Elizabethville April 30 - May 20, 2007 Annual raid by the Sunnies - tunnels and tantrums at Pinnacles - no baby overboard

	Another Elizabeth Rubber band racing cars at the Children's Museum.

	Evening TV session

As soon as Martina departed, a great conference erupted at the Sun side. Suchýš had arrived as first. He brought beautiful presents for the kids, but I'm afraid that Judge Lynch shall await him next time. Especially if he happens to be within my slapping reach around six thirty a.m., after he got me and Sid drunk on the previous evening and distributed WHISTLES among our children. I'm convinced that every jury must acquit me in that case.

On the following day I left Lisa with granny, loaded Tom into our bus (which had been returned to seven-seater normalcy), and headed to the airport to pick up Blanka, Peter, and their little -- for a change -- Elizabeth. According to all indicators the airplane had arrived, but not landed. Eventually they confirmed that it had really circled for about an hour around the airport. Sid, my optimistic sunshine, explained that it surely had been caused by the landing gear refusing to extend, and perhaps the pilot was trying to kick-start the engines, which would not rev up, by dive-ramming the air through the turbines, which made him do all the crazy maneuvers that Peter later mentioned they had been through. Given the fact that we had already purchased tickets for our flight to Europe, I decided to henceforth ignore all air traffic disasters, to prevent my stroke from happening before departure.

	Got no hands, got no feet, ain't going nowhere

	A moment of silence -- hippo offspring is feeding...

Tom had quite enjoyed the delay -- it meant we were to ride longer on all the trains, elevators and escalators. By one in the afternoon even he looked rather hungry, so I gave in and bought us a horribly expensive California roll. Then finally the plane had landed and our visitors emerged from the innards of the customs and immigration control. I think that Tommy became confused for a moment by the unexpected number of Elizabeths in his life, but he eventually regained balance. I was quite glad we had not brought Lisa along -- her hour of afternoon nap was upon us and even Tom began to be rather annoying. Elizabeth, luckily, was very tired -- if she did not sleep, she monitored her surroundings with a noticeably de-focused gaze, not having anywhere near the energy for tantrums that our tired Tom had.

Blanka began by requesting a Thai cuisine, but before we finished stumbling to Mountain View, it was past three o'clock and our favorite Amarinhad just closed; other restaurants on the main street followed suit. In the end we found a Vietnamese formica eatery -- I promised all travelers a noodle soup like mom used to make and since altogether three large bowls disappeared in us, it must have been an adequate lunch.

Going to the hotel was all that remained -- at which point our mission developed an unusual twist, for the hotel company had -- without prior notice -- re-booked our visitors to Alviso -- which is a middle-of-nowhere kind of place between a freeway, a railroad, and the Bay. Thus I had reached home by five, quite tired. By then I felt really miserable -- since Martina's departure I suffered some vague virosis. Thus on Thursday I took advantage of granny's baby-sitting, and loafed a bit at home, enjoying luxurious combo of bed - tea - book.

	Tom on a bridge -- but this year there's no creek.

	The path leads through a narrow gorge filled with boulders

On Friday we took Blanka and Elizabeth to the Children's Discovery Museum (it was Peter's business trip, so he had to work all day). Lisa practically right at the entrance yelped with joy and rushed to the test tubes, funnels and scales with fine white sand, which entertained her for most of the time spent at the museum. Tom has been more systematic in discovering the museum's displays, he always finds a new activity; Lisa sticks to well trodden paths. Elizabeth was taken aback first, but soon she understood that all this space is at her disposal and she may check it all out -- she went for water colors. However, only untalented people limit themselves to paper -- first she splashed her head with purple, then with a green wave.

Blanka and Elizabeth had spent a few nights in our home, sometimes we went together somewhere, sometimes they did on their own. I felt that Tommy would have needed Jack (= Kubíček, they are of same age, but little Jack was this time left behind at his granny's) -- he often harassed and provoked the girls. Elizabeth easily adopted to our home routine, but still the third child was noticeable: more mess, more noise, more abandoned toys. Lisa apparently enjoyed a visit by a girl of same age -- she often asked for and about her. And she would also throw herself into Blanka's arms -- very unusual with our mamas. She was much more cautious with Peter -- what a dilemma, when Peter rocked Tommy and Lisa would have wanted the same, but was forced to overcome her dislike to strangers...

On Saturday the 13th we made a family trip to Pinnacles. We had planned how the kids would throw rocks into a creek and run up and down the many trail bridges. So -- we found the bridges in their usual places, but the creek somehow did not show up this year. A very dry winter thus had again interfered with our plans. Lizzy must have gotten out of her bed the wrong foot first that day -- she whined, made scenes, threw tantrums, demanded to be carried, then again to be immediately released into the wilderness, and overall spoiled the beautiful trip. In one moment she fell and then pretended to having lost both hands and feet, and being unable to get up.

