Fun in Philly - Day 10, Thursday

November 14

Carrie took Emily to Wawa (a gas station) for what Carrie called "hot drinks" (hot chocolate for Emily and coffee for Carrie) and donuts. Then they went to the park and had a "picnic". Emily came back buzzed from the adventure (and probably all the sugar).

We ended the day by playing Scrabble on Papa's bed. The challenge of the game was to make sure Emily didn't rearrange letters on the board when no one was looking. I had a great time. I love playing games, especially with my family.

Fun in Philly - Day 9, Wednesday

Today most of our fun was in Philadelphia.

Papa had a doctor's visit in the University City part of Philadelphia, so we figured we'd all go together and have some adventures. My sister Carrie lives downtown, so we picked her up, and then went to a Korean restaurant for lunch.

I don't know that I've ever had Korean food before, and this stuff was AMAZING! I think the place was called Giwa, near Rittenhouse Square. It was a tiny place, you could maybe sit 20 people, and it was packed. Carrie had been there before so she ordered for everyone.

She came back with a couple bottles of water and this stuff:

"Aloe vera juice with pulp bites." In my experience, aloe is something you use to soothe burns, so it was a little strange to be drinking it. It's a sweet, smooth (ok, it was slimy but that's not really an appetizing word) juice and then all the sudden you'll get a chunk of something, the "pulp bites". If you know that they are coming it's not too bad. We got Emily to try it. She was not a fan of the chunks. A couple sips was enough for me.

Then our food was ready. It's called bibimbop, which is fun to say. Sort of like "Francisco".

It came in steaming hot metal (maybe stone?) bowls, piled high with vegetables (carrots, bean sprouts, baby corn, lettuce, red bell peppers, spinachy stuff, red cabbage, mushrooms), rice in the bottom and some beef in the middle. Hot hot hot! I'm pretty sure the veggies were raw when I first got the bowl, but they were perfectly cooked by the time everything was cool enough to eat. The meat was probably marinated, but I don't think there was any seasonings or sauce on it. It did come with a little bowl of red sauce. It was pretty spicy so I only put a little on and the whole bowl was AMAZING. Warmed my whole body up. So so so good. I ate the whole thing, but was surprised that I didn't feel stuffed. Maybe because there were so many vegetables. Oh it was good. If it didn't involve a ridiculous drive into the city, I would go get more right now. Maybe I can figure out how to make something similar at home. Did I mention how delicious it was?

Emily, with her boring toddler palate, had a bowl of plain white rice. And water. Prison food. Whatever. We tried to get her to taste everything. No dice.

We had parked in a garage next to the restaurant. We had to pay $28. To park in a crappy garage for an hour and a half! Instead of talking about how outrageous it was to pay that much, we called it "part of the experience."

We dropped Grammy and Papa off at his doctor's appointment and then had two or three hours to kill. We walked around for a little bit and then ended up at the University of Pennsylvania bookstore.

We walked around the store, read books and stopped in at the cafe. I got the peppermint hot chocolate (which was good but not as good as QuikTrip's) and Carrie got an eggnog latte (which smelled like burnt egg nog, but she said it was delicious). Emily had a gigantic sugar cookie with red sugar sprinkled on top. Definitely not prison food.

We picked up Grammy and Papa, dropped off Carrie at work and started on our way back to Royersford. At 4:30 pm. On a weekday. At rush hour. Ugh. It took at least two hours to drive 33 miles. I'm glad I wasn't driving. As a bonus, Emily slept almost the whole way.

Reading with Papa was a fun way to end the day.

Fun in Philly - Day 3, Thursday

November 7

Emily and I have been sharing a full-sized bed. She's had a hard time going to sleep, but once she does it's not too bad. I kind of like having her little body snuggled up next to me. Except that by morning she's hogging the whole bed. As you can see, she generously left me 1/4 of the bed.

Nap time has been a disaster. She just can't settle down and relax enough to sleep. Today she finally crashed on the bedroom floor.

The best part of today was that Aunt Carrie was able to come to Grammy's house. Aunt Carrie is always fun to play with. First some Play-Doh.

Then kids yoga on YouTube.

I really wish we could have Aunt Carrie over all the time.

Fun in Philly - Day 2, Wednesday

November 6

Grammy had to go in to work today, so it was just me and Emily ramming around the house while Papa slept.

A little sidewalk chalk coloring:

A little Daniel Tiger's Neighborhood during lunch (don't forget your safari hat!):

And a little playhouse construction:

My mom made this playhouse for us when we were kids. I have a lot of fond memories of it. She made it to look just like our house at the time. Yellow siding, brown door, cat sitting in the window and red flowers.

