Holiday Madness

Another whirlwind of a holiday weekend for our crew.

On Thursday, I snuck out of work early, ran to Wegmans and the liquor store, picked up Chris at work and raced home to get everyone changed to head out for Aidan's 1st ever swim meet.

I knew Aidan would be nervous about the swim meet. It is an overwhelming scene - people everywhere, announcer rattling off names of kids in each race, gunshots signaling the beginning of each race and just general chaos. I wasn't surprised when Aidan melted down during the pre-meet cheer. And thus began our theme for the night. Aidan was told to join his age group to line up for his event. Aidan melted down. Aidan was given a high five by his coach. Aidan melted down. Aidan walking to the start of his event, grabbing onto my legs and crying hysterically.

I kept telling him he could chose not to do it. During each meltdown, he empathically said he wanted to race, right up until they wanted him to line up to get on the starting block. He grabbed my legs in terror, cried with fright and said he didn't want to do it.

After five years with Aidan, the crying and terror barely phased me. Meanwhile, Chris was at the other side of the pool with Brennan and Griffin. Griffin howled right along with Aidan. This ensured that not one observer was spared from hearing the screaming of my children. (We are equal opportunity criers.)

The meltdown(s) allowed us to leave the meet early to head over to my grandparent's for dinner in honor of my grandfather's birthday. I dropped Chris off at home with a clearly overtired Griffin and lured the other two boys back out with promise of cake. My brothers, sister in law and Travis's girlfriend had just arrived from NYC - which perked up the mood of the boys almost immediately. We enjoyed a lovely dinner outside and gave my grandfather his collective family gift - a scrapbook of letters written by every member of his family.

On Friday, the boys and I started our 4th of July celebration with baking a birthday cake for Grandma JoJo at 8 a.m. We then moved on to the pool for a picnic, music and lots and lots of swimming. The boys exhausted Seth, Trav, Tennille and Lynda with their poolside antics. Early afternoon, we went home for a very brief afternoon nap, and then welcomed the entire family crew over to our house for dinner in honor of my mom's birthday.

We mixed up drinks and lots of food. (cosmos! mojitos! fancy, fancy Trav burgers! and corn grilled in its husk!) We sang happy birthday to Jo Jo, opened presents, and the boys ran their uncles ragged with water wars. We ended the night with a little Wii Rock Band - starring Lynda on drums, Trav on guitar, and me on vocals. We may take our rock act on tour soon.

After everyone had left, Chris and I grabbed two lawn chairs, held hands, and sat on our front lawn watching the fireworks in the distance. It was a perfect ending to a great day.

(I would rather end the story there - with thoughts of fireworks and hand holding than with me, doubled over with stomach cramps, 24 hrs later due most likely to a bad case of food poisoning. Let's just end the whole story there, okay?)