	Kids were delighted by the cave -- such a beautiful "tunnel"

	Pinnacles NP

Our picnic made her somewhat more joyful; when we arrived to a canyon, we offered her a seat in the backpack carrier. She lasted about five minutes; then she decided that she could not miss such fun like running inside a cave with Tommy, and demanded to be let out. Both children we quite ecstatic from these "tunnels" and zipped up and down. Eventually the path became too difficult for tourists this small and we turned back. Having left the cave, Lisa abandoned her good mood and not even finding a wooden stick (an important equipment for a little walker) would not help. She refused to walk on her own, or hand in hand, or being carried -- whatever. Considering ourselves experienced parents, we tried to "leave her in the woods", but that did not work either. Watching her secretly from around the nearest bend, when would she finally lose interest in sulking, but Lisa, quite unamazed, simply skipped between the trees, away from us. Eventually, Tom had lost his nerve first, demanding between sobs that we must not lose Lizzy, and ran to save her right away. It's interesting that Lisa let him take her by her hand and obediently followed him back to their despicable parents.

I know I must be repeating myself, but Lisa has really been quite horrible lately; moreover, she's the type of a child who keeps testing her parents, she constantly attempts to move the limits, does not give us any rest. On the other hand, she is very attentive and skillful. She articulates beautifully (with respect to her age, of course), she eats cleanly, has a lot of patience for books and small toys, and on one day she made a decision on her own, to start pee and poo into a potty. Well, she still misses the concept of asking for the pot when there's need, she usually goes when I invite her or because her brother does. After Tommy, who used to refuse any contact with the potty, Lisa has been a real shock. I hope that it's going to ease my plans of potty training -- as soon as I recover from my endless sickness and will have the strength to deal with occasional accidents.

My mysterious disease looks like common cold or similar virosis. My head aches a bit, sometimes I have a runny nose, I cough a little; there's no fever. Nothing life-threatening -- but when I started my fourth week with a TB-grade cough, I visited my doctor. It was a hypochondriac's dream come true. I received corticoids for my nose, antibiotics, and a referral to spirometrics (regarding asthma) and alergology. Apparently I shall become quite entangled with the health care now.

	Lisa is being lucky, for her brother refuses to leave her behind in the woods.

	The only family picture from Elkhorn Slough Practical reasons prevented us from taking the camera on board.

On the next Sunday, we took the kids to Elkhorn Slough -- a lagoon stretching deep inland. I was again grateful that we have a bus -- it happily carried our inflatable boat, complete change of clothes, and Tom's bicycle and Lisa's "motorbike" (a push-tricycle loaned from neighbors) on top. Before Sid made the boat ready, I made a circle around the parking with the kids on their machines, and we covered a part of a trail along the lagoon; as a bonus, we saw a freight train passing by.

We were not sure how our offspring would react to the boat. We were also wondering who would be the first one to fall in the water (our kids were wearing lifesaving vests). To our surprise, everything went great. Juniors kept leaning out of the boat, splashing their hands and overall engaged. Lizzy lost interest as first after about half hour. We reversed the process -- Sid collapsed the boat, I circled around with the children. Tommy demanded to pee, and of course Lisa demanded the same -- this was my first time with a girl outdoors. I must say that boys are somewhat simpler to handle, and less strenuous on one's hands.

Blanka, Peter and Elizabeth were in that moment driving out on their five-day quick-trip through Yosemite and Death Valley. We had found their plans mildly unrealistic, but they actually managed to squeeze in all they wanted to do, and except for Elizabeth who kept barfing in some turns, they completed the journey in good health. On their last night before flying back to Czech Republic they all slept in our house, which lead to my renewed candidacy as a Mother of the Year (or at least renewed chance to enter the nominations). By three in the morning, Elizabeth started to cry. I could hear Blanka comforting her. Elizabeth then cried for another hour. I reckoned that while she stayed with both parents in one room, nothing really bad could have been happening to her, and I eventually fell asleep. In the morning, I tactfully asked why Elizabeth had screamed for so long -- and found out that the crying baby was our Lisa! Analysis of our recollections showed that Elizabeth indeed woke as first, got comforted and nursed. This, however, woke Lisa, who proceeded -- and I had completely ignored that my own child was screaming!!! Alas, what could you possibly expect from a gold fish...

Copyright © 2007 by Carol & Sid Paral. All rights reserved.