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11/16/2003 Archived Entry: "bushed!"

Whew! I'm bushed, today is the first day without anything going on. I've been on the go since last Tuesday. We did have a pretty exciting weekend, even if it was a tad too full. Friday morning we got up at 6:00am to drive an hour to Perris. Side note: it took me a bit of explaining to Tabitha on Thursday on why we didn't need to take a plane to go to Perris. She obviously confused it with Paris, France and knows that's a whole different country. Anyway, why did we drive to Perris you ask? Why to seeThomas the Tank Engine of course :) It was really neat to see this big old smiling blue train come rolling by. Not only did we get to see him, but we got to ride him! The event was held an a railroad museum and they have quite a few old trolleys from Los Angeles. Hard to imagine a time when LA had a fabulous public transit system. They had a few activities for the kids and we also met Sir Topham Hatt, plus the obligatory face painting and bounce houses. The only problem is the area was very muddy because of all our rain. Another side note: what else is going to happen in our state this year? We've had a recall vote, elected an action hero with no political background governor, had the most devastating fires in over a decade, and now, record breaking torrential downpours. And lets not forget our horrendous ongoing budget woes. I'm scared to see what happens next. We're really earning our reputation as a weird state this year. Anyway, the event was a unique experience and I'm glad we went. Oh, they had some merchandise (of course) and I'm very pleased with all we got. For less than twenty dollars, Tabitha got a new train engine (Percy) for her train set, a Thomas book, 2 postcards and a punching balloon. Plus I got a postcard to put in the scrapbook when I do the Thomas layout.
Saturday, we headed to Pilgrim Place. It was built in 1915 as a place for missionaries to stay but evolved into a community for retired church professionals. They would have had to work in a Christian service for at least 20 years, such as being a minister, a missionary, or even working at the YMCA. Anyway, once a year they hold a festival in November as a money raising event. The community members make arts and crafts to sell and also it's a little bit like a tag sale. In addition, they have crafts for the kids and face painting (though no bounce house) and a ride on the "Mayflower." They also do a re-enactment of the first settlers to America, but we missed that due to a couple conflicts. We had a lot of fun and look forward to making it a yearly event for our family.
After Pilgrim Place, Tabitha and I dropped Chris off at work and then headed to a birthday party. It was a Care Bear theme, which was a hit with all the kids. My only complaint was the balloon man. He was supposedly cancelled, but showed up anyway. He's one of those men that thinks he's funny and that putting down children is nothing more than harmless teasing. Stupid stuff like calling the boys girls and things like that. And he just stayed and stayed. All my kid wanted was a heart shaped balloon. The first time he took a heart shaped balloon and put it in with other balloons to make some weird hat. So I told her to tell him she just wanted a heart. He kept putting her off and putting her off saying she had to wait until everyone had a balloon but some other kids already had two or three so I don't know why he wouldn't just blow it up already. And then he told her he make something better than just a heart. She only wanted a darn heart! *Why* that was so hard for him to understand, I just don't know. Eventually I told her to forget it and managed to untwist what she already had and just give her the heart. That made her happy :) By the time the balloon man left and we did the piņata and the cake and it was time to open gifts we had been there over 3 hours (mind you, we were 40 minutes late, too) and my kid had had enough. The whining was starting to creep into her voice and I wanted to nip that in the bud so we got our goody bag and left. Most people had left long before.
Today, Chris and Tabitha went out to breakfast and visited with his mom for awhile. While they were gone, I got some scrapbooking and laundry done and just little things. Nothing major but it was nice to have no fear of being interrupted and having to stop what I was doing every 10 minutes. I mean, I actually ran out of things to do! When they got home though, it was really good to see Tabi, I had missed her. Since she was gone all morning I decided the two of us would go to the mall. She needs new tennis shoes anyway. We lucked out in that Payless was having one of their "buy 1 get the second pair 1/2 price" sale. So Tabitha got two pairs of shoes. I got her heeled tennis shoes, lol The reason I did is because her pants are basically too big in the waist and even with a belt they tend to sag. When they do that, the hems touch the ground and get tattered and dirty, or, during this time of year, wet. So the heels will help keep her pants off the ground. The other pair is a a pair of Power Puff Girl clogs. Normally I dislike character shoes, but these don't strike me as quite as obnoxious as most pairs. You should have seen the "Cat in the Hat" shoes! Thank goodness most characters shoes are leather so they are a non-option in our family. But they clogs are kind of cute and I did get them for half price.
Tomorrow our school lesson books should arrive! I've been anxiously awaiting them, Tabitha has been too! If they come early enough we might even get a math lesson or two in tomorrow :)
Stay tuned for a special update to Tabitha's Place very soon.