Pico DiPaolo

No, I’m not referring to Meg (aka Noonie).  Instead, I’m talking about the DiPaolos that live in Nottingham Forest.  I won’t name any of their first names for their privacy, but it’s crazy how many times I’m asked if I’m ____ DiPaolo instead of Petie DiPaolo.  It reminds me of something that struck me the first day in Disney.  I remember looking around wondering when I’d see someone I knew.  Then, I remembered, oh, I won’t see anyone here.  I’m so used to the small town I live in inside of this huge city.  Our area of town is very unique, I think.  I run into the same people all over the place.  We frequent the same stores, schools and restaurants.

Back to the other DiPaolos.  Similar to everyone else in this area, they go to Ace Hardware, the MAC and MDUMC, just to name a few examples.  So, when stores are looking up my frequent card number under DiPaolo, they always ask if I’m this other DiPaolo woman because her first name comes before Petie alphabetically.  This has also happened at my gym – the MAC.  I also was getting her child’s classroom news via e-mail, she wasn’t getting them.  Despite repeated attempts to correct the situation, I continued to get her e-mails until last month.  The latest incident happened when I got the mail from the mailman.  I saw him coming and waited.  He handed me the mail and said, “Are you related to the DiPaolos in Nottingham Forest?  I’m their regular mailman.” 

I guess it’s a unique name.

Chris and I have usually kept our blog “clean” of a lot of political chatter.  We generally steer clear of topics that could stir up debates and stick to the funny family stories.  That is why we started the blog – to keep relatives and friends entertained with stories of our girls.  Also, to chronicle their childhood tales for later in life. 

However, how can I skip over the political season without mentioning anything at all?  Chris and I both voted yesterday in the primary.  I believe it’s the first time I’ve done so, but the race is so close between Hillary and Obama.  We felt we should.  It’s not that I don’t like voting.  I actually feel like it is a duty and privilege, my parents raised me correctly, but I do get frustrated not knowing much about the candidates (aside from the presidential race) and I do get a little crestfallen when I always seem to vote for the losing candidate. 

We live in a very republican area, but I generally don’t let that make me shy about letting people know I’ll be voting for Obama this year (or Hillary, if she wins).  I do think though that it certainly won’t change anyone’s mind on who they are voting for.  I’ve found that even getting down to the details with folks and having them realize that they are probably voting for the wrong person, they won’t budge on voting against their party.  However, I liked how eloquently my Mom put it to me last night.  She said, “Petie, don’t tell people who you are voting for or even what party you align yourself with.  Instead, say that you think, ‘it’s time for change.’”  I like that.  I did change.  I’m embarrassed to say that I voted for Bush and not Gore the first go round.  The second time, I didn’t make the same mistake.  Once again, I find myself being hopeful that things will turn out better this time. 

I’m gonna hate having my hopes dashed for another four years. 

“Soft drinks are the cigarettes of this generation.”  This quotation was on a bag I got from Lululemon.  (very cool work out / lounge clothes, for those interested).

Obviously, it caught my attention.  I mean, it’s quite a statement and I’ve been known to drink a lot of Diet Dr. Pepper’s.  They are lovingly called “DDP” in our household.  I know they aren’t great for you, but are they as bad as a cigarette?  This quotation coupled with the discovery that Chris has yet another kidney stone (when he took an MRI to discover why his back was hurting – herniated discs) has made us both drastically cut down on our soda consumption.  Poor Poppy was accustomed to coming over to the house and taking a DDP roadie.  He’s been incredulous to find our fridge is no longer stocked full.

….and then there is the debate about plastics leeching into our water.  At Christmas, Chris bought us both Sigg bottles to take with us to work out.  They’re made of alumnimum and supposedly safe to drink from.  Around the house, to encourage one another to drink more water, Chris and I have taken to saying, “I finished a Sigg.  Or, it was a 3 Sigg day for me.”  Joelle has picked up on this new lingo and thinks fondly of them.  At Whole Foods last week, I saw kid size Siggs and had to splurge.  I had no idea what a hit it would be with Joelle.  She’s taken it for lunch every day, wants us to take it with us everywhere at all times, and even took it for show n tell at school!  That gave me a little family pride. 

