business trip (ironic, I know, since we moved half-way around the world from Seattle only to have him make regular trips back there). So, that meant that I was home alone. Well, not exactly alone alone–I mean, I had my kids here with me. But it was…different. The day after I got back from my own trip to Phoenix, Jon left for Seattle. I was exhausted and a bit overwhelmed (this is the longest business trip Jon’s taken since we’ve had kids), but I was determined to make the best of our situation. Without family nearby to offer a helping hand, or even a babysitter to call on for relief (they were all away on their own vacations, lucky ducks!), it was all up to me. So, I set about planning little day-ventures for us close to home (because, as much as I wanted to, I couldn’t muster up the courage to take two young children trekking across the country by myself for a full-on adventure). We managed to squeeze in quite a bit of fun to help pass the time while Daddy was away. Here’s a photo journal of what we’ve been up to these past couple of weeks:

We started our week at the grocery store. The boys helped me pick up some fuel for all of our upcoming adventures:

While we were at the grocery store (which is inside a shopping mall) we took a little break to ride a train around the mall:

We had a hot cocoa date at Costa Coffee:

We went to the zoo where we saw magnificent animals, played on the playgrounds, pet baby kangaroos, and ate ice cream:

We visited Rumley’s Open Farm to spend an afternoon playing…

…greeting animal friends…

…and even dining with a rogue mama pig and her six little piglets who wandered in from the farm:

We had brother snuggle time in David’s huge bed:

And went to the indoor playground with our friends:

We ate popcorn for breakfast. Twice:

We visited a new town. Monkstown is just up the road from us, about 10 minutes from our house, and I’d never been there before. It’s an adorable little seaside town with a marina, beautiful old churches, and a fantastic playground for the kiddies:

We went for a run by the sea and enjoyed a castle tea:

We visited Charles Fort, a 400-year old army fort that helped carry Ireland through the Spanish War and the war of Irish Independence:

After exploring the fort, we had a picnic overlooking the harbor:

Then we went into the town of Kinsale for ice cream and a stroll:

After I tucked the boys into bed each night, I worked on projects (I made 3 photo books, Mother’s Day gifts, and finished a couple of sewing projects). I may have also watched Downton Abbey. All three seasons of it:

We walked up the road to the farm that we can see from our back yard. I asked the (very tiny) woman who answered the door if we could meet her cows because we watch them every day and we’d like to get to know them. She told me (in a very thick Irish country accent) that ‘Sure ye can meet the calves, alright.’ When we asked her if the cows (‘No, they’s calves, those ‘uns’) had names she just shook her head and replied ‘They haven’t names, these calves. They’re being fattened now, alright.’:

After a disappointing encounter with cows (er…calves) who will never live to see their next birthday, we walked back down the road to our favorite walking trail so we could go throw rocks in the river:

On Thursday we went to the Farmer’s Market for Mommy’s weekly multi-sensory indulgence:

On May Day we went to a park to pick flowers. I don’t think I’ve ever been so happy to see May 1st arrive. Ireland as a country shuts down during the “winter” which just so happens to be half of the year (November-April). May 1st signaled the beginning of the official tourist season and shops, museums, restaurants–heck, whole towns–that had been closed all winter reopened their dusty doors for business. No more driving for hours trying to find an open restaurant or going to the mall on every rainy day to pass the time. Ireland is back open, and I am thrilled. Flowers seemed like a fitting celebration:

I watched Toy Story 3 for the first time with David. He sat on the couch next to me with his Woody and Buzz Lightyear toys and we watched the little boy in the movie, Andy, grow up and move out for college. I bawled my eyes out. I have now confirmed David’s suspicions that his mother truly is crazy:

We had a balloon sword fight at McDonalds:

And we baked the most delicious carrot cake sandwich cookies to share with our friends at church:

And, finally, we decorated a welcome home sign for Daddy. We all missed you like crazy, Jon!

Well, there you have it: two weeks come and gone. Even though it wasn’t easy having Daddy gone, we all survived and we even managed to have fun making memories together. It was a special time that I got to spend with just my handsome boys–boys who will grow up some day and leave me for college just like Andy in Toy Story. So in the end, if I’m going to be home “alone”, there’s nobody else I’d rather be here with.

Limerick: “Angela’s Ashes” Walking Tour and King John’s Castle

April 12, 20145 Comments

Several years ago I read a book that touched my heart: Angela’s Ashes. It is the childhood memoir of Frank McCourt, an American-born son of two Irish imigrants who returned to Ireland with his family when he was a young boy. His story is one of extreme poverty, neglect, sickness, death, constant struggle…and hope. It’s an incredible story that is told through the innocent and witty eyes of a boy who overcame all odds (McCourt went on to be a respected teacher in New York City and a Pulitzer Prize-winning author). The story is set in Limerick, Ireland where McCourt grew up. When we moved to Ireland I kept thinking back to anecdotes and references from Angela’s Ashes and I kept thinking, “I should really read that book again while I’m living here.” So, I did (and, let me tell you, it’s just as good the second time around!). And then I couldn’t stop thinking about Limerick. I wanted to see all of the places from the book–I wanted to experience first hand the city of this story.

