Catching up- Starting with the big trip

Life has been very busy in deed. I am going to back track and begin with my wonderful vacation with Marley and my Mother.

My Mother came down to spend a couple of days at the beach at the end of July. We wanted to go to the beach but the temperature was 113 degrees and no one wanted to be outside so we spent the time inside playing with Marley. On Saturday July 29th we left for Virginia, spent the night on the farm, woke up the next morning and headed for Pennsylvania to visit my Grandmother.

My Grandmother is approaching her 96th birthday. She is the most amazing woman I have ever known. Unfortunately, a few weeks prior, she fell and broke her hip. Now this usually marks the end for people of that age but not for my Grandmother. She had to leave her apartment and stay in an assisted living area of her retirement home. She had a roommate that she could not stand and made it absolutely clear that she was ready to get out of there and back to her apartment. Amazingly the Dr's felt that she was well on her way to making a full recovery and did for awhile contemplate her living on her own again. Since then she has made an incredible recovery and although she is not back in her apartment, she is in another area of the retirement home that allows her some freedom and thankfully no roommates. I only hope that I will have the will of iron that she embraces.

Now, as you can imagine Marley was a delight in the retirement facility. She especially loved the long corridors and crawled and crawled to her hearts delight. This amazed and warmed the hearts of all who passed her. Marley took no time to warm up to her Great Grandmother. She stared at her at first and then spent the rest of the visit showing her silly face. Marley went through a stage of puckering her lips and drawing in air through her nose making a loud and long sniffing sound. When ever she made this face we all would laugh which made her do it even more, my little ham.

On a hot Monday morning we left Pennsylvania to proceed with our trip. We said goodbye to my Grandmother who was on her way to the hospital for her triweekly dialysis treatment. Marley gave my Grandmother another shot of her silly face. For a woman who spends three days a week hooked up to a dialysis machine and who had recently broken her hip she looked absolutely amazing and remarkably happy.

The three of us headed to Massachusetts that day. What an amazing drive. I have never spent a lot of time in New England and I have heard it's beautiful but words can not describe the scenery that I witnessed. I can understand why people move there and never want to leave. We drove through the mountains of Connecticut into Massachusetts and landed at our final destination, my Uncle Tom and Aunt Jane's house. They were more than anxious to meet Marley. One thing I have discovered with being a new Mother is the zealous attitude of visits. People are very happy to see the Mother because the Mother is the transporter of the "star", the baby. It's a reason why I have named my blog...All About Marley. This zealous attitude fills my heart with great joy and pride.

The next morning we woke up and lazily began the day. This was the day that Marley was going to meet a good friend of her Mommy's, Vikingzen and her daughter Snicker. Vikingzen and I had not seen each other in many, many, many years. We are good friends from highschool. All I can say is that it was an amazing afternoon. We met at Vikingzen's beautiful home and had a great visit. Our daughter's played while we caught up on the last...ok I'm not going to say how many years had gone by but I will say even after all these years our friendship has stood the test of time. I truly feel it's the definition of true friendship. It was wonderful seeing you Vikingzen and meeting Snicker and I hope another, undisclosed amount of time does not pass us by again.

The next day was Wednesday. Our itinerary noted another long drive this time to Cape Cod to see my cousin in the circus then to New York. Yes, my cousin joined the circus. Not just any circus though, this is the one and only Circus Smirkus. It is a troupe of highly talented teenagers that spend their summer touring New England performing just about every day. What an amazing show. For anyone who is reading and who ever has the opportunity to see this group you will be astounded. For information on the next tour visit www.circussmirkus.org.

It was oppressively hot even on the Cape. I was a little worried about Marley and the heat. I made sure that she had plenty of water and I placed an ice pack between the two of us although the ice pack did not help us from constantly sweating. Marley was absolutely mesmerized by the performance. There was a loud bang in the first act that scared her and I had to take her out to console her. As soon as she calmed down she was eager to get back to the show and she spent the rest of the time in my lap watching, her eyes glued and her mouth open.

After the show we said goodbye to my Aunt, Uncle and cousin and headed to New York to spend the night with my Uncle Steve and Aunt D. We arrived late to find the electricity out. In fact you could here transformers popping all over the neighborhood. Why? THE HEAT. The use of air conditioning was more than the town could handle. It was late when we arrived so we had a quick visit with my Uncle and Aunt and then off to bed we went. Marley did not seem to care about the heat, she was very happy to be out of the car and in her pack n play for a nights rest. I eventually fell asleep despite the fact I was pouring sweat. We woke the next morning and had another brief visit with my Uncle and Aunt and we were off again this time back to my Mom's farm in Virginia.

This marks the end of our wonderful vacation. I was so impressed with Marley. She was great on the long car rides and really didn't have any problems sleeping in new places. She is so easy going. I am really lucky to have such a great daughter. I love you Bugalicious.