Dads and Dresses

If I was a better blogger I would have taken pictures of Chris's first attempt at putting Margaret into this outfit.  He called me into the room in complete exasperation--he had put her tights on first, ruffles in front and then attempted to put on the onesie and couldn't figure out how to snap it because it would cover the ruffles which, again, were in the front.

Girls clothes.  So much more difficult than boys clothes.  And so much cuter.

In other news of baby cuteness, John has taken to demanding that he get to "hold baby!" several times throughout the day and he will not take no for an answer.  I think he must love her, even if she is usurping his throne.

Metro Rides and Museums Without Dinosaurs

We braved the cold and the metro this week on our first trip into the city.  It's only a little less than a mile to the nearest metro from our house so we just walked down took the kids on their very first metro ride.  The double stroller did just fine and the boys were really excited about being on "the monorail"--clearly we've been living too close to Disney for too long.

We were going to take the kids to the Natural History museum because--dinosaurs!!  Unfortunately when planning our visit online I found out that the dinosaurs have been removed from the museum for the next five years!  I cannot begin to describe the disappointment in the Reintjes house when that news was broken.  We promised to take them once the lame (and not nearly as exciting as the old exhibit) on American dinosaurs opens next week which offered some appeasement.

That and the promise of the Air and Space museum.

The boys loved all the planes and space stuff.  I, well I prefer the Natural History museum.......or the art museum.........or pretty much any other museum......

......and I'm pretty sure Margaret agrees with me...girls united against science!  I kid, I kid.....well, mostly..... ;)

Me:  Give me your best astronaut impression!
David:  Like what?
Me:  I don't know, pretend like you're floating in space.
David:  ..... (giving a very awkward thumbs up)
Me:  That's what you think astronauts are doing in space?

It was a fun first excursion into the city and now I'm confident I can handle the metro on my own with the children--I even know where all the relevant metro elevators are, which is a feat in itself!

I think I'll wait till spring to venture out alone though--the circus that is outfitting these little ones in all their winter gear is quite an adventure and the trip home from the metro is all uphill and no one wants to listen to whiny boys with frozen noses complain about all the injustices of their cold cold lives while pushing all their weight up a partially frozen hill.  At least, I don't.

The Move Begins

We'll, we are officially moved out of our house of the past two years--the moving truck is gone, house cleaned, keys turned in.  Chris pretty much handled everything including John Michael while the big boys, baby and I have spent most of the past two days alternating between saying goodbye to our friends and watching live TV in the cabin we rented behind our house--which is apparently an unfathomable nightmare for children whose viewing options are generally limited to Netflix and Amazon Prime:

child:  "I want to watch something different"
me:     "There isn't anything different, this is live TV."
child:   blank stare
me:     "Live TV means shows play one after another, you just have to watch the show that's playing right now."
child:   "Well just pause it then."
me:      "It doesn't pause, it's just TV"
child:   angry blank stare
me:      "It just doesn't pause."
child:   "Well can I at least have that super obnoxious Jake and the Neverland Pirates ship that doesn't even come with Captain Hook/amazing sugar cereal I've never seen before/cruise ship trip to the Caribbean?
me:     face palm

I did manage to make Chris take some unrelated pictures of me and the baby in between all of the goodbyes and television rants so I haven't been totally useless throughout this process.

As much as I don't love the climate in Florida and the fact that I'm pretty sure we are all allergic to the whole area in general, I'm really going to miss it here--especially all the friends we've made and living on base where everything was just so easy.

As I watched our moving truck filling up the reality of our leaving finally hit me.......but that wave of sadness was quickly overshadowed by the dread of knowing I'd have to put all of those things away again come Monday morning--probably with a house full of children running wild and attempting to escape out of the open front door directly into a very busy street.

That's the way it goes.  There's no time to mope when there's so much that still needs to be done.   I'll just have to save the moping for later, right now I've got a long drive tomorrow and one whole weekend to mentally prepare for the unpack......or pretend that it's not actually happening, we'll see how I feel.

I'm sure it will all work out in the end.  It usually does :)