As I was reading the book I took notes of locations that held special importance to McCourt: where his homes were, his school, the library where he spent countless hours reading, the pub where he would frequently retrieve his drunken father. Then I entered all of my “places of interest” into Google Maps and made myself a customized Angela’s Ashes walking tour of Limerick:

Now, there are a couple of official Angela’s Ashes tours led by different people in Limerick, but none of them were running at this time of the year (this time of the year being NOT the busy summer tourist season)–and, besides, our crew with two fussy boys under the age of four just doesn’t do well on guided tours. I did, however, find a great walking tour online that covered a few of the places I was already planning on visiting so I printed that off as well. With all of my maps and little waling guides in hand, it was time to pack up the family and drive up to Limerick.

We got to Limerick at lunch time. There was a cute Farmer’s Market set up on one of the streets downtown:

But, being the lazy, grease-hungry Americans that we are, we opted to eat at the Burger King across the street.

After lunch we walked a few blocks away to a little park where we could see the Shannon River. It’s a huge river and at low-tide (which it was when we were there) little rapids form at the crests of the river. There was a group of kayakers paddling through the rapids having a grand time. In the distance you can see King John’s castle…more on that later. Now, moving on to the Limerick of Frank McCourt.

Our walking tour began at the Parnell Street Railway Station. This is the railway station that the McCourt family arrived in when they first came to Limerick (OK, a little back story for those of you who haven’t read the book: Frank’s parents–Malachy and Angela–met in New York City the day that Angela immigrated from Ireland to start a “better life” for herself. Malachy had just gotten out of jail and was on the run for some anonymous crimes related to his involvement in the IRA back home in his native Northern Ireland. So, Malachy and Angela meet, they hit it off, and…9 months later Frank is born. It’s quite the scandal. Malachy and Angela quickly marry and even more quickly start making babies. Within four years they’ve had five children. They have no money, no love for each other, and very little love for their ever-growing brood of children. So much for the “better life”. They do have one saving grace: a baby girl who everyone adores. When she dies in infancy due to the horrid conditions the McCourt family is living in, it’s more than anyone can handle. They decide it’s time to leave New York and start back over in Ireland. Angela’s mom pays for the family to travel to Ireland because the McCourt family doesn’t even have enough money to buy a loaf of bread, let alone six one-way tickets to Ireland. So, they arrive in Northern Ireland where Malachy is from, they get kicked out; they go to Dublin; they get kicked out; they decide their last chance is to go to Limerick where Angela’s family is from. They ride the train all the way from Dublin down to Limerick and they arrive at…the Parnell Street train station. There. All caught up.)

The railway station is a beautiful building and I was fortunate enough to see the inside where trains have passed through for centuries (we had to run in so David could use the potty):

After arriving at the train station, the McCourt family carried their meager belongings through town to their new home in Limerick. The first place they passed through on this walk was the Peoples’ Park. I’m not sure what little Frankie was feeling when he first saw this park, but we loved it. There was a great playground for the kids (which we enjoyed immensely, but I’m sure it was not there in the 1930’s when the McCourt family arrived) and beautiful flowers everywhere.

At the edge of the park there is an art center that used to be a library. This is the library that Frank McCourt used to frequent as a boy so he could check out books for his mother and, if he was lucky, be allowed to sit in himself to read books about saints (guess libraries hadn’t caught on to the idea of a children’s section and weekly story times yet).

Just past the library is St. Michael’s Church where Frank and his friend Billy Campbell (jealously) watched the Protestants play croquet on the church lawn after service on Sunday mornings:

About a block past the church is South’s Pub–the infamous pub where Malachy McCourt infamously drank away every penny he ever earned (meaning his own family was cold and starving). This is the same pub where Frank’s uncle bought him his first pint at the age of 16 so he could become a “real man”:

And, to be quite honest, I don’t think I would have minded spending a bit of time inside South’s. It’s a beautiful pub, warm, welcoming–probably a lot nicer place to hang out than the overcrowded, damp, cold, nasty slums where the McCourt family lived:

And that brings us to the overcrowded, damp, cold, nasty slums where the McCourt family lived. This is Windmill Lane, the location of the McCourt’s first house in Limerick. The tenements where the McCourt family actually lived in the ’30’s have been torn down and replaced with more stable homes. This house was so poorly-built that one of Frank’s brothers, a twin, died here of disease when he was only two years old:

The family was distraught by little Oliver’s death. They couldn’t stay in that house on Windmill Lane a moment longer, so they moved to a house on Hartstonge Street (again, the old tenement houses have been replaced):

Unfortunately, little Oliver’s twin, Eugene, was so heartbroken over the death of his twin that he, too perished. The family decided to move again, this time to the top of Barrack Hill on Roden Lane:

This is where Frank lived for most of his childhood (and, once again, the original houses are long gone). The house on Roden Lane was at the end of the lane near a stable. There was one outhouse that the entire lane used–and it was right next to the McCourt’s house. The stench was unbearable in the summer. In the winter, the bottom floor of their house was constantly flooded and they were forced to move upstairs where it was dry–a place they fondly referred to as “Italy”.