On a related side note, Nana mentioned she used to drink out of AL cups as a kid.  (If  plastic  was invented, it wasn’t as widely used back then and glass wasn’t so great for the kids).  I was also shocked to find out that my parents used to belong to a veggie co-op.  Things really do come full circle. 

Elise loved her bottle.  Elise worshipped her bottle.  She anticipated the delightful end cap to her daily adventures.  We had her down to two bottles, her night bottle before bed and her morning bottle (5 or 6 am).  Both Chris and I knew that we should wean her of all bottles by her first birthday.  We felt the dread of that moment approaching, knowing, without actually discussing, that she would get the typical second baby slide.  Well, maybe by 18 months? 

She hasn’t had a bottle since February 4th, almost exactly one week after she turned one.  Before you think of Chris and I as parent Gods (may I remind you that we recently used the terms “competent” and “adequate” to define our parenting skills), I’ll share our secret.  The stomach bug.  The same one that damned Joelle and I to a miserable three plus days.  The stomach bug that upturned our whole house and plans for a week.  The silver lining is that it also efficiently ended the bottle.  Elise certainly didn’t want it while she was sick and by the time she was well enough to have it again, she had frankly forgotten all about it. 

Pretty cool, huh?  Now, if only we could have some divine intervention with the bink.  I don’t know if the bink fairy will work, like it did for Joelle. 

So, I’ve been slacking.  …and I really won’t remember everything now.  So, this is probably going to be the last blog from our trip where I remember “everything else” and smush it into one last ditty.  We went to Epcot the next day, lunch at Akershus.  I think we all agreed the Princess breakfast was better at the castle (last time we went to disney we did this), but it was cool to get so many autographs in one sitting!  Chris and Elise left after lunch and the fun began, kidding.  We did get to do Soarin’ (cool) and Test Track (very cool) after Lis left the scene.  She came back sometime when we were in China, where we spent 3 or more hours.  The dragon acrobats made a big impression on Joelle and we were there so long waiting for Mulan (grrr, we had waited forever and then she left and that left Mushu alone, so we had to wait for her to come back out) that Elise caught up with us and got to see the second show of the Dragon acrobats.  Also a hit with Elise.  Joelle spent a long time coloring a mask at China.  The me in Disney last time wouldn’t have allowed that (we can draw on masks at home, but can we go down the Norway ride and see all the worlds at home?)  Having Elise at Disney made me realize that you can appreciate all the small things about Disney / vacation, too.  We don’t have to go, go, go all the time.  Anyway, we really did literally skim all the rest of the worlds because it was dinner time.  “Gotta eat,” as Nana would say.  Seriously, Elise should wear this logo on all her clothes.  The other best thing about this day was Poppy winning Joelle the ring toss pin.  It was neat to see Poppy so happy to have made Joelle so happy.  Of course, he would later buy her the pin trader sash – she needed a place to put her pin, right?  …and that pin needed friends, right?  We all got a laugh out of the hidden mickey pins – not sure if there is more to them or not, but there is a tiny mickey on the bottom of the pin.  Is that “hidden?”

The next day – most of the gang went to Hollywood Studios (Chris will have to add anything worth adding about their adventure).  Having had none of the nap duties to date, I took Elise to Magic Kingdom (there really isn’t anything for her to do at Hollywood studios.)  So, when you’re with mommie, well, you get the mommie deluxe treatment.  We were there ready for the gates to open – treated to the special opening show.  We raced to Pooh (this was my only mistake – first, you should go to dumbo).  We rode Pooh 3 times in a row!  No line.  Elise had memorized exactly where Tigger would pop up next.  You could see her tiny head move in anticipation of his next sighting.  We then went to get a fast pass from Peter Pan.  We walked over to the Toon town and walked through minnie’s house.  She liked all the pots and then loved playing at a park there.  Then, we went over to small world and used our fast pass for Peter Pan.  Again, no lines and she loved it all.  Mommie can navigate the park.  I looked down to see my sweet baby knocked out.  I guess I wore her out.  While she slept, I shopped and discovered what I would tell Chris was “Disney’s best kept secret.”  He said, “vacation club?”  I said, “the aloha bar.”  Pineapple smoothies with vanilla/pineapple ice cream swirl.  Yummy! 

