2014 - Queen of the Juggle

Year: 2014

Queen of the Juggle > 2014

Vacation Part X – Oregon to Nevada

Posted on July 20, 2014January 25, 2018 by Sherri

We made our way through McDermott, hotter than hell and then we get the amazing welcome of the sign on the door that read “bathrooms for customers only”. WHATEVER. not happening. We have 5 kids and they all need to pee. I do too. So not in the mood for anymore. No one stopped us or said anything. There was also another small problem I was having on top of all the rest…I had these weird bites on my legs that were very itchy and painful. I felt terrible overall. I just could not shake these weird bites of whatever they were. I was beyond miserable. Add to that that when we got to Winnemucca, my mom’s gate was locked. She had gone fishing. OMG…could this get worse? Still 106 degrees outside and oh man…it was rough. And I still had to get our 1/2 beef. And I was exhausted. And I was in pain. Perfect storm. Chip threw the stuff we needed over the fence and we climbed the fence. Luckily I had a key to the house. We overnighted at moms. Next morning, hubs loaded up all the stuff and kiddos and headed home in a jam-packed minivan. I stayed behind to get the meat in the big ole diesel pusher Dodge. The final leg of the McVey Vaca. This was fun, but not without its own bunch of crazy, and a lot of driving.

I’m still having trouble with my legs/feet. Finally, I was able to pick up our beef. Jim’s wife commented on my legs/feet when I picked up the boxes of beef. I felt like a lepper. It was all I could do to get that loaded and get going. I high tailed it out of there because I too was worried about my legs/feet and wanted to (hopefully) get to an urgent care. I had reached my max. The itching. The heat. The kids. The lack of air conditioning. I made my way out of the Mucc, headed for Reno and over to St. Mary’s Quick Care at Walmart about 15 minutes before they closed. Because it was so hot, Chip came and grabbed the truck and I would take the minivan home. I walk in and they say it’s too late and I can’t be seen. At that moment, it was so overwhelming. The tears came. I was so DONE. There was no more to give. I begged them. Luckily they saw me. It was flea bites. From somewhere. Really? Great. Just great. Then I had to trek over to CVS for antibiotics. Wow. Amazing.

Regardless of all of that, a big, huge THANK YOU to all of those who housed, fed, partied, laughed, and put up with invasions of the McVey family. It’s quite a big undertaking to take on 7. Hopefully, we didn’t leave too much devastation as we left each place. We’re grateful to all that we were able to share special times with so many. Friends and family that we didn’t get to see, we are sorry we couldn’t make it happen. We hope to get up to WA/OR again soon. Now a week from now I must start to work hard to remove some of the vacation food and drink indulgence weight gain. Gillian was a trooper too. Hard to be tied to a bunch of rambunctious little boys for days on end when you’re right smack in the middle of being a teenager. Chip, Gill and I had some great conversation about all of it on our last night. Wish I had one more day to breathe, but it is what it is and we’ve had a fun time with our travels. Thank you hubs for packing, unpacking, packing and unpacking with all the kiddos in tow.

Vacation Part V – Oregon Tigard

Posted on July 14, 2014January 20, 2018 by Sherri

So we get up early to leave, Chip packed the car super fast as I gathered, herded and managed to get myself ready. Neither Chip nor I had a chance to get anything to eat. We were hyper-focused on leaving to avoid Seattle traffic. This would definitely come back to haunt us.

Off to Oregon way we went! We managed to leave Dawn and Rusty’s around 10:30 or so, give or take 30 minutes. We knew it would be bad, but not how horrific this day would be. 5 mph on I-5. Seriously. I was trying so hard to be calm. After a while, it was just infuriating. Especially considering the hunger factor. I tend to go from zero to bitch in about a millisecond when I’m frustrated and hungry. It was all I could do to not hurt our children in the car with me as I was spouting off at Chip how horrible it was as the hours wore on. I wanted it to be his fault. It so wasn’t. It really wasn’t. As the day wore on, if traffic allowed for 20 mph it made me super happy.

Of course it IS July. It IS hot out. No, we don’t have snacks. Arrrrrrggggghhhhh. This went on for a few more hours. Finally at about 3:30p we got off the God awful freeway and made our way to a Jimmy John’s Deli. We had never been there before, so ordering was interesting. I desperately wanted a drink…if only drinking and driving were legal. And…I was still itching. A lot.