After seeing all of the McCourt houses (well, the general locations, at least) we made one final stop on our Angela’s Ashes tour: Leamy’s National School. This is the school where Frank received his formal education–all six years of it.

Today the school is home to the Frank McCourt Museum, a wonderful privately-run museum. There are only two rooms in the museum–a classroom and a room set up like the McCourts house on Roden Lane–but they managed to fit a lot of information and memorabilia into the small space. The photos in this collage are: (top left) entrance to the museum, (top right) me and David with Frankie boy, (bottom right) Frank’s classroom (with some extra-cute pupils), (bottom left) school photo with Frank McCourt (he’s sitting in the front row on the right with the dark hair):

The museum is run by this woman (the one drawing at the easel in the photo):

Her father-in-law bought Leamy’s school after it became derelict and turned it into a garment shop. Once he retired, the building was sitting empty and she decided to make it into a museum. She drove around the country collecting information and artifacts and set about creating this little gem of a museum. And, speaking of gems, she was a gem herself. She gave my children paly-doh and markers to play with while she showed me and Jon around the museum, then she sat the boys down to draw portraits of them (she’s an artist), then she gave them candy for being such good little museum-goers. Seriously, one of the best museum-with-children experiences I’ve ever had! I would highly recommend that anybody who finds themselves in Limerick make a quick stop by the Frank McCourt Museum and give this woman a little hello.

After a full afternoon of walking around Limerick we had the option of driving home and crashing or…going to a castle! We, of course, went to the castle. Limerick is home to King John’s Castle, a fortress that was commissioned by King John (of Robin Hood lore) in the late 12th century. Last summer the castle was restored and renovated to include some incredible exhibits on the history of the castle and what life was like in Medieval times. There were lots of hands-on activities and interactive displays that kept us all entertained for hours:

As an added bonus, we were treated to beautiful views of Limerick from the top of the castle walls:

As we were walking back to the car at the end of the day I asked David what his favorite part of our day had been: The fun playground at the park? The lollipops at the museum? Climbing up castle walls? Nope, none of that. Do you know what his answer was? Getting rocks stuck in his boots. Yep. There were lots of pebbles at the castle and while he was running around like a wild banshee kicking up all the gravel, some of it got stuck in his boots. It was…awesome. At least for a 3-year old.

On our way out of town we made one last quick stop. Jon’s friend from work heard that we were in Limerick for the day and there just happened to be a Munster rugby match happening RIGHT THERE in Thomond Park, and he had an extra ticket, and could Jon come? Please, please, please could Jonny come out to play? So, as we drove out of Limerick we swung by the stadium to drop Daddy off for his first Irish sporting event (and, if you know my anti-sports-watching husband, you know that this is a big deal). He had a great time, and he even bought himself a Munster rugby hat. Up, Munster!

As I drove home alone with the boys I was treated to beautiful views of the rolling green hills in the Irish countryside. We ate granola bars and fruit snacks for dinner in our car, and it was perfect. An absolutely, perfectly Irish-y day.

St. Patrick’s Day In Ireland

March 18, 20143 Comments

On March 17th each year the whole world dresses in green to celebrate St. Patrick’s Day. Never in my life did I think I would actually be in Ireland on this most-Irish of all holidays. Yet, here we find ourselves, and I couldn’t have been more excited. This being our first St. Patrick’s Day in the Emerald Isle, we wanted to make it memorable. And, now that I’m starting to recover from the festivities, I can honestly say that St. Patrick’s Day in Ireland did not disappoint. We had a whole weekend of celebrations, and this will definitely be a St. Patrick’s Day that none of us will ever forget!

Our St. Patrick’s weekend festivities began on Friday. The boys received a care package in the mail from their Gammy and Grandpa Pete in Washington. It was full of goodies–including “leprechaun candy” that they feasted on all weekend:

On Friday afternoon we had a St. Paddy’s playdate with some of David’s friends. We all went out to lunch at our “local” (the pub in our neighborhood) that was all bedecked in Irish decor. Two of the moms have recently gone back to work so we don’t see as much of each other as we used to–we had a grand time catching up while the kids ran around the pub like wild banshees. Here’s David with his two buddies: Alannah and Jack Kelly (David calls him Jack Kelly–not just Jack–Jack KELLY. I kind of love it because it sounds so very Irish):

Saturday was an absolutely gorgeous day so we went out to Blarney Castle for a romp in the gardens. The castle grounds were beautiful with the Spring flowers blooming and the (rare) sun shining to warm us:

On Sunday we had our day of rest to prepare for the busy day on Monday: St. Patrick’s Day! Since St. Patrick’s Day is a national holiday in Ireland, Jon had the day off work (woot!). We started our day with a hearty St. Patrick’s-themed breakfast: “shamrock pancakes” (green pancakes) and “leprechaun juice” (green milk).

