I used to be good at this.....

I've done the empty nest thing: Daughter and family lived 400 miles away, Oldest Son was nearby but newly married and starting a family, and Youngest Son went off to start his own life.

Youngest Son and I had been on our own together for 7 years, so that first year of empty nest was NOT EASY, but I had my own apartment and got used to being on my own.....no problem!

Fast forward 6 years: Oldest Son and I bought this house together and it's been 5 years of busy Grandkids, lots of noise and activity, and plenty of company. Daughter lives 2 miles away and there is almost daily visits, quick impromptu runs to Target together, and last minute sleepovers with the Grandaughters.

NO MORE EMPTY NEST FOR ME!

And now.....EVERYONE HAS GONE ON A LONG VACATION AT THE SAME TIME AND LEFT ME AT HOME IN THIS BIG OLD EMPTY HOUSE BY MYSELF! How Rude! It's just too darn quiet around here!

I mean, I'm just fine with alone time....I really need a lot of alone time.....but 2 WEEKS?!

Enough already! I can't take being away from those pesky Grandkids for so long. What has happened to me? I used to be good at this alone thing.......

Those darn kids have me left me no choice...I am going to hunt them down!

I'm off this morning to meet Oldest Son and family at the Colorado River for 4 days of their 2 week vacation. It will be a shorter version of last years trip. They are forcing me to spend some time relaxing with a giant glass of iced tea, my ipod, and a book. And I suppose they'll make me go out on the boat, too. And of course I'll have to spend some time playing with those 2 little ones that are always underfoot. What's a Mimi to do?.....

Oh, the things we're willing to do for our kids.......

Off into the wild blue yonder

I'm all ready to go.........

IPOD: full of music, podcasts, audio books, and games.....CHECK!

reading and writing material.......CHECK!

plenty of snacks..........CHECK!

(SUGAR BABIES... the best candy ever, by the way)

bags all packed.......CHECK!

O.K.....here I go.....off to the airport......all ready to go .......to the airport......I'm going now......to the airport........TO GET ON AN AIRPLANE!!!!!!!!

(I think I can, I think I can, I think I can)

a REAL vacation......

I'm not one of those people who love to travel. I've been enjoying "stay-cations" as long as I can remember, long before that word was invented! But don't get me wrong, it's not that I haven't traveled anywhere. My mother has enough of the travel bug for 20 people, so by the time I was 16 years old I'd been to 40-something states and seen more things than I can even remember. I'd just rather stay close to home and sleep in my own bed and do all the homebody things I like to do. Add to that the fact that I HATE TO FLY and you can see why I haven't been on a real vacation in a very long time....

Well......last year, youngest Son moved to Cape Cod, and I knew I would have to change my way of thinking if I ever wanted to see him again..........so tonight I'm taking a red-eye flight from San Diego to Boston. COULD SOMEONE PLEASE KNOCK ME OUT AND WAKE ME UP WHEN WE GET OFF THE PLANE?? Actually, I've really been looking forward to this trip (except for the flying part) since this is a Mother/Daughter trip. Daughter is leaving Hubby and 3 Daughters at home to have their own Spring Break adventure while we go visit Son/Brother that we miss so much!

And of course this was a good reason for me to do some sewing to prepare for the trip so I dug into my scrap bag and made a few little goodies:

a fleece sleeve for my camera so I can easily slip it in and out of my purse:

a few luggage handle covers to make it easier to identify ours in a sea of all-the-same bags:

And then some projects out of the fabric stash.....

Son is a Chef and moved to Martha's Vineyard to work with a Chef friend who has a wife and 2 little ones. Since I have not met this family yet, I wanted to make them some gifts to thank them for being Son's "family" while he is living so far away from all of us here in So Cal.

Friend's wife was a Pastry Chef before becoming a Stay-at-Home-Mom, so I made her a pastry-themed reversible apron:

With two Chef parents, 3 yr. old son and 6 month old daughter need to have their own aprons of course!

They are also getting flannel blankets for the cold Cape Cod winters: bugs for the boy (I'm told he loves bugs and robots) and more cupcakes for the girl.

And here I sit at the computer, delaying the inevitable (couldn't we just drive there? How long would that take us?). We're leaving for the airport in 4 hours and I haven't finished packing yet.....

OK! I'VE REALLY GOTTA GO NOW......(must...get...on...plane....)

back to the old grind...........

WOW!!

This has been the longest time I've taken off from work in the 25 years I've been there! 10 whole days! (5 vacations days, a weekend on either end, plus Labor Day). it has been FABULOUS!! I hope I remember how to do my job tomorrow......

Earlier this year I was off 9 days (5 days plus 2 weekends) because of the San Diego Fires. It seemed like the whole world was on fire for a while and I didn't go to work for an entire week; the freeways were closed and I couldn't get there! That was not a relaxing time off, believe me.

So what did I do with the remaining 4 days after returning home from the vacation away? Pretty much nothing at all and I like it that way! I have a constant struggle with feeling like I should be doing something "productive" all the time, that I'm often wasting time. Since 98% of my free time is my own, with no one to answer to, you'd think I'd get a grip on that wouldn't you. I'm working on that!! See the quote at the top of this blog? I'm really trying to take that to heart.