The next day, we all went to Animal Kingdom.  It was the typical “bad day” on a vacation.  You know, the day when everyone is tired and a little grumpy.  Lotsa little annoyances (train to Rafiki land closed), some kinda big (Joelle getting soaked on Kali rapids, so that’s why there wasn’t a line!)  We did have fun though.  A bad day in disney isn’t like a bad day anywhere else.  Although, the bird pooping on my head really did make me a bit unhappy.  (Yes, this really did happen.  lucky for me, I carry baby wipes with me).  It WAS cool that Pocohontas was just standing outside the park waiting for us (so it seemed) when we left.  That was the highlight of the day for me… I think it was mommie more than Joelle who wanted every possible autograph!  Appropriate for the day, dinner was also botched up a bit.  We thought we had signed up for the Luau, but apparently, we had reservations for O’hana.  You know, I think that turned out for the best.  Dinner was fabulous and we would have all been cold at the Luau.  Also, it gave us an extra table service meal.  So, we had an awesome lunch at liberty tavern in magic kingdom the last day. 

The last day was Magic Kingdom again.  Joelle had expressed an interest in seeing the dinosaur bones again in Animal Kingdom (oops, forgot to mention that – she loved digging for bones at the dinosaur park.  Poppy said, “why is she playing here, we have that in Houston!?”  ”We do?  Look around, it’s cool!”)  Somehow, we did convince her to stay at Magic Kingdom (it’s time consuming to jump around to different parks.)  We rode all the hits again and both girls had fun playing in Pooh’s park.  I pointed out to Joelle that she could read all the signs now and she thought that was funny.  I pointed out all the misspellings – and she thought that was very crazy.  I think she can already spell better!  Elise was dragged around to all the rides and fell asleep again.  Joelle choose to see the parade and then we got to go on one last ride – she choose it’s a small world.  Thank goodness it wasn’t closed yet both girls loved it and I personally went so many times that I was able to watch the evolution of the hula girl.  First, she was going way to fast (battery about the run out).  Second, she had stopped (battery out).  Third, she was back on, dancing normally.  Noonie’s Aunt Diane told me that she saw a show where it said that It’s a Small World will be closed for updating soon.  They have to dig the canal deeper for the boats because all the generations of Americans are getting heavier.  In other words, on average, a boat load going down it’s a small world is heavier then it was 40 years ago.  That’s sad.  (I’m not suggesting that I’m not contributing to this problem.)   

As a fitting good-bye, we saw Peter Pan walk out of the hotel lobby and down to the boat dock as we took our luggage to the concierge for the early morning departure.  Instinctively, I thought, “where’s the autograph book!?”  He was whistling a little tune and it was fun to see him disappear from view.

The extra magical hour was at Magic Kingdom our first day, so, of course, we opted for Magic Kingdom our first day.  With Joelle on our first trip, we had things mapped out exactly.  Where we would run first, what fast passes to secure, etc.  This trip, we were much more laid back.  Heck, we weren’t even there when the park opened!  We got there at 8:30, instead of 8:00.  After that, we didn’t even try to get the extra hour of magic, we knew our herd would get enough magic.  Chris will say that we didn’t secure the Cinderella Suite because I didn’t wear mouse ears, but we did have a “dream” that very first day.  A woman stopped us (wearing the non descript satchel of dreams we were told to watch for).  It was right outside the castle…., but it was not the suite.  If only I had had on mouse ears!  It was really cool though.  Joelle was given the chance to pull out the sword in the stone.  They gave her some pixie dust and it came out!  That same dream weaver also gave me a fast pass later that day when she saw Chris, Joelle and Elise get on the Pooh ride without me.  (We only had 2 fast passes because Chris was out of the park giving Elise a nap while I got them.)  That was cool to get to ride with Lis on her first Pooh ride.

