*****
 |
| source |
Before I get started, please prayerfully consider donating to a friend of ours. He was working on a roof yesterday and fell and sustained serious injuries. The link will explain more, but he needs our prayers and - if possible - our financial help. We can personally vouch for this man - he is a faithful man of God.
*****
What a weekend. I feel like I've been run over by a truck, and just want to nap for a few days to recover! Let me give you the Reader's Digest version
Thursday
Nothing extraordinary happened this day, just the normal "leaving for a road trip" chaos: laundry, packing, last-minute running to the store, dogs going to the kennel...that kind of thing. Took the big two to gymnastics practice and realized that we didn't have as much time as we thought, so it was a smash-crash-bang to try and hit the road once we picked them up.
Then the snow started.
Then the snow started.
And apparently New Hampshire and Massachusetts were not prepared for it, because the conditions were SCARY, even for my "I'll drive through anything because I grew up in lake effect snow" husband.
Eventually, the snow stopped and we made it to our hotel. At 1 am. By the time the kids were transferred into the hotel and asleep in bed, Mike and I were crawling into bed around 2 am.
Friday
Friday was spent at the pool and recovering from the late night drive the night before. I was grateful that we were 1) in a huge 2 bedroom suite that made napping much much easier for the babies, and 2) had thought ahead to pack food for meals. It was so nice to just be able to pull out lunch and dinner and whip it up than try to find a restaurant that could seat all (11) of us AND that wouldn't make my kids who are used to a mostly vegan diet feel sick to their stomachs. We've dealt with that before, and it's really hard on them to compete when their tummies are upset.
We made it onto West Point's campus twice that day - once to cheer on a teammate at his meet and again that night to watch the collegiate level team competition. The college meet is probably the main reason why we even go to this meet - our kids get great experience at their actual competition, but seeing the college guys really leaves an impression on them. Not only are these guys crazy strong and LOOK crazy strong, but they stand there and cheer constantly for each other. It's so good for them to see that gymnastics is also a MAN'S sport, you know? There's so little focus on mens gymnastics at the local level - it's all about the girls - and seeing these college guys and the crowd gathered to support them really is huge for our boys.
We made it onto West Point's campus twice that day - once to cheer on a teammate at his meet and again that night to watch the collegiate level team competition. The college meet is probably the main reason why we even go to this meet - our kids get great experience at their actual competition, but seeing the college guys really leaves an impression on them. Not only are these guys crazy strong and LOOK crazy strong, but they stand there and cheer constantly for each other. It's so good for them to see that gymnastics is also a MAN'S sport, you know? There's so little focus on mens gymnastics at the local level - it's all about the girls - and seeing these college guys and the crowd gathered to support them really is huge for our boys.
On the way back to the hotel after the daytime meet, I got a call from our vet. Apparently, our dog (who was being boarded at the vet's) has whipworm. She has absolutely no symptoms until that day, so it was quite a surprise to us! One of the nice things about boarding our dogs at the vet's is that they could take care of her there before we even got home, but man. Poor doggie!
Saturday
By Saturday, all of our relatives had made it into town (both sets of grandparents were coming to watch our boys compete), and were all checked into our hotel. Not only did we have the family all together, we had quite a few of the gym teammates staying at the same hotel. The weekend was pretty much a constant party/sleepover, and was a lot of fun.
We went to the West Point Museum (we'd been there before, and it was awesome), and met up with a teammate there and his family. They have a scavenger hunt program that the kids all participated in and had a blast with - I love it when museums do that for us!
Dinner was back at the hotel, and then it was chaos to get out of the door again and back to West Point to see more college-level gymnastics, then back to the hotel to (try to) get the kids in bed because we had an early day the next day.
We went to the West Point Museum (we'd been there before, and it was awesome), and met up with a teammate there and his family. They have a scavenger hunt program that the kids all participated in and had a blast with - I love it when museums do that for us!
Dinner was back at the hotel, and then it was chaos to get out of the door again and back to West Point to see more college-level gymnastics, then back to the hotel to (try to) get the kids in bed because we had an early day the next day.
Sunday
Here's where it gets fun.
Sunday morning, we managed to get everyone up and in the car (grandparents included!) by 8 am so we could get to Mass at a local church. It was a nice church, albeit very sparsely attended, and this part of the day was pretty uneventful. We headed back to the hotel for lunch and to get the kids ready for their meet, as check-in was at 12:30pm.
Then the phone rang.
It was another gym parent letting us know that we had to leave NOW (11:30 - I was still eating) because the roads were closed up and over the mountain due to the ice/freezing rain that was happening and accidents. Luckily, I was the only one left to eat, so we were able to get the kids packed up and in the car in five minutes. We hit the road and headed to the interstate, because the other mom had been told that it was still open and the only way to get to West Point was to go around the mountain on the highway.
Just as we got too close to the toll booth entrance to turn around.....the highway was closed in the direction that we needed to go, due to accidents. We were forced to go north - the opposite direction - for TEN MILES to the next exit. Once we got to that next exit, we were able to get off and take a local highway back down to the south and back - past our hotel - towards West Point. The roads were a mess. Super slick and icy in spots, and just wet in others. Cars were going all over the place. It was crazy stressful, only made more fun by the sobbing child (Joseph) in the back seat. At this point, we weren't even sure if we were going to make it in time for his meet at all, much less any of the warm up period. It got so bad that I actually bugged his coach for words of wisdom because he wasn't listening to me anymore.