After breakfast we noticed that there were little green “clues” hidden all over the place. Apparently, a sneaky little leprechaun had snuck into our house while we were sleeping and hidden his treasure for us to find. The boys ran around (and up and down and all about) following the clues until they found the leprechaun’s treasure:

After our scavenger hunt we dressed up in our green get-ups and got ready to drive into the city for the Cork City St. Patrick’s Day Parade. Even Bota dressed up for the occasion (even if she didn’t get to come with us to the parade):

We arrived about 2 hours before the start of the parade which was kind of perfect–all of the Catholics (a.k.a all of the Irish people) were still in mass so we got a great parking spot and staked out a seat along the parade route. While we were waiting for the parade to begin we wandered around and got lunch at the food booths, visited the face painters in the park, and generally took it all in. We were here, in Ireland, for St. Patrick’s Day!

The parade was a grand affair. Michael Flatley of “Riverdance” fame was the master of ceremonies, although I didn’t even recognize him when he drove by (you can hardly blame me–he wasn’t wearing tights). The parade had bands, acrobats, dancing groups, an eclectic collection of international groups, fire trucks, and floats. The boys loved watching the parade–David’s favorite group was “the army guys” and Jacob’s favorite was the Chinese dragon (I know because he cried when it went around the corner and he couldn’t see it anymore). It was all really, really wonderful.

The parade must have wiped the boys out because shortly after we returned home I found them resting on the floor with blankets they’d pulled off their beds. Ah, even leprechauns need their sleep.

I probably should have joined them for their little afternoon snooze, because my day was far from over at this point. After the boys were tucked in for the night we had a babysitter come over so Jon and I could go out and enjoy the St. Paddy’s nightlife. We went back into the city and met up with our friend (and Jon’s co-worker), Cole, who had just arrived in town for a week of work in the Ireland office.

We visited some pubs, and I learned three important truths on our little late-night escapade:

1. There is nothing like celebrating St. Patrick’s Day in an Irish pub. Especially if that Irish pub is actually in Ireland. The atmosphere was…how do I put this…electric. Everything was buzzing and alive and, well, crazy. It was tons of fun.

2. Even the rowdiest pub in Ireland will still serve you tea and scones at midnight. No joke.

3. I am getting old. One of the pubs had a great band playing cover songs and we spent most of the night signing and dancing along with (what seemed to be) half of Ireland. I left the pub feeling old. Very, very old. Nevermind the fact that I still can’t hear out of my left ear (the one that was facing the speaker while the band played) or the fact that I left the pub clutching my sore back (too much dancing). The thing that makes me feel REALLY old is the fact that me, Jon, and Cole were the only ones singing along to songs from our high school days. Which makes sense when you consider that most of the other revelers in the pub were probably in Kindergarten when those songs were popular. Dang.

In short, St. Patrick’s Day in Ireland was everything I’d hoped that it would be…and more. Every St. Patrick’s Day for the rest of my life I will remember this week: that time that I was actually in Ireland for St. Patrick’s Day.

And it was–wait for it–legendary.

Weekend in Kilkenny

March 10, 20141 Comment

For a few months now we’ve been planning a trip with some friends of ours, Audrey and Dave and their three children: Zoe, Jack and Benjamin. Audrey and Dave are from a place called Kilkenny, and they were generous enough to offer themselves as our hosts and guides for our weekend out in the country. We were all very excited for our little 2-family getaway. That is, until this happened:

On the eve of our most-exciting trip, David came down with a nasty viral infection. His fever spiked to 105 degrees in the middle of the night, and we decided to take him to the hospital for a little check-up just to be safe. So, with a sick child and no previous Irish-hospital experience, Jon braved a night in the ER. I could devote an entire blog post just to this ridiculous hospital visit, but for now I’ll just say that it involved Jon kicking down a door in the hospital, sitting in a waiting room with people who had been waiting for TWELVE HOURS, and getting sent home with a “prescription” for Tylenol. Needless to say, Jon and David were pretty wiped out from the whole hospital experience and neither of them were up for a trip to the country–no matter how glorious it was going to be. We decided that it would be best for Jon and David to stay home and rest up while Jacob and I went on to meet our friends in Kilkenny.

Jacob and I got up before the crack of dawn (his idea, not mine), packed up the car, and drove 2 hours north into the Irish countryside. The drive itself was gorgeous–pastures, farms, animals, and ancient ruins everywhere you looked:

We arrived in Kilkenny just after 10:00 on Saturday morning so we had the whole day to explore. Audrey’s parents run a grain farm, and they were kind enough to put us all up in the bungalow on their property. The “bungalow” was actually a huge house with 5 bedrooms, a large kitchen, and 2 sitting rooms. The bungalow is on the farm, so we could look out the window and see tractors going by and even hear animals baa-ing and moo-ing in the distance. We couldn’t have asked for a more perfect place to stay on our little Irish holiday.

The first thing we did after getting unpacked was to go for a little walk around the farm:

All of the kids had a great time checking out the big tractors and massive farm machinery. Every little boy’s dream come true!