Adding insult to injury, the speed limit in Oregon is 55 mph. Finally at about 6:30 or so, we managed to reach Danny and Jamie’s. Thank god we had cold wine! It was so fabulous to visit with Bunny, Bill, Danny and Jamie. It was way too quick at less than 24 hours, but we crammed in all of the wine and conversation that we could. The kids enjoyed the cat, but Ryan had a little reaction. No, we didn’t punch him.

After wayyyyyy too much wine, I went to bed. Chip, Bunny and Bill stayed up and enjoyed more wine and conversation. As soon as the alcohol had worn off, I was awake. Off to Fred Meyer I went. Early in the morning, the store was quiet. As I roamed the beautiful store, it made me nostalgic for my Alaska home. I remembered how much I enjoyed shopping at Fred Meyer out on Dimond. Amidst my thoughts of home, I gathered up sausage and biscuits because I was set to make the best hangover food ever! Biscuits and gravy. I found all of my ingredients but made no hurry of leaving the store. I was reliving my past in Anchorage. God how I miss that place. Living there. And the people.

Anyway, back to Horton’s I went and whipped up some breakfast while everyone, with cobwebs in their head and all made their way through the morning. Chip and I quickly packed up because we had to get to Winnemucca within the next 24 hours or so to pick up our half beef. Always something. Always a deadline. Made it feel like it was not a vacation. Oh yeah, I was still itching. Bad. Really bad.

Vacation part IV…Washington

Posted on July 11, 2014January 20, 2018 by Sherri

So we got on the road from Othello and headed over to Washington. It was, theoretically, a 4 1/2 hour drive. So we took off about 9 or so.

It seemed to take forever to get over into Western Washington, but boy when we did, we knew it. Seattle was horrible to navigate through. It wasn’t even rush hour, it was right around noon time. Oh.my.god! The amount of traffic we encountered was atrocious! That slowed us down by an hour probably.

Once out of the mess of Seattle, we headed out to Dawns in Sedro-Woolley. Before we got there, somewhere around Bellingham, we stopped at a Buffalo Wild Wings for lunch. It was later in the afternoon and we were so hungry. I could have eaten my arm. So we walk in and we stand. Restaurant has a few people eating. I mean it’s late afternoon. Around 2 or so. There were a few different choices for eating in the complex we were in, so we opted for something we knew would be okay. Buffalo Wild Wings has never been a favorite. When we think of them, we think mediocre or less.

So we walk in and we wait. People walk by and then we wait some more. Finally a third person takes us to our table. Then we wait some more. By now I’m about ready to lose it because I just couldn’t take it anymore. So we get an appetizer. No plates. No extra napkins. Takes a while for that to arrive. Then we wait some more. No one says much, they just go about their business. No sense of urgency. Food comes out and we eat. Not impressed, not impressed at all. In fact it was disappointing. I should have taken to Yelp right there, but I didn’t not worth my time.

So then we arrived at my sisters. YAY! Cousins finally got to meet. It was fabulous! The kids took to the video games right away. Aurora showed them the dance game via connect and they tried to show her Call of Duty. Um yeah…no. It was funny because the boys seemed surprised that she hadn’t seen it before. Between the five of them they settled on a Spongebob game.

Ben went right into the kitchen with Auntie. It was SO cute!

Boys playing video games at Dawns

We only had a few days with Dawn, so we made the most of it. Dawn whipped up a great breakfast the next morning and we headed out to the lake cabin. Oh.my.gosh! We had no idea how much fun we would have! The place is so beautiful. Truly.

Of course, we had to spend a lot of time packing vehicles and all of that, so we had a bit of a slow start. Worth every bit of effort.

All of the kiddos and adults suited up for a fabulous day on the lake. The cabin is about 30 minutes from Dawn and Rusty’s. Once we drove in, we saw a beautiful lake. We got everyone into their life jackets and swim gear. It didn’t take anyone long to be in the water and to head out to the party barge. Dawn had a great BBQ planned along with sparklers for the kids…the boys had never done those before.