The gang all lined up to ride Dumbo.  Elise’s first ride.  Dumbo is such a simple ride, but it’s so darn fun and cute.  The carpets of Aladdin and the dinosaur ride (all the same concept) just aren’t as good as riding on good ‘ole Dumbo.  Elise and Chris exit the park – walking back.  I loved that flexibility of being able to walk from Magic Kingdom.  Joelle, Nana, Poppy, and I kept on playing – riding classics such as small world, peter pan and the haunted mansion.  Yes, Joelle loved the haunted mansion!  That was crazy to me.  I thought she would hate it. 

We all gathered for a favorite lunch spot of ours – the crystal palace.  I held my breath to see if Elise would love the Pooh characters.  She did.  She thought it was quite funny when she would spot them.  She loved chowing down at the buffets, I recall cutting up a lot of watermelon for her at that lunch.  Chris and I couldn’t cut the food up fast enough for her voracious appetite. 

I should have taken notes there because the details are already fuzzy, but I know that Nana and Elise left for naps after Elise had one Pooh ride.  Chris, Poppy, Joelle and I then headed over to Frontier land where Joelle got to meet Jasmine.  I think the entire trip was worth it to Chris when he saw the look Joelle gave Jasmine.  As mommie predicted, she still thought all the princesses were real.  She adored meeting her favorite.  I commented afterwards, “oh, Jasmine had such pretty jewelry on.”  Joelle sighed, “and her make-up was so pretty.”  We continued on to Pirates – Joelle also liked this ride.  Would she dislike anything?  Maybe it was a good thing Splash Mountain was closed. 

Joelle had her first ear ice cream, but seemed to prefer our frozen lemonades.  We met back up with Elise and Nana but exited the park via the train shortly after dinner.  Elise was done for the day.  (She had skipped the nap that she was supposed to take while with Nana.)

Chris and I sneaked up to the observation deck to watch the fireworks.  They looked like they were right over tomorrow land – right by our hotel and we told Joelle, Nana and Poppy that they would have to watch the next night.

At some point this day, we end up with a new umbrella stroller.  I say “new”, but it was really much more beat up then ours.  A testament to how many strollers there are in all the miscellaneous stroller parkings! 

I have to put a break in my chronicles of Disney because of three thoughts that I don’t want to forget and are relevant now.

Elise had to get her shots a day after we got back from the trip.  Chris came along because I knew she also was going to get the anemia and lead testing done (which translates to blood being drawn, a weakness of Mommie and I was afraid Elise would be screaming.  One of my most memorable events was the jaundice test for Joelle, less then one week old.  They couldn’t get enough blood and her crying literally drove me mad.  Chris sent me out of the room while they finished scraping the hell out of Joelle’s heel.)  First up, the shots.  She only shed one tear for three shots.   Second test, the blood sample.  I assumed they’d scrape Elise’s heel to get the blood, but they actually gave my tiny baby a little tourniquet and stuck a needle in her arm!   It was the craziest thing.  Elise sat in Chris’s lap, eating yogurt raisans, without batting an eye lash.   Both the nurse and lab technician were also in shock, waiting for the plaintive wails to ensue.  Elise is one tough baby.

Joelle caught me by suprise this week with her intelligence.  She’s this little thing who was so, so cute walking down the aisle for practice last night for Meg and Danny’s wedding, but she’s also got this spark of witty straightforwardness that seems so big for her age.  We were getting her valentine baggies ready for her classmates.  Chris walked in and I said, “yeah, I’m not sure if these were supposed to go yesterday with the actual valentines (they were due a day early to give the kids time to sort them out and distribute to the appropriate mailboxes).  I just figured these wouldn’t fit in the mailbox slots.”  Joelle looked incredulously at me and said, “Mommie, they’re shoeboxes.  You can take the lid off.”  I started giggling at her observation.  Chris, too, thought it was funny.

