Vacation Wrap-Up in In the Meadow

Vacation is wrapping up and the kids go back to school tomorrow. We have had a good vacation. On Friday went to the mall that has the Dave and Busters. Most of the kids were on vacation this week and it was very crowded. They had some fun new games. We also went to the two pet stores in the mall. The cats were just adorable. There is a store that has an area for batting practice in the mall. We have been taking the kids for batting practice. It is still too snowy and cold for them to practice outside. They are starting baseball and softball in just over a month. Softball is Kayla's favorite sport. Timmy's favorite is soccer, but he also likes baseball.

We watched some of the Olympics over the past week. Kayla watched a lot of the figure skating. We watched the speed skating relay, which was fun to watch. We also watched the team luge competition, which made me dizzy because they were sliding nonstop. The closing ceremony was on late tonight so we will watch it later this week after school.

Today we went to Applebee's for lunch with my parents. I had a new dish. I think it was called chicken and shrimp tango. It was good. My mom and I ordered the special where you got an appetizer. We had boneless chicken wings.

As we were arriving at the restaurant I saw a family leaving. They had five young kids with them. I am interested in families with a larger number of kids and try to guess the dynamics of them.

I come from a fairly large family, and we spent a lot of time with my mom's sister, who also had a lot of kids. Between them, my mom and her sister have ten kids. Back then, medical science for pregnancy and newborns was not quite what it is today, and they each had two babies who sadly did not survive. I remember when I was about twelve or thirteen my mom and her sister took us to a museum. It was six of us kids. I don't remember where the others were. At one point my mom went to the restroom or somewhere else in the museum and it was just my aunt and the kids. A lady came up to us and said to my aunt that she didn't know how she managed with six kids because she had trouble with two. My aunt told the lady that only four of them were hers. We could hear the lady saying to the other lady that was with her that only four of the kids were hers. Later we met back up with my mom and my aunt told her the story of what the lady had said. My aunt added that the lady said it as if that had been the main topic of conversation all day.

Anyway I thought the woman in the restaurant really looked too young for the older kids to be hers, so I wondered if they were his kids from a previous relationship. I guess it's silly that I think about things like that.

I am going to watch a Columbo episode tonight and then go to sleep.