Then we got out the s’mores equipment and the fishing poles. Dawn and I, being the tough Alaska chicks that we are, we did all of the hooking and weighting for all 6 poles. Yes, 6 poles. She secretly told me that she didn’t think there was any fish in the lake, but we kept that between ourselves. Everyone had a great time trying though!

The next day…only one more day in Washington…we treated all of us to a 3D movie! We all donned the glasses and saw “How To Train Your Dragon 2”. Really, really good! Definitely worth seeing in 3D. The kids had so much fun! Mostly because of the massive amount of popcorn and soda they were permitted to ingest. Hahahahaha.

Dawn headed back with the kiddos and Chip and I headed to the Walmart to replace the crappy tent that bit it at the beginning of the trip. So, like smart peeps, we bought 2 smaller tents to replace the 10 man. Then the boys have theirs, we have ours and Gillian could have her own.

That evening we snapped some family pics and did s’mores and of course enjoyed wine. It was such a quick visit, but so happy we could make it happen. So lucky that Dawn has a big house that we could invade for a few days.

I think all of us enjoyed this special time. I know it won’t be another 7 years before we see each other again. Thank you my seester. We had a blast!

So the next morning we packed it up. Chip did an amazing job of getting both vehicles loaded. Buh-bye Washington! Hello Oregon. Oh yeah…I was STILL itching. Only worse.

Vacation…part III… Leaving the campground and Othello

Posted on July 8, 2014January 20, 2018 by Sherri

Super happy to have any coffee and percolator coffee in Cars movie cups was just fine. We start to take the tent down and up rolls Ranger Rick. Well, right away I renamed him, Ranger Dick, because he was just that. Now keep in mind that we slept horribly in the “vestibule”, was up very late and then up very early the next day. Prior to the Ranger Dick’s arrival, I did more freeze-dried food preparation. This morning it was scrambled eggs with ham and sausage. Um yeah…didn’t go over well with the kiddos either.

So Ranger boy rolls up and asks if our van and truck have been there all night. Of course (naively) I told the truth. Yep, we couldn’t bring our trailer so we had to bring two vehicles. He then tells me we owe $9 more because we have an additional vehicle. Um yeah, that didn’t sit well with me. I was not so quiet as I told him we were tearing down to leave and had arrived late. He says “it’s my job to make sure everyone is in compliance”. Whatever buddy. That’s not happening. Then I said even louder “you mean to tell me that because I didn’t bring a trailer, but 2 cars, I have to pay MORE!?!” “Yes,” he says. HELL, no is what I’m thinking. So basically we went back and forth for a good 5 minutes or so. Finally, I told him that the ranger on duty said “no problem” when I told her we had two vehicles. Then he stepped off and said that since that is what we were told, I didn’t have to pay it. By then I screamed “we will never come back here!” and went back to tent folding. It was horrible. Just unbelievable. I was a little worried because yes, this was only day two. I think this is the point I started itching. Must be stress I figured.

So we were out of there as soon as humanly possible. Not awesome. Definitely not awesome.

Off we went into Washington and arrived in Othello about 1p. The party had already started at Snuffy’s Bar and we were more than eager to join the fun. Especially since we were hot, tired and had had enough of being in the car with kiddos for hours.

When I had been in Othello the past February, we had these awesome little tacos. Super awesome, true Mexican food. So I had to do it again. This place also has THE best green salsa I’ve ever eaten. Green, hot and yummy. I quite possibly could have just drunk that and been happy. Well, not quite, but you get my drift. So we loaded up on a ton of tacos and Cindy and I went and got them.

It was so awesome to visit with Larry and Cindy and their furry family. It was so cool to introduce them to the boys. Cindy brought out the 4 wheeler and gave everyone rides. Gillian and Chip also drove it. They were bitten by the bug and now it’s a “must have”. Cindy also made the boys a “redneck slip ‘n slide”. I had not heard of such a thing, but man the boys had a blast on it. Carter basically rolled down the hill and squealed with delight as he did it. It was funny because he was anything but sliding. The other boys plowed down the slide with awesome speed and absolutely no fear. Even Chip took a ride or two down the slide. They also ran through the sprinklers and ran wild all over the place. So much room to roam.