We walked through the ginormous grain sheds (seriously, I think you could fit Safeco Field inside one of these guys!) and got to learn about all of the different grains that are on the farm:

Audrey’s dad, Farmer Harper (alright, I don’t know if anyone calls him that, but his last name is Harper!), came down for a bit to show us around his farm and take the kids for rides on the tractor:

And then it was insisted upon that I drive the tractor:

I tried to warn them that I didn’t have an insurance policy to cover tractor collisions, but they still gave me the go-ahead (don’t worry, I drove at about 0.5 Miles Per Hour and couldn’t have hit a turtle if I’d been gunning for it):

After a fun morning playing at Farmer Harper’s grain farm we headed out for our next farm-venture. Audrey’s cousin runs an open farm (a farm open for visitors with animals and kids’ activities) called Nore Valley Park, just up the road from her parents’ farm. There were lots of baby animals for us to see and pet and cuddle at Nore Valley: ducklings, chicks, and bunnies.

My favorite babies, though, were definitely these twin lambs (you can only see one because her sister is lying behind Mama Sheep). They were born just a few hours before we arrived–they were so new that they still had their umbilical cords hanging on them!

There were lots of fun activities for the kids including Jacob’s favorite, the sand pit:

There were so many gorgeous animals for us to visit out on the farm. It doesn’t get much more Irish than this: a flock of fuzzy sheep and their new baby lambs grazing in a lush green field:

We made one last stop after Nore Valley at a pottery studio called Nicholas Mosse. Kilkenny is well-known for the Irish arts and crafts that are produced in this region, so I had to see at least one design center while we were there.

The Nicholas Mosse studio was very cool. The building itself is a 250-year old former grain mill on the banks of the River Nore. Inside, you can see demos of artists throwing the pottery and hand-painting each piece. Unfortunately, there were no demos for us to view while we were visiting, but there were several displays and videos showing us the whole pottery-making process.

We spent a bit of time perusing the pottery that was for sale in the store. But, since I didn’t have $80 to spare for a tea cup, we decided to move along.

There was a lovely cafe upstairs with a view of the river below. We all got tea and snacks to eat in the cafe. And, just to prove how Irish he’s becoming, Jacob drank nearly my whole pot of tea before I could get a sip in.

We took the scenic road home from Nicholas Mosse and, my, was it gorgeous. Beautiful roads winding along rivers and past pristine country farms. A gorgeous end to our first day in Kilkenny.

We spent our second day exploring the sights in Kilkenny. We started at Kilkenny Castle, a majestic building that is very unlike the rest of the typically rustic castles I’ve seen in Ireland. We posed for a quick group photo in front of the castle and then explored a bit of the grounds. There is a beautiful park surrounding the castle, complete with rose gardens and an awesome playground for the kids.

At this point, the babies were already asleep in their strollers so we decided to leave Dave outside with all of the kids at the playground while Audrey and I went inside to tour the castle (you win Man of The Year for that one, Dave!).

The castle itself was incredible. It was built in 1195 on the banks of the River Nore and was occupied by many different people throughout its history. The last family to inhabit these walls was the prosperous Butler family, and they went all out in the opulence department. There is hand-painted silk wallpaper in the drawing room and gold-plated ceilings in the library. Most of the furnishings, decorations, and details of the castle have been restored to their former glory. Sadly, we weren’t allowed to take photos inside–but just take my word for it, it was amazing!

After touring the castle we walked through town to do a bit of exploring:

As we were walking through town we came upon all of these lovely anti-witch posters. You see, Kilkenny was the home of Alice Kyteler, the first woman accused and condemned as a witch in Ireland.

After her fourth husband “mysteriously” died, Alice Kyteler was accused of being a witch and sentenced to death. She got wind of this unfortunate turn of events and hastily found her way right out of Ireland. She must have forgotten to tell her maidservant, Petronella de Meath, about all of this, though–she was burned at the stake in Kyteler’s place in 1324. Today you can still visit Kyteler’s former house in Kilkenny. It is a pub, as it has been since 1324 when the residents abandoned the house.

Continuing our walk through Kilkenny we came to a spot on the sidewalk where you can see the remains of the 13th century city wall. This wall was (obviously) built as a fortress to protect the residents inside the city and (not so obviously) as a means to separate the wealthy English residents and the poor Irish residents. Consequently, the two sides of the wall were called English town and Irish town, respectively.

Our final two stops on our walk through Kilkenny were two ancient churches. The first church we visited, Black Abbey, was built in 1225. It was deliberately built outside the town walls so that they could serve residents of both English town and Irish town and claim their independence from either side.

The second church we visited was St. Canice’s Cathedral. The cathedral was closed to the public when we visited, but I hear that the inside is gorgeous. What we could see on the outside was also quite fascinating. For instance, the round tower that stands to the side of the cathedral was a sort of hideout that the monks could go to if the cathedral was ever attacked (which, by merely imagining the effort that must have gone into building that tower, I would have to assume happened quite often). The door to the round tower is about 10 feet off the ground and would be accessed with a ladder–once the monks were safely inside, they’d pull up the ladder and climb to the top of the tower where they would be safe.

I loved Kilkenny–the beautiful countryside, the quaint town, the rich history. I’m already planning our next trip here–hopefully minus the fevers and late-night hospital visits!