Eventually, we made it back down to the point where we could take our original route up and over the mountain, or we could continue to go around and south of the mountain. Mike suggested that we call the police department to see what was going on with the roads, so Mr Google helped me find the phone number and the pleasant (not) lady at the phone informed me that no, the road that we were wanting to originally take up and over the mountain was no longer closed and we were free to go that way to West Point.
So we did.
The storm had started inverting at that time, so up at the higher elevations (the mountain road), it was warm and raining and the roads were perfectly clear, just wet. In the valleys, like the entrance of West Point, it was icy and super slick because it was actually colder at this point.
So we did.
The storm had started inverting at that time, so up at the higher elevations (the mountain road), it was warm and raining and the roads were perfectly clear, just wet. In the valleys, like the entrance of West Point, it was icy and super slick because it was actually colder at this point.
So...in case you weren't following, we ended up driving TWO HOURS out of our way on treacherous roads because we got stuck on the highway and forced to go north....and ended up taking the regular old route to West Point anyway because nothing was closed anymore. The boys made it to the meet with about an hour of warm up instead of two hours. It was incredibly stressful and frustrating, but all I can hold to is that our guardian angels were keeping us off of that mountain road while the storm was inverting and the ice was melting up there.
Joseph had a rough meet - he was really shaken up by the storm and the drive and he had a hard time pulling it together. He did well - tying his best ever all around score and getting his best pommel score ever - but he made a few silly mistakes that really ruined his chances at medalling. He was very disappointed with himself after the meet, and we're working hard at focusing on the fact that he overcame a horrible situation and still competed really well.
Graham, on the other hand, totally rocked the meet. He, once again, beat his best ever all-around, this time by 2 points. He even placed on 3 events (high bar, parallel bars, and still rings) and placed FIFTH overall! Considering his competition was comprised of gyms from all over the East Coast - including NYC and Boston - we were very proud! He really pulled out an awesome meet.
Joseph had a rough meet - he was really shaken up by the storm and the drive and he had a hard time pulling it together. He did well - tying his best ever all around score and getting his best pommel score ever - but he made a few silly mistakes that really ruined his chances at medalling. He was very disappointed with himself after the meet, and we're working hard at focusing on the fact that he overcame a horrible situation and still competed really well.
Graham, on the other hand, totally rocked the meet. He, once again, beat his best ever all-around, this time by 2 points. He even placed on 3 events (high bar, parallel bars, and still rings) and placed FIFTH overall! Considering his competition was comprised of gyms from all over the East Coast - including NYC and Boston - we were very proud! He really pulled out an awesome meet.
We went back to the hotel to relax and celebrate with a pizza and Patriots party with the rest of the teammates in the hotel lobby. It ended up being a good night, once the adrenaline wore off!
Monday
Monday morning, we took our time getting out of the hotel and finally hit the road around noon. What should have been a 6 hour drive turned into a 10 hour one, though, once we added in bathroom stops and food stops and.....accident stops. (Not us, but another woman). One of the aspects of Mike's job is that if we see an accident happen....we have to stop. So, when we saw a woman spin her car and nearly hit another car and end up pointing the wrong direction on the interstate, we pulled over too. No one was hurt, which was good.
We were about an hour from home when we got the news that Isaac had been in an accident. Pretty much immediately, my phone turned into Grand Central Station, with texts coming and going pretty much nonstop. It was a bit crazy for awhile!
We were about an hour from home when we got the news that Isaac had been in an accident. Pretty much immediately, my phone turned into Grand Central Station, with texts coming and going pretty much nonstop. It was a bit crazy for awhile!
We stopped for dinner at an Olive Garden and managed to feed everyone a "special" dinner without anyone dropping their entire meal or melting down, so that was definitely a success. The rest of our drive included a family rosary for Isaac, and naps for the littlest Circus clowns.
We were unloading the car and moving the kids into their beds when Joseph came out of the bedroom holding what looked to be a ball of fur.
We were unloading the car and moving the kids into their beds when Joseph came out of the bedroom holding what looked to be a ball of fur.
The hamster had died while we were gone.
Seriously.
It was just the icing on the cake, and honestly, I can't stop laughing about it. Ice storm, hard meet, dogs getting parasites, friend having a major accident, and just to top it off.....the hamster dies. Sigh. The kiddos handled it amazingly well, which I fully attribute to the fact that we had JUST been talking about how old our hamster was and how amazed we were at how long we'd had him and that he was still alive. It was almost as if we were preparing to make this discovery, you know?
***
So now, we're home and I'm trying hard to get back into the swing of things, but after laundry and grocery shopping, I'm pretty much spent today. I was hoping to work out after the kids go to bed, but it's going to take some major self-cheerleading to get to that point. Send me some motivation? Thanks.
Hope to have pictures soon from the meet - we ended up not bringing our camera in because we were skating across sheet ice in the parking lot with babies in hand to get into the gym and decided that taking pictures just wasn't high enough on the priority list to try and juggle the camera, too. Once I get pictures from other teammates, I'll share!
Have a great night, y'all.
No comments:
Post a Comment