We also took the kiddos to Country Mercantile. They loved it! So many things to taste, touch and see. Debbie led the charge. We had some lunch and let the boys just roam about the store. If ever you have the opportunity to visit one, do it! Amazingly yummy stuff. The boys had ice cream too. So fabulous to watch them take soooo much time to choose their flavors and have samples. Gillian showed them how it was done. Very cool.

More evening adult fun.

The next morning I was up bright and early and headed to the Walmart for doughnuts and stuff to make potato salad and ranch bacon pasta salad. We are on vacation after all. Everything turned out great, so we headed to Debbie and Mark’s. We had a great time in the pool and the incredible spread of food and drink in the pool house and of course the good company. What an awesome day. Very hot, but awesome.

Mark and Debbie both filled us in as to the hay cutting works. It was really cool to understand the process and the precision that goes into it. Learning that it goes to the Middle East was surprising. What was very clear is that farming is hard work and every bit of prosperity that comes from it is earned and then some.

The next day, still hot, sent us back over to Debbie and Mark’s. After hanging in the pool for awhile we thought we’d head out and see some wineries. Gillian said she’d watch the boys so off we went for some adult time. After seeing more farms and talking our way to the first winery, my phone rang. It was Gillian and apparently Ben had a stomachache. So after about an hour, we headed back to the farm with a quick stop to the grocery store to grab our own wine. I even found a Seahawks wine for mom. I didn’t buy it but took a pic. Of course, you get a discount on 6 bottles, so we loaded up on Washington wine.

July 7 was our 11th wedding anniversary. As in the usual way, we were busy with the family and didn’t do anything spectacular to celebrate. It is becoming a pattern. One we’ll hopefully change, but both of us were busy enough that until Cindy said Happy Anniversary, it wasn’t even front of mind.

Back at the farm, we opened and imbibed with several bottles and ended up staying the night at Mark and Debbie’s. I felt pretty lame that I didn’t call Larry and Cindy as I realized how late it had gotten. Not an awesome way to treat our hosts.

As the night got later, I did go out to the farm and saw the measuring of moisture as hay was being processed. Due to the fact that we had over-imbibed, Chip was looking for me, wanted to leave and drive (wasn’t and didn’t happen). Ummm, yeah…no. When I got back from the field I was done in.

Boys had long gone to sleep on the sofas, which would turn out to be a BIG mistake. Chip and I were both up hella early, as we were headed to my sister’s in Bellingham for a few days. Neither one of us were at our finest, but we managed to wake the boys and then head back over to Cindy’s to pack everything up. So I wake Gillian and then both Chip and I wake the boys. OH MY GOD! They had wet through blankets onto the furniture. Debbie and Mark’s main living room furniture. Not only was I frustrated, but also embarrassed. I’m still embarrassed to this day. I sent Debbie a text but was beyond embarrassed.

Once back at Larry and Cindy’s, we said our goodbyes, which is always hard. All the Hollenbecks and families were so generous and great to us. So, so, so much fun. But hot. Very hot.

We stopped at Burger King on the way out of Othello. The slowest drive through and the lowest enthusiasm that I had seen for a long time. It took a good 10 minutes to get through the drive through. Chip and I ate very little and passed the rest on to the kiddos. And then did our best to get out of town. What an adventure! I hope on the next trip we haven’t worn out our welcome.

The next leg would also have its own adventures. And oh, by the way, my legs were starting to itch…worse.

Vacation…part II

Posted on July 6, 2014December 31, 2014 by Sherri

Up we rose the next day, cleaning up the trailer, getting ready, packing up the truck and van. Being so type A, it was good for me to let go and let C. head up the project…for the most part. I will be finding out more about this later on in our trip.

We finally take off, headed to Ontario, OR. It’s gonna be a long day of driving. There isn’t a lot of things to see, outside of desert scrub, along the way. Honestly, it’s one of the most boring drive every, with the high points being a bar in Orvada, NV and then another in McDermott, NV, that claims to not be friendly, because no one is welcome to use the bathroom unless you’re gambling. Whatever. Seriously.