Belfast: From Ships To Sheep

March 3, 20144 Comments

This weekend we took a roadtrip to a foreign country: Northern Ireland. Yes, this is still part of the island of Ireland and, no, there is not a physical border crossing that you pass through (much to my disappointment…I really wanted another stamp in my passport!). Nevertheless, The North is part of the U.K. and is, therefore, a separate country. Our destination this weekend was Belfast, a city rich in history and conflict. A city, we happily discovered, that is well worth a visit. When we told David that we were going to Belfast, he quickly retorted that he wanted to see “ships and sheep” there (not sure why…guess he just thought that would be cool to see). So, we had our mission set before us: get to Belfast and see ships and sheep.

The drive from Cork to Belfast is just over 4 hours. We loaded up our car with snacks and iPads for the kiddos and left town early Friday morning. We made one stop along the way, just north of Dublin. The Gas Station Oasis (as I’m now referring to it) that we stopped at was amazing–it had shops, restaurants, free wifi, and indoor and outdoor playgrounds for the kids. It was the perfect place to stop, refuel, and get some wiggles out before getting back on the road.

Our journey went smoothly and both kids did great during the long drive. We arrived in Belfast at about 2:00, and that’s when the most stressful part of our trip began. First, we missed a turn and got onto a Motorway going the opposite direction of where we needed to be. Ordinarily this wouldn’t be such a big deal but, since we were now in a foreign country, our cell phones weren’t working yet with the local network. Which means that the GPS we were using for navigation went out. And the physical maps we had were not detailed enough for us to find our way out. Which means we were a bit lost. In the end, Jon’s keen sense of direction got us back on track and we found our destination–a bit frazzled and a bit later than we had hoped to arrive, but all in one piece. And that leads me to our next problem.

Jon had a Very Important Meeting that he had to attend for work that afternoon at 3:00 (so the driving aimlessly around lost in a city we’ve never been to before really didn’t help things). We had originally thought we could check in to our accommodations in time for the Very Important Meeting so Jon could use the wifi. Unfortunately, our host was out of town until later in the evening and we couldn’t be let in until he got back. Long story short, we found a business center just in the nick of time that Jon could go in and pay (a lot of money) to have a conference room so he could use the wifi and take his phone call for the Very Important Meeting.

Unfortunately for me, I was now stranded in a city I’d never been to before, without a car or navigation, with two hungry and very tired children. I didn’t quite know what to do with myself, so I just started walking toward the big buildings that I assumed represented downtown. Thankfully my instincts were right and we quickly found our way to the central train station. We hunkered down at the train station for awhile so we could eat a snack and get our bearings.

There were lots of maps available at the train station so I picked one up and we headed back out to explore the city. Belfast is a beautiful city. Most of the buildings were built of brick in the mid-1800’s, so everywhere you look there are these rich red-brown buildings towering over you:

After wandering around the city for awhile we found our way to the waterfront where we watched boats cruising up and down the river (and where the boys could participate in their favorite activity of all time, throwing rocks into water).

Finally, the Very Important Meeting was over and our host was available to let us in to our house. For me, the house we stayed in was actually one of the coolest parts of our trip. The house was originally owned by Anthony “Artie” Frost. Artie was an engineer for Harland and Wolff, the company responsible for building Titanic right here in Belfast. Artie was a member of the Titanic Guarantee Group, which basically means that Harland and Wolff were so sure their ship was unsinkable that they sent a team of their own engineers to ride on its maiden voyage as a “guarantee” of how sound she was. Artie perished in the sinking of Titanic, leaving behind a wife and three children (and, consequently, his very cool house):

As we were walking around Belfast we came upon this Titanic memorial at City Hall. On the base of it there is listed every Belfast resident who lost their life on Titanic:

And right there, 4th name from the top, is our friend Anthony Frost:

The house was quite spacious. The boys each had their own room on the 3rd floor, we had the master suite on the 2nd floor, and the living space was on the 1st floor. David and Jacob loved all of the stairs and they had races to see who could slide from the top floor down to the bottom the fastest:

The view from the landing between the 2nd and 3rd floors of the house was pretty amazing. The house backs up to a church and, if you look into the distance, you can see the yellow gantry cranes of Harland and Wolff that still stand at the same shipyard where Titanic was built. I can just imagine Artie Frost standing here in his house and looking out this window to see the building of this unsinkable ship he had helped to design:

After we got settled in that night we walked around the neighborhood and found a great little pizzeria for dinner. We were all pretty wiped out from our big day of travel so we just got our pizza to go and brought it back to the house to eat. And then, it was off to sleepy-land for all of us.

The next morning (Saturday) we started our day in a neighborhood right down the street from where we were staying. Jon and I really wanted to come here because this is where one of our favorite authors, C.S. Lewis, got his start. C.S. Lewis holds a special place in our hearts because Jon and I actually met when we were in college studying one of his books together. We just had to see where the beginning of our beginning was.

