Our first family holiday as 4 has been a very interesting experience. Packing everything – I think we may have managed to get the kitchen sink in there somewhere. We ended up with the entire boot full of stuff, even without the pram! Now the events that unfolded were um… wonderful family bonding of course, bear in mind that we have a 5 month old, 17 month old, a hormonally imbalanced mother and an OCD tidy dad – enter an inevitable drama scene before we even set foot in the car – that didn’t flipping work… But more about that later.
True to form, we left all the packing to be done on the morning that we had to leave. We had to be in the car leaving at 11 as that is when Kyla has her morning sleep (if she was awake the whole way there, the car would have exploded). By 9 it was looking good and I was even starting to be a little optimistic about making our departure time. I think that was my first mistake…
Kyla absolutely LOVES Teletubbies. I just don’t get it, what is so great about 4 pear shaped weirdos saying eh-oh all the time? Although I will (quite sheepishly) admit that I love the music video – Dipsy’s dancing is awesome! So anyway, we let her watch it as it is the only one she actually likes and, well, it’s nice to have a couple minutes of “peace”. (Time to call the Parent Police). She was getting so excited that she would stand up and wave (which she does throughout the program – it’s so funny), she was waving so hard that her entire little body was shaking with the effort. This was hilarious and cute when she was on the floor, but halfway through she moved onto the couch – then it got a bit dangerous.
First came the typical warning, “Kyla, look at me. Please stop standing on the couch, if you do it again you will go on your naughty chair. Do you understand?” This whole time she is staring into my eyes. It is so clear that she understands… However, not even 2 minutes later she was up again. So Seth put her on her naughty chair. By now it’s 10.45 and Seth is obsessed with getting the house tidy before we leave, but we still had lots to pack which I was more worried about (remember hormonally challenged – who cares about the house when we have 2 over tired kiddo’s on our hands) so we were both feeling a bit frazzled. The next thing Kyla ran across the couch, like full on ran. Seth grabbed her and smacked her on her nappy bum. I think Kyla thought – *insert appropriate accent* – “Oh no you di’nt!!” And proceeded to have the biggest crying fit. Balling her eyes out from the couch (to get Angie in her pram at the dining room table – because she didn’t know what else to do with herself), all the way (pushing Angie) to me in the kitchen. When she got to me she was almost hysterical, then because I wouldn’t pick her up she vomited all over herself. Great. Then because I still wouldn’t cuddle her (due to said vomit) she super-sayned into a screeching banshee. It was intesne, but after a couple of cuddles (post clean up) and trying to talk some sense into her she calmed down. (Some good came out of this however, now if she is doing something naughty, you ask her if she wants a smack and she shakes her head and drops whatever it is that she was about to impale her sister with or whatever).
Finally all the bags were packed and the house was in relatively good order, I went to the car to start packing everything into it. I should just clarify that while our Clio was in for repairs (for 3 weeks costing us R6500 only to still have to go in a couple more times) we were using Seth’s Mom’s car. With this car you need to press the unlock key while pointing it at the rearview mirror, and even on a good day I often have to do it a couple of times to unlock it. I pressed once, then twice, then by the 20th time I was about to break the window or even throw the keys on the floor and roll around on them pounding my fists on the ground. While all of these appealing thoughts were going through my head, Shane came out to see why Kyla had momentarily lost her mind. I threw the keys at him and made the car his problem – thankfully he didn’t get offended by my momentary loss of control of adult thinking.
So after closer inspection by Seth (who had originally asked me if I pointed it in the right place and who I answered with a death look) finally decided that we should call the assist line. From previous experience with the Clio, where it took 2 hours, I was in no mood to wait. Riya was already in her car seat crying as she was quite tired, while Kyla was in on all the action outside with the car, moaning the whole time. While I was sulking in the lounge, Seth came in and told me to put Kyla to sleep cos it would be too long before she would get to sleep in the car. So I take the screaming over-tired Riya from the car seat and then put her on the couch to put her to sleep by lying next to her – by this time I was the one crying like a baby. Then Seth comes in and says “what the heck are you doing”. I had a few off hand responses come to mind, the just of it being “YOU were the one that TOLD me to put Kyla to sleep, how the heck do you expect me to do that with a screaming baby in the lounge huh? Huh? How dare you ask me what I am doing!” However I just cried instead, damn these hormones (and I’m not even pregnant – well I had better not be anyway).
Finally we all squeezed into Shane’s car, as he had offered to drive us to Seth’s parents, where the Clio now “fixed”) was parked. We skilfully removed a sleeping Kyla (still strapped into her car seat) into the Clio, packed the boot and off we went. Finally on our way I could relax and laugh at how stupid I was.
Hermanus was cold and overcast – which was just perfect cos I planned for all occasions… No, actually that would mean that I was organised. The only ones that had proper warm clothes were the kids.
We stayed at the Windsor and were spoilt with amazing breakfast together every morning. It really was a totes awesome time!
On the second day we did a bit of sight seeing and came across this massive horse just walking freely. Turns out it’s a place you can go to horse ride.
We finally managed to get out first family pic of the 4 of us (disgusting I know). I know this bottom one is a bit blurred, but I love Ri’s face.
Some Kyla moments and moments with GrandMaMa. All in all it was a really great time away to catch up with the family and spend some QT together.