As mentioned above, we went to Meg and Danny’s rehearsal last night for the wedding.  Chris mentioned afterwards, “I was struck by the moment.  Danny really is getting married.”  Meg has felt part of our family for a very long time.  Joelle has always adored her and is quite confused that she is only now becoming an “aunt noonie” because she has always thought of her as an aunt, but Chris is right – it’s so cool that Meg and Danny are getting married.  It’s such an awesome event and I am always moved during the ceremony.  I expect no less tonight.  I was personally also struck last night by something that seems so obvious.  Danny is old now.  I don’t mean that in a mean way, I just mean to say that in my mind he’s always stayed about the age he was when Chris and I got married.  Standing up there, it struck me that he’s grown up so much.  As the second kid with a big brother, it just felt like Danny would always be way younger.  Maybe I’m trying to kid myself into thinking I’m still young!  Anyway, I can’t wait for tonight.  I’m very happy for them.   

As usual, I drastically underestimated how early one must arrive to endure airport procedures when I purchased our tickets. Our flight left at 10 something, so we left very early for all the girls. We splurged on terminal parking because we had 4 bags between 2 adults, 1 walking kid and 1 strolling kid. Why hasn’t someone invented a stroller with one handle? Security was security and even Elise removed her Robeez for inspection. Chris vocally mentioned what I had been thinking, “Oh, we ARE that family now.” The ones who look flustered and confused while looking for the baby food that we forgot is a liquid and trying to unpack every other offending morsel for the inspectors. Security is not kind to those traveling with young children.

Elise enjoyed her freedom walking around the airport and doesn’t enjoy her freedom being taken away once boarded. Luckily, she did sleep for about an hour of the flight. She was slightly amused by the dvd, but mostly wanted off the plane. One more obstacle before the holy land, the bus. The magical transportation bus, which actually does help us because they took our bags to the hotel for us. The driver made me laugh when he said “folks, I live the magic 12 times a day.” (in reference to hearing the video on the bus about disney.) Of course, we were the last of 4 stops, but, ah, we arrived at the Contemporary at last.

Nana, Joelle and I ventured to downtown Disney. Joelle was in awe of Goofy’s candy store. Frankly, it is pretty amazing – any and every sugar concoction you can think of. She settled in on a cookie dipped in white chocolate with sprinkles. Yum. I was still feeling quite awful from my stomach bug. Nothing else in the entire store tempts me, a testament to how ill I still felt. (I made up for it later!) We shopped a bit until Chris called to say Elise was up. We decided that we’d all eat at Downtown Disney, an ill-fated decision which made Chris (and Poppy) endure a bus ride with a wailing Elise. We’re introduced to the Disney meal plan and the Earl of Sandwich: desserts and food are plentiful.

I hope to soon document a lot of our trip to Disney in one or more blogs, but I feel I would be remiss in not sharing the week we had prior to leaving for Disney.  I just kept thinking, “oh my gosh, we’re leaving for a family vacation in ____ days, how will we get there?”  It all started on Monday night, January 28th.  Elise threw up several times in the night.  She’s had a few tummy bugs, no worries.  She did fine all the next day on crackers, rice cereal and banana.  So, we gave her corn for dinner.  She threw it up.  It was strange.  In my great motherly wisdom, this wasn’t how it was supposed to work.  Hence, I coined the phrase, “I’m adequate,” when Chris said, “such a good mommie” one night.  Later in the week, he would say, “I’m competent,” when his own confidence was shaken.  The entire next day, she only had Pedialyte.  Scheduled for her one-year shots, we took her to the doctor on Wednesday.  She used every last ounce of energy to tell us, the entire audience in the waiting room and all the nurses that she was pissed off about being there.  After her battle cries were issued, she turned into a limp rag in her daddy’s arm.  I can still envision her body draped over Chris’s arms, completely limp.  Her eyes would follow Dr. Pielop around the room, but she didn’t move.  I could tell that the doctor was even a bit dismayed and worried over her appearance.  Chris has mentioned this, but when the doctor asked me when she had smiled last, I broke down in tears.  It had been quite some time.