We make our way into OR and then into ID to make our way back to Ontario, OR. We hit a bit of a snag in ID when a truck had caught on fire and we are stopped at the fire. Screaming halt to progress. I mean serious halt. Traffic backed up for quite a few cars, indicating that it will be quite some time. We think it’s a forest fire initially. Nope. Well, that’s kinda good, so at least the earth isn’t on fire. However, a vehicle is and and we must wait…and wait…and wait. To the tune of at least an hour or more. Again, almost 100 degrees like in Winnemucca.

We finally get the go ahead to head down the road. We do and try to get to Ontario and the state park with a vengeance. We roll up with both the truck and the van, different than we had reserved, which was our trailer and our van. Person at the little hut says no problem. Great. We’re really happy.

We roll into our little space, between a cabin and other tent camp spaces. This was meant to be for a trailer but whatever. C. and I begin to grab tents and get ready to go because we know we’re working against daylight. Boys have a innate ability to understand that we are busy and may be under pressure. This is license to jack. Jack as in “jack around”. As in be difficult and understand that we are busy and play on it. As in try to screw with each other knowing we can’t possibly police it all.

On the flip side, the 4 man tent went up great. The 10 man, well, that was a whole different story. We try and we struggle. All of the pieces, some connected, so not. Some higher than the other and some not. We have to figure out what is what. Once we do…at least 1.5 hrs. later…a huge windstorm kicks up. This is not a breeze. This.is.a.windstorm. The big tent, which took incredible effort to get to stand up, becomes like a sail. No trees to protect it. Nothing but the river behind and a RV pad around. Definitely not a recipe for success. Wind continues to blow. Big tent collapses. Big tent pipes to hold it up bend and break. No 10 person tent for 7 people. OMG. What the heck do we do? Never mind we had planned to roast hot dogs over a fire for dinner. That ain’t gonna happen. If we light a fire, there’s a good chance that the whole park could catch on fire. It’s now getting later. Approximatley 8p to 9p. Still no dinner for the kiddos and only one tent. Not looking awesome. Not at all. I’ve had a couple of glasses of wine, so I’m somewhat calm. Everyone else, not so much. All the kids are crying. Tired, hungry and have a group that has absolutely zero passion for tent camping are a recipe for a complete cluster…and it was. C. wants to go to a hotel, G. is crying, boys are crying. I somehow find a voice.

“We will be fine.” “There is no need for a motel and we will get through this.” “It’s called camping” is what I say. This is easier for me because I’ve had two glasses of wine and I can deal with everyone freaking. By now it’s like 10p or so. Nothing good is coming from it. We know the 10 man tent is so toast that we will have to get really creative about sleeping arrangements.

While contemplating the sleeping arrangements with only 1 four man tent and the van and truck, it’s gonna be interesting. G. right away asks to sleep in the van. Um OK…she’s taken care of.

What about those 4 boys and the 2 ‘rents? Gotta make it work. So the kiddos pile into the 4 man tent and we see that we will have to do this. So, that leaves C and I to either sleep in the truck or somehow squeeze into the tent. We opt for the tent since we have a good air bed that we just bought from Costco. Good in theory. Once we provided batteries to blow it up (rechargeable), it promptly became really hot and then just plain stopped working. So, we had some inflation, but not too much. Insult to injury? Well that would be that the airbed would not fit in the “vestibule”, aka “the bug tent outside the door”. We were forced to camp there. On the ground, no inflatable. SO not awesome. We thought we were fairly prepared for the trip. Oh wait! We can’t prepare for wind. But still, a “Weather Master 10” model of tent that collapses and bends? Yeah, not so sure that tent was the best choice. Well, obviously not , since it collapsed.

We have to eat first. This is gonna be interesting since there’s nothing near. We are in a National Park near nothing but a river, fire pit or what we’ve packed in our food tote. No fire for hot dogs, so our other option is freeze dried food. I have a love/hate relationship with freeze dried food. On one hand, essential to have. On the other hand, it’s full of salt and crap, designed to help people survive. I get it. Um yeah.

So, knowing that we had to be prepared (we happened to be prepared, but we really weren’t), we did bring freeze dried food. So we picked 3 since there were 7 of us, to see if we could actually make it happen. Kiddos were still crying, didn’t want to be there, didn’t like the weather. C told the boys that he “asked God to turn the wind machine off”. They believed it, but it was super funny, much needed comic relief during this, very frankly, sh^tty time while everyone cried except for C. and I. I told them that we can do it. That it would all be OK. Let’s just get through dinner. C. shelters the flame of our 1 burner, meanwhile I’m watching the percolator to see when our hot water (aka path to Nirvana) will be done. It’s getting darker and things quieter.