C.S. Lewis was born in this house, “Little Lea”, in 1898. He lived in this house until he joined the service during World War I when he was 19 years old:

We couldn’t actually go inside the house because it is a private residence, but it was still fun to see it and picture where little C.S. (well, they called him Jack back then) used to roam. C.S. Lewis told his biographer that he used to spend hours upon hours playing in an upstairs room in this house when he was a boy–an empty room with nothing but a wardrobe–and that this was his inspiration for “The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe”. Here is a photo that I found in a book in a library in Belfast of C.S. Lewis with his family standing on the front porch of Little Lea when he was a boy (C.S. Lewis is second from the left in this photo, wearing the black outfit):

After our walk around C.S. Lewis-land we drove into the city for some exploring. We started at Victoria Square, a large shopping center in the heart of the city center. We got some coffee and then made the obligatory stop at the Belfast Apple store. Then we took the lift to the dome at the top of the shopping center where there were some amazing views of the city:

Our shopping spree continued down the road at St. George’s Market, the oldest public market in Belfast. The market has a very interesting history that is shown in a series of photos that line the walls of the market. Apparently, during the Belfast Blitz of World War II this space was even used as a temporary mortuary to house the bodies of those who perished in the attack.

The Saturday morning market was buzzing with vendors selling everything from produce to meats to spices, baked goods, preserves, artwork, handicrafts, and toys. David got a new stuffed animal there, a hippo that he has named “David Junior”. As an added bonus, the boys also got to pet goats, rabbits, and baby chicks:

From the market we continued on to the Linen Hall Library, the oldest library in Belfast. Books were quite a rarity in Ireland when this library was built in 1788, so it was quite a landmark for its day. The library had a nice children’s area where the boys could play and read, and there was an amazing collection of Irish works on the top floor (including several written by and about our favorite Belfast-born author, C.S. Lewis):

We spent our afternoon exploring the Titanic Belfast museum. The museum opened about 2 years ago, just in time for the 100th anniversary of the sinking of Titanic. It is a beautiful modern museum with incredible exhibits. The museum is in the dock area of Belfast, on the actual site where Titanic was built in the early 1900’s. The building is even meant to resemble the shape and size of Titanic, so you really get a good idea of how massive the ship would have been:

We spent several hours exploring the museum. There were lots of interactive exhibits that could engage even the fidgety-est of 3-year olds:

There was even a ride in the museum that took you through the ship-building process. We got to ride in our own little pod that was suspended from the ceiling, almost like a gondola that went up and down and all around. It was hard to get a good photo on the ride because it was dark and moving, but we all had a great time!

Wandering through the museum we even came across several places where “our” former house-owner, Anthony Frost, was mentioned:

After seeing the entire Titanic Museum we decided to continue on to view one more piece of Titanic history, the pump house and docks where Titanic was fitted out for sea. On our way to the docks we passed Titanic Studios, a production studio where the T.V. show “Game of Thrones” is filmed:

The Pump House (the area that housed machinery for pumping sea water in and out of the docks) was pretty much left exactly how it was in the early 1900’s when Titanic was housed outside its windows. There were lots of big levers and wheels and buttons that the boys could touch, and lots of loud gangways that they could run (er…walk…) up and down:

The docks themselves were amazing. Just this huge, huge pit in the ground where enormous ships would have sat until they were ready for sea. This photo shows Titanic sitting in the dock, with the empty dock behind it:

We were able to go all the way to the bottom of the dock and stand where the bottom of Titanic would have sat. Being in the massive dock with towering walls rising 4 stories above your head gives you an appreciation for the people who would have been down here working on the ship every day. Let’s just say I’m glad that wasn’t my job!

Suffice it to say, we saw lots of ships and “ship stuff” in Belfast. Alright, David, one down, one to go on the “ships and sheep tour”.

Our final excursion for the day was to drive by the “Peace Walls” that separate Catholic and Protestant neighborhoods in Belfast. During The Troubles that scarred this city for nearly 40 years, these walls were erected to keep peace between warring groups of Protestants and Catholics. Even though city officials have tried to take down the walls in recent years, the residents living inside them insist that they remain standing. Many of the walls are covered in colorful murals:

…and other sections of the walls just look like prison barriers, complete with barbed wire and police watch towers:

This house even has a cage covering their entire back yard–just in case someone tries to throw a petrol bomb or something over the fence:

It was crazy to see how some people in this city still live in fear–and even hatred–of their own neighbors.

The next day (Sunday) we made one more stop before heading out of town. We visited a unique “museum” called the Ulster Folk Park on the outskirts of Belfast city. The folk park consists of historical buildings from around Ulster (the region of Northern Ireland where Belfast is located) that have been relocated to the park. Each building was taken apart, stone-by-stone or brick-by-brick, and moved here to the park. The park is set up to look like a city and a rural community in Ulster during the early-1900’s. Guests can wander through the town, go inside the buildings, and even see actors dressed in period costume who demonstrate what life would have been like 100 years ago:

I enjoyed sitting the boys down in the 1-room school house–boy am I glad I never had to work in one of those! One teacher, up to 100 children aged 6-12, 1 coal-burning fireplace for heat, 1 outhouse, and very few books or learning materials available. At least the pupils were cute:

There were beautiful old farm houses that we could explore both outside:

…and inside:

There was even a man demonstrating how a printing press works–we were all very impressed:

We found our way out to the “rural” part of the museum where there were working farms. We saw all sorts of animals, including donkeys, chickens, pigs, and SHEEP! Sheep: check.