This is how I spent the last 4 days:

I "cannibalized" a huge stash of magazines that have been piling up: I tear out recipes, decorating and craft ideas, inspiring stories , and anything else I feel the need to save. The rest goes in the recycle bin. I had a whole years worth of 8 different magazines! (and of course I do this while catching up on the TV shows I've missed)

I sewed 9 blankets to donate to Binky Patrol.

I made 5 of my favorite flannel blankets

and added appliques to 4 fleece blankets that I bought a few years ago for $3.00 each on clearance.

I re-prioritized all the sewing projects that I need to complete in the next month and took inventory of what supplies I still need to finish all of them.

I spent WAY too many hours on iTUNES and playing around with my new iPOD....Daughter should have never gotten me started down that path....I really didn't need one more reason to be on the laptop. I already stay up way too late every night as it is!#$%!!#*!

I spent Sunday evening helping chaperone oldest Granddaughter's 13th birthday SLUMBER PARTY! Daughter definitely needed a little moral support with ten 13yr. old girls in her house from 3:00 p.m. Sunday to 12:00 p.m. Monday! (I know, I know....Granddaughter sent out the invites before her mother got to see them)

...and I finished off the holiday with some COTTAGE CHEESE RANCH BREAD made in my bread machine (love that thing!)

and a delicious salad with garden tomatoes, eggs, and COSTCO ROAST CHICKEN, (one of the best things ever invented, by the way!)

Hi Ho, Hi Ho, it's off to work I go.....(it's been a really great 10 days)

There's no place like home....

It so true.....vacations are great but so is being back home again!!

Well, once again I had a great time at Buckskin State Park in the constant 100 plus degrees! Amazing!

We went on many boat rides,

taking time to shut off the engine and just drift and enjoy the scenery and jump off the boat to cool off when the heat was too much.

We cooked some fun meals:

Son enjoys using his DUTCH OVEN for many meals including breakfast and even deserts. This kind of cooking has quite a following. There are competitions and recipe swapping and many websites devoted to the "art" of Dutch Oven cooking.

I made a meal that I remembered my kids always enjoyed when they were little. We used to do this in a firepit at the beach. Wrap each item in foil and put it all in the coals:

red pototatoes

sweet potatoes

zucchini

corn

onions (cut almost all the way through in eights and put in center cavity: butter, beef bouillon cube, dried thyme...tastes like french onion soup)

apples (leave whole but hollow out the core: fill with butter, brown sugar, cinnamon, nuts, raisins)

banana boats ( lay banana on side, peel down long strip, cut out long wedge of banana, fill with mini marshmallows and choc chips, replace wedge of banana and strip of peel)

Gourmet S'mores: chocolate grahams, white chocolate, strawberry and chocolate marshmallows (we never actually got to make these due to the surprise Monsoon...)

I colored in colorbooks, played wild animal bingo and pre-school UNO.

I sat in the shade and read magazines and drank gallons of cold drinks.

We did have several glitches during the week:

We hit a rock with the propeller and lost a day of boating while Son had to find a replacement.

We were surprised by a Monsoon one night that even the locals said was unlike any they'd seen in along time. Incredible thunder and lightning, a huge downpour, leaks in the trailer, and a hysterical 4 yr.old made for an unexpected adventure. We were safe, but there were flashfloods in the nearby town, and in the morning we found "Boaty" completely up on the beach (it had been too late to get him out of the water the night before).

By noon we were back in business with no damage done. However, up around the bend of the river the winds were so strong that some boats were flipped out of the water onto the docks, crushing whatever was in the way!

Also, on our second day we got a phone call with some serious and scary family news

(see Daughter's blog) which put a damper on my mood until I knew things were O.K. (more in my next post)

It's good to be back home with my hummingbirds, my laptop, my daily blogs to read, and my spacious kitchen, just in time to make a chocolate-peanut butter-ice cream-cake for D-I-L's 29th B'day today.......

And I still have a long 4 day weekend left before I have to be back at work next Tuesday!

It's good to have things back to normal.......I think I hear my sewing machine calling me......

Gone Fishin'

Well, not really fishing, but tomorrow morning I'm leaving for a weeks vacation. I'm going to "the River" with my son and his family.......

I am NOT a hot weather person (see here). I don't like any activity that requires hanging around in a bathing suit all day........and yet, I'm going to spend 6 days at Buckskin State Park in Parker, AZ!!

Let me explain.......

All my life I've known people who go to "The River" every summer. The thought of this has never interested me at all. My adult children, however, feel VERY differently. My son and his family have become bonafide "River Rats" over the last several years and last year bought a very nice trailer for their river trips.

Last summer they insisted that I go with them and I LOVED IT!! I had the best time and no one was more surprised than ME!!! It was great to just sit in a lounge chair all day with a cold beverage and lots of reading material. When it gets too hot you just move your chair into the water and sit there instead! And the trailer has lovely air conditioning for when 110 degrees starts to feel like 1000 degrees! The campground is great,too. Nice bathrooms and hot showers. There's a little grocery store/restaurant/gift shop and a playground.

This summer they have a new boat, too.

This is "Boaty" (named by 3 and 4 yr.old SpongeBob fans)

I'm all ready to go:

Lots of reading material?.... Check.

Lots of sun protection?....Check.

Lots of cold beverages?....Check.

I'm off to sit in the SHADE, get caught up on my reading, and spend lots of fun time with these two delightful people.

I'll take pictures......talk to you when I get back!!