Originally, it went on top of our shabby folding card table. That table is long gone and apparently they make card tables a different size now, so the playhouse has been folded up in a box for years. This past summer we worked together to figure out a solution. We settled on a cube made out of PVC pipe. It's easy to build, easy to take down and easy to store.

It even has a see-through window!

Chimney.

Another generation of fun!

After Grammy got home, we walked up to the playground in the middle of their development. She refused to take a nap earlier in the day, so she was sort of grumpy at first.

So Grammy and I played for a little while until she decided to join us.

Once she finally started playing, she had a great time. The funniest thing was when she started awarding medals. Grammy put together this Instagram collage:

Later we went to Wegman's (a regional grocery store) for dinner. On the way, Emily took this awesome photo of the countryside:

Fun in Philly - Day 1, Tuesday

When I found out that Robert was going on two business trips back-to-back, I tried to figure out how I was going to single parent for two weeks AND keep my sanity (props to those who do it on a regular basis). Then I got a fare alert from Travelocity that tickets to Philly were $150 each! I figured my sanity was worth at least $300, so Emily and I went to Pennsylvania to see my parents while Robert went to Miami to "work".

Day 1 - Tuesday, November 5

Our flight left early Tuesday morning, so I had to wake up Emily crazy early. I was a little nervous because waking up a toddler has the potential to make them grumpy all day. Fortunately, when I woke up Emily she practically popped out of bed. She was SO excited to go to "delphia".

Robert dropped us off at the airport and we got through security and to our gate with no problems. This gave us plenty of time for breakfast.

Dickies BBQ was right next to our gate, so we stopped in and had omelets (me) and pancakes (her). I know, I know, what was I thinking, letting her have syrupy pancakes right before getting on an airplane?! I obviously wasn't thinking, but I was able to get her all cleaned up before we boarded.

She was pretty good on the airplane. No hysterics. However, I am the sort of person that is not opposed to bribing a child when they are in a difficult situation. For example, confining a toddler to a tiny square of real estate and telling them to be quiet for three or four hours. I am also the sort of person that bribes myself to make it through difficult situations, so gummy bears for everyone!

Grammy picked us up from the airport. Emily was excited/nervous to see her again. She warmed up, while Grammy and I wrestled with the stupid car seat for 20 minutes. [Before a car can go on the market, a car designer/manufacturer should have to install a car seat in the pick-up lane at the airport. Because, if they had tried it, they never would have designed it that way. Dummies.] 

Emily just couldn't wait to see Aunt Carrie, so we stopped in Philadelphia to pick her up for lunch at a local diner. It was average diner food, but at least they had chocolate milk. Emily wasn't quite satisfied with how long it was taking them to bring her food and kept saying, "Where's my wunch?"

Carrie had to work that evening, so we dropped her off and drove on to Grammy's house. After we got all the luggage in and went upstairs to say hi to Papa, we went downstairs and dragged out all of the boxes of toys. Emily discovered my old baby doll and fell in love.

Rock-a-bye baby.

Her eyes are the blinking kind: open when she sits up....

....closed when she lays down. Emily thought that was pretty cool.

Emily took few minutes to do some more coloring with her Water Wow coloring book. Emily and I both love this thing. You color the pictures with a brush that has a little water reservoir in it (comes with the book). When you get the pictures wet, the colors and more details show up. After the pictures dry, you can paint them again. Over and over and over. Forever. Best airplane toy ever.

Grammy and Papa had a short meeting at the church that night, so we tagged along. We wandered around the building for a little while. We finally scored big when we found some balls and toy cars left in the gym. That was enough to keep us entertained for a while.

What a busy day with my girl. We are so excited to spend so much time with our Philadelphia family.

You know what this blog needs? Some pictures!

We got our family photos today!

 

I am so grateful to be a part of this forever family.

 Oh how this girl loves her baby and oh how I love her.

 I love this man so much.

 So blessed.

I feel like this photo needs clarification. I realize that it looks like Emily is staring mechanically at mind-numbing technology, while her parents look on adoringly, with pride at all that she has "accomplished". However, about five minutes before this picture was taken, Emily fell and skinned her knee on the gravel. She was bleeding and hysterical. We still needed to take a couple more shots so I gave her my iPhone and turned on a PBS show so she would calm the heck down. It barely worked. So things are not always what they seem. Don't judge me. Besides, I really like this picture. :)

Many thanks to our photographer friend Heather Adams. Check out her work at http://www.artworksimages.ca/#!