We all eat freeze dried food, which was pretty well received since it was this or that as the choices. Well, the last choice was starve, so whatever works for them. I mean really, hot water from a percolator is all that we had. Well they could have eaten 10 granola bars I suppose, but that sounds less appealing than freeze dried food if you ask me.e.

So after an incredibly late dinner, we head to bed. Gillian to the van, boys to our space in the 4 man and us to the screened in porch. SO not amazing. Let me tell ya. So we roll around in there…not fun…cramped in so many ways.

C is up first, Ben, as usual is up first for the kiddos. Daddy and Ben have a chance to spend some time together. Way to freakin’ early for me, but doesn’t matter. Life works like that.

I make my first attempt at percolator coffee. It was mostly successful. Doable enough. However, I also think that it takes talent. My parents made it look so easy. After doing it, not so sure, but whatever. Oh yeah…note to self…bring paper cups so we don’t have to drink coffee out of Cars the movie party cups. Just sayin’.

Getting our vaca on, part 1

Posted on July 4, 2014October 18, 2015 by Sherri

So here we are…a long time later. It’s been awhile since I’ve posted for sure. I’m still juggling along. Doing so many things. Work, home, school, boys. Daily stuff. I guess what that really means is that I haven’t been a very good Queen of the Juggle! Finally, we are going on VACATION! Yay! After almost a year under our belt with the Jazz trailer, we figure we’ve got this stuff figured out. We thought we’d go see my sister in Central WA, friends in Eastern WA, and then back down to home. A long, long way on roads that we’ve never driven on before. The day before we were going to leave, Chip has an epiphany and looks at the numbers and says “hey, it’s gonna cost a lot for gas and how often do we want to hitch and unhitch”? I though “um, we just do”? Well, yeah, no. Then Chip brought up a fabulous idea of staying at tent camp locations and really roughing it. Because he has great ideas and yep, I’ve tent camped before, I totally bought in. Well, I didn’t really remember how easy my parents made it for me and how they made it look super easy.

Well, yeah, no. Not when you have 5 kids with you and a husband that has never done it. Not that I’m an expert, but having been the only one with camping experience, it was a little bit crazy to take on this idea. Gillian and I had camped when she was much younger as a brownie/girl scout. Somehow she didn’t remember much, which I thought was odd, because we had a really fun time. Well, we are preparing for our summer vaca, day one. As usual, the day job takes a lot out of me. Hubs for sure. He was crazy nuts about getting ready.

He’s so awesome, loaded up all of everything that we needed. Loaded it all into our minivan. Man, that had to be quite the job! Especially since this change of plan was sudden. Thinking we are taking the trailer our big truckand the Jazz trailer were already out at my mom’s in Winnemucca. That meant that we had to take all of the gear and 7 of us in our minivan. Whoa! That was an incredible juggle in itself. My husband, the best in the world, did all of the packing, toting and loading.

Then he began to prodding me… I was juggling as much as I could the day we left. My plan was to leave early, but that wasn’t to be. Since work is crazy to the last minute and has been for quite some time, which is beyond brutal for me. Juggling vacation prep and planning along with a full time job is ROUGH! Especially when you’re dealing with unhappy customers, who, I guess, don’t think you have feelings or that you are a human being just like they are. Since we have one person out on maternity leave, one leaving, an open position and me going on vacation, my team is stretched pretty thin. It’s really hard to look forward to vacation when the stress is so high and I know it is going to be a) ugly for those that are backing me up and b) ugly for me when I get back. Just thinking about it causes me angst and stress. Which is another reason I desperately need this vacation. I need distraction. My world of juggling is in a bad, bad, place. 10 hour days for months on end are not healthy. Chip finally forced me out of my chair and clutches of the work laptop to head out Winnemucca way. We arrived about 3 hours later than planned and then of course I had to do some more work. I managed to do some and then just finally quit.

We slept in the trailer and as I fell asleep I wondered if this tent camp, house surf vaca would work. We will see! Well, if nothing else it would be an adventure!