Montgomery or Bust

Dear Laney,

Before boarding the plane back to Montana last Tuesday, your dad dropped us off with Peg Peg and Tex so we could move on to the Alabama portion of our visit. That's right - he drove allll the way to Columbus just to have lunch with his in-laws. At an Applebee's. If you ever want to know how I know we'll be married forever, it's because he does stuff like that (where "stuff like that" = "responds easily to guilt trips and subtle prodding.")

We said goodbye to Dad after lunch and headed over to Montgomery, where your grandparents and Granny Jack walked you up to Frazer United Methodist Church to check out the pumpkin patch. Since you were gone about an hour, I can only assume that your great-grandmother had time to sign you up for a church committee. Come Wednesday Night Supper, I bet they're going to wonder what became of their green bean scooper. Eh, it's probably best that you don't show up - we don't want those church ladies accusing you of getting a prime spot on the hot food line through nepotism.

___

The next morning, Peg Peg and I took you to the children's exhibit at the Montgomery Museum of Fine Art.

Here's the thing about Peg Peg - she isn't just "Type A," she's positively A+. She likes to see and do as much as possible in the shortest amount of time; every outing is The Amazing Race. I can recall vacations from my childhood with moments like, "There'sTheGrandCanyon.Didyouseeit?Good!Getbackinthecar."

I tried to prepare her for the fact that there are days when you accomplish absolutely nothing. Tried to remind her that when adding a toddler to the equation, you should also triple the time you think any given activity should take.

I can't tell you how it entertained me to no end when you'd sit down and do something like play with blocks at the museum with no interest in doing anything else for hours... and Peg had to sit still and watch you until she positively got the shakes because don't you know we could be AT TALBOT'S?!?

She finally got you away from the blocks long enough to play with her on the animated display, but you were over that in about two minutes.

For Peg Peg's sake, we did stop at a mall later in the day, where she took you off to buy a smoothie so I could actually check out the stuff on sale. When y'all came back ten minutes later, smoothie in tow, you yelled across the store, "MOM! I miss you SO MUCH!!" To clarify things for our fellow shoppers, Peg Peg hollered, "We were only gone ten minutes!! We just went to Panera!!"

Basically, as a group, we probably shouldn't be allowed in public.

Love,

Mom