Magically, on Thursday, she was a bit better.  Joelle went over to a friend’s house after school and threw up right as we were about leave.  All over the place.  I hesitate to write this because of the graphic nature (those weak at heart, should skip to the next line), but it has relevance later. She actually even threw up in my mouth.  I couldn’t take a shower for obvious reasons and was mortified at having had this huge incident at a friend’s house.  It was an awful moment.  I called Chris on the way home and told him bluntly what had happened.  Without waiting for his reply, I hung up.  I’d had a rough week already and now this.  It was a low moment for me.  Luckily, Nana was at the house watching Elise and was able to help and Chris skipped his party for Baker & O’Brien that night to come home. 

Joelle bounced back from her GI quickly and could have almost even gone to school the next day.  Turning point?  Is everyone getting well?  Not quite yet.  Having had the germ in my mouth, it was a bit hard for my body to fight it off.  I, too, fell prey.  I got sick on Saturday night and was in bed almost all of Sunday.  I felt better at times, but it was a rough go on Monday and Tuesday.  I didn’t eat anything until Tuesday.  I lived on gatarade and really didn’t have my full appetite back until Thursday or Friday at Disney.  We made it though.  We made it and maybe enjoyed it all the more knowing how sick we had all been.  I just keep thinking how lucky we were to get sick before we left and not during the trip. 

A high point of the the whole experience was on Friday when Poppy came late in the afternoon to bring the girls “get well” balloons.  Elise was delighted.  She walked around and around the room (a delightful sight without the balloon since she hadn’t really walked for three days) tugging her little balloon with her.  There aren’t many things in this world cuter then a kid holding on to a beloved balloon.  She didn’t understand where it went when she let go until a few hours of trained exposure, so when her balloon first went “away” to the ceiling, she immediately tried to grab Joelle’s.  It was adorable to see her feisty spirit back. 

As we flipped the calendar to 2008 we looked forward to a fun year – Elise’s 1st birthday party, family trip to Disney World, girls going to meet Joaquin in SLC…all in the first part of the year. Instead the highlights have been:

Jan 1 (day after flexible spending due) – someone puts a pin in the Chris voodoo doll (herniated disc)

Jan 27 – Elise’s 1st birthday party (ok, it hasn’t all been bad)

Jan 28 – Elise gets sick and basically doesn’t eat anything for a good part of the week – she’s pretty much her old self again but she gets tired and hungry quickly because she’s still trying to catch up on calories.

Jan 31 – As Elise is just starting to be able to at least be able to drink gatorade, Joelle gets sick

OK, we can look forward to February – Disney! Uh, hold on there…

Feb 2 – Petie is next in line and gets sick after feeling under the weather most of the week.

Guess who’s next?

It has been really, really sad to see my girls not just “sick” but SICK. One by one they have been picked off and the life just taken out of them. I think Petie would agree (although right this second she might not) that the worst moment was when we took Elise to the doctor on Thursday. We had her 1 year appointment scheduled but used it as a “sick visit” because she basically hadn’t kept anything down in almost 3 days. The doctor asked if she was showing normal emotions (like smiling) but was just lethargic. We realized that we couldn’t really remember the last time she had truly smiled.

Which reminds me, the next time we saw her smile might have been later that night when Joelle was around, now sick. It was ironic because when Joelle would go up to Elise when Elise was sick, Elise would kind of swipe at her. When Joelle was in her zombie-sick state Elise would go up to Joelle and grin as if to say “see, how do you like someone smiling at you?” Joelle for her part showed great restraint and did her best to deliver a fake-perky “Hi Elise”.