Back to the grind

A few of the shots from our trip:

From left to right: somebody cloned Gabe at Bay Beach Amusement Park, me and the kids at the zoo, one of the creepier train car exhibits at the Railroad Museum, playing in the hotel water park, and running on the course of the Green Bay Marathon. More pictures from the vacation are up here.

On the last full day in Green Bay, we decided to do the ArtStreet festival, before the rain rolled in. Unfortunately, it was drizzly and cold, and I (the Perpetually Freezing) was the only one who bothered with bringing any warm clothes on the trip. I loaned Sam my sweater, which dragged past his hands but kept him sheltered, and we picked up a handknit sweater for Gabe from one of the vendors; it’s precious, and he loves it, and he needed one, anyway. Then it was just Eric and I with the shivers, but truthfully, once the kids stop howling about being too cold, it gets much easier to deal with low temperatures. (It was in the fifties, anyway, not actually freezing.)

After that, we piddled around with some extra shopping (Eric got me a lovely glass pendant at the festival, and then we got some chocolate and a few books at some surrounding stores). We had a very relaxed last evening, and the next day, we spent a last hour in the water park before taking the “scenic route” home. All in all, the vacation was perhaps a little less low-key than it could have been, but much better than last year in terms of kid meltdowns. (Eric doesn’t recall last year being so bad, so it’s possible that by next summer, this vacation will have achieved golden aura status.)

A low point was and continues to be increasing allergies for Sam. Oh, the cough! He’s using his albuterol, but it is not helping. I’ll probably place a call to his allergist later this morning; I don’t relish sending him to school tomorrow morning sounding like he should be in a TB ward. For now, though, we’ll hunker down and get the house back in order, with the laundry and the food replenishment. Fall definitely seems to be here; I did my run in forty-degree temps this morning!