Our last stop at the folk park was the town sweet shop so we could pick up some treats for the looooong drive back to Cork. David chose the largest, most ridiculously-colored rainbow lollipop in the store.

The folk park was huge–we were there for over 3 hours and we still didn’t see everything. Alas, it was time for us to say goodbye to Belfast and hit the road. We thoroughly enjoyed our weekend in Belfast, and we’d love to come back to Northern Ireland again soon to explore the Northern coast and surrounding areas. For now, though, I think we can leave saying that we saw all that we came to see–even ships and sheep.

How To Visit A Pediatrician In Ireland In 16 Not-So-Easy Steps

February 25, 20146 Comments

In America kids visit the pediatrician all the time. They go for “well child” exams. They go for hearing tests and vision tests. They go for regular vaccinations. Shoot, when they’re babies I think they schedule a visit every other week just for kicks and giggles. As I quickly discovered, though, that is not the case in Ireland.If you want to take your kids to the pediatrician in Ireland there are a few extra steps you’ll need to take:

Step 1: Realize that there is no such thing as a pediatrician in Ireland. Well, maybe there is, but a pediatrician only sees rare and extreme cases of childhood ailments. Google “childhood doctors in (your city)” and discover that there is, instead, such a thing as a GP (a General Practitioner). Make an appointment with a GP.

Step 2: Visit the GP and realize that he is not who you want to see either. All he does is give vaccines to babies and prescribe medicine if you’re sick. Go home confused. How will I ever know what percentile my baby is in? Who will make sure my kids are developing properly? Who will pat me on the back and tell me I’m a fantastic parent?

Step 3: 7 months later, discover that there is something called a Public Health Nurse. This is the person who actually weighs and measures and checks for hearing and vision.

Step 4: Call to schedule an appointment with the Public Health Nurse (PHN). After 4 phone calls, realize that each PHN covers a specific region and you may only make an appointment with the PHN assigned to where you live. Call your PHN and leave a message because they do not answer the phone, they only return phone calls the next business day between 9:30 and 10:30 AM. Wait by your phone between 9:30-10:30 AM the next day to make sure you don’t miss your call; otherwise you’ll have to call back, leave another message, and wait for your call to be returned the next morning. Get the phone call, make your appointment (for the first available spot, 2 months from now), and get directions to the clinic.

Step 5: On the morning of your appointment, drive out to the clinic. Realize that the lack of an actual address and the directions you got were too vague to actually find the building: “on Beach Street (the streets don’t have published names, so that doesn’t help) before the “Y” in the road to Monkstown (you don’t know where Monkstown is, or which direction of the “Y” leads to this place) with a railing in front (every building has a railing in front of it)”.

Step 6: Park your car on what you hope is Beach Street, get the kids out of the car, and stare blankly at all of the buildings with railings on (what you presume to be) Beach Street. Start knocking on every door of every building with a railing in front of it. Thank the person who eventually opens the door for you and ask her if she knows where the Public Health Nurse’s office is. Take her advice that it is 2 doors past the pink fence and start walking up the street.

Step 7: Get to an ordinary-looking house that is apparently a public health center and let yourself in.

Go to the back of the house/public health center and sit in a room with a bunch of other people who look like they may be waiting to see a nurse. There is no receptionist or sign on any of the doors, so you hope you’re in the right place. See one of those bead maze thingys that they always have at doctor’s offices and assume you have found some sort of clinic anyway.

Step 8: Wait. You are now 15 minutes late, but there is nobody to check in with to let them know you have arrived (at least, you think you have arrived at the correct place).

Step 9: After another 15 minutes (half an hour after your scheduled appointment time) a woman will enter the building and say, “Is anyone waiting for the Public Health Nurse? I’ve just arrived”. Stand up and follow her into her exam room.

Step 10: The nurse will begin to weigh and measure your children. Then she will realize (since she was at least half an hour late showing up to work) that she left all of the necessary paperwork and exam tools in another room. She will leave mid-exam and not return for 15 minutes. Try to occupy the children with all of the nurse’s paperwork that she left out on the desk.

Step 11: Expect your older child to be a rampant terror while his baby brother is attempting to perform cognitive tests. Have baby watch crazy older brother instead of paying a bit of attention to the nurse who is attempting to test his brain development. Hope the nurse doesn’t diagnose baby with ADD or some sort of distractibility disorder.

Step 12: After making it through the exams, ask the nurse a question. Her answer will be to talk to a man in another office in the building who is holding clinic hours today, and would you mind just going back to the waiting room to wait a turn to speak with him.

Step 13: Go back to the waiting room. Sit for 20 minutes with two tired, cranky children. Feed them lollipops to quiet them up, even though you just swore to the Public Health Nurse that your childrens’ nutrition was your top priority.

Step 14: Get your turn to ask the other doctor your question. Go into his office and ask your question. His answer will be, “I don’t know, but you can look it up on our website.”

Step 15: Leave the health center. Go to a playground down the road to blow off some steam.

Step 16: Conclude that from now on you will just visit WebMD.com and buy a scale and a tape measure to measure your kids at home.

We Love, Teach, Grow

My journey through motherhood

Category: Children