A night out

On Friday evening, Ramy and I got to enjoy a rare treat - a little "adults only" date! Rebecca was invited to spend some time with her cousin Jessica, Auntie Myrna, and Uncle Ed. Rebecca looovvvves Jessica, not to mention their dog Slinky (and visiting puppy Riley), and she was excited to get to have pizza with Jessica. It's so cute to see a tiny little girl looking up to an older girl - it's practically idol worship. Fortunately for us, Rebecca couldn't have a better older girl as a role model. Jessica is the sweetest, most polite, best behaved almost teenager I've ever met. (It's hard to believe our little flower girl is "graduating" from 6th grade this weekend!) It is nice that Rebecca is now a little more open to socializing! We took advantage of some time to not look at a kids' menu!

Girl with a chocolate doughnut

Yesterday morning, Ramy got us doughnuts as a Saturday morning treat. Rebecca helped herself to a big chocolate doughnut with sprinkles on it. She attacked that doughnut for half an hour!



By this point, she was starting to think the doughnut was maybe a little more than she bargained for.



Finally, she gave up and washed it down with some water. In actually, she probably only ate 1/10 of the doughnut, but she certainly thought she'd had a decadent treat!

Pretty girl

Intern dinner

Last night, I went to a dinner for all the LLU Psych people getting ready to start internship. Most people are going far away, unlike me! We also had a few people from our cohot who are currently on internship. It was nice to get to see them and find out how their experience has been on internship and what their post-doc plans are. It was a fun night out!

Luckily, Julie actually remembered to bring her camera and was nice enough to share the pic with all of us.

A Magical Day

On Saturday, we took Rebecca to her first trip to Disneyland. It was actually my first trip to Disneyland as well, although I've spent quite a bit of time in Disney World. It was a perfect day! Warm during the day, but not too hot, and just a bit chilly in the evening. The first ride we rode was It's A Small World. Rebecca was a bit awestruck! Then we stood in line for an absolute eternity so that Rebecca could meet Minnie Mouse and tour her mouse house. I was afraid that we very well might stand in line all that time and then Rebecca would be afraid of her, but she was not. In fact, she even kissed Minnie on her mouse nose. After that, however, Rebecca was spent and needed a nap. Unfortunately, she slept through the whole parade. I videoed it for her though, and she has enjoyed watching it on the computer. We also rode the train, a couple of boat rides, a circus train, the Winnie the Pooh ride, the Dumbo airplanes, and the carousel. We even stayed late enough to see the fireworks! By that time, Rebecca was quite sleepy, but she still enjoyed them. She especially liked the shimmery fireworks and would ask, "where the shimmies?" She picked out a stuffed Pooh, which she tried to feed honey at the Pooh ride. After she was asleep, we also got her a bunch of the little poseable Disney figures. They have been her ever-present companions ever since! She carries them all around in a little tote bag. Lord help us if one of them gets lost!

I've got a slide show of pics over there on the right, so you can check out our magical day!

Wow! I just can't how Rebecca's vocabulary grows exponentially! I love being able to have whole conversations with her now. Last night, I asked her what she did that day. She replied, "I eat apples and meat and cheese. Nanny Becca play with the ball. We go for walk. I hiding. I watch Elmo. Mama come home, we snuggle." Apparently it was a fairly accurate representation of her day! I asked her what she wanted to eat for dinner and she said, "Ummmm, how 'bout pasta?" So I made her some ravioli. As it was boiling, she wandered into the kitchen and said, "I vewy [very] hungwy, Mama!" I told her it would take a few minutes for it to cook. She heaved a sigh and said, "Alright." Then she wanted to watch it boil, so I picked her up and let her look into the pasta pot. She peered into the pot for several seconds to look at the boiling water and pasta and then exclaimed, "Almost there!" When we were finally ready to eat, she looked over at me as I was about to take a bite and said, "Be careful, Mama. It hot!" Very cautiously, she stabbed her own ravioli with her fork and blew on it, all the while, looking sideways at me, as though she wanted to be sure I understood how to cool off my pasta. After dinner, we were playing with a ball, rolling it back and forth and throwing it (kind of). I bounced it to her and she bent over to get it; the ball bounced against the top of her head. She giggled and said, "Ball hit Becca's noggin!" I had no idea she had ever heard the word noggin, much less could apply it appropriately. Paddington was a little less interested in being part of our ball game and wasn't too receptive to Rebecca rolling the ball at him. Apparently he was in kind of a grouchy mood, because he barked at Rebecca a bit harshly, which crushed Rebecca's feelings. We had several minutes of tears and she told me "Paddy mad!" Luckily, it was soon afterward that Daddy came home, and all was well again with the world!

It's been a busy week since my mom left. On Tuesday, I had to do feedbacks with three patients I've tested in the last few weeks, plus another eval. Fortunately, my eval was a pretty short, straightforward case of a gentleman who was diagnosed with Alzheimer's about two years ago and needed a re-eval to determine progression. Luckily for him, he's been on Aricept and Namenda, which is really working well and he was actually doing no worse on anything and his memory was actually better than two years ago. Unfortunately, my feedbacks didn't go as well. I had to tell one patient she has Alzheimer's (probably actually AD and vascular dementia) and not only can she not drive, she needs 24-hour supervision. (She got lost coming back from lunch on the day I tested her and was found wandering in the inpatient unit with no clue where she was going or why she was there). Another patient was unhappy that she doesn't have Alzheimers (she really wanted that diagnosis, for some reason) and told us where we could go. She went completely ballistic when we told her that because of her severe visuoperceptual deficits, she can't get the electric mobility scooter her assisted living facility has ordered for her. The best part was that when she was storming out of the office in anger, she told me that she could drive better than I could because she had glasses and I didn't (?). As she turned to tell me this, she completely ran into the door with her walker - a good example of why she would be unsafe with any motorized vehicle!

The best part of the week was that my new DSLR camera (my birthday present) came on Tuesday night! I just have to get a super huge memory card for it, figure out how to use the non-automatic functions, and I'll be a picture-snapping fool!

I'm finally all finished with all the paperwork before I start at county on July 1. I have my NPI number now, so they can bill for my services. The department is going to be hit really hard by the State of California's financial crisis. Mental health services under Medi-Cal are going to take a beating. One of the smartest ideas they have for saving money is to institute a mandatory state review before any Medi-Cal patient can get antipsychotic medications. What an AWESOME idea!!! I wonder if Gov. Swarzenegger would like my schizophrenic patients having a psychotic break and hearing voices telling them to do violent things to come hang out with him and Maria and their kids while they wait for the state to decide if they're crazy enough for some Geodon.

Thirty-one

Today was my 31st birthday. Ramy, Rebecca, and my mom made it a lovely day for me. We started out the day with breakfast at Bravo Burger, did a little shopping, and had dinner at Mi Piace in Pasadena. I made my own birthday cake yesterday - white cake with caramel icing. I had intended to make homemade ice cream as well, but I didn't remember to stick the freezer mechanism in the freezer until last night and then just didn't get the mix made up today. We enjoyed the cake and store-bought ice cream though. Rebecca proclaimed, "Dat's good keek [cake]!" The highlight of my day was possibly Rebecca singing "Happy Birthday" to me in her sweet little voice. She was, however, hysterical when other people sang it to me. I have no idea why that terrifies her, but it does. She freaked out at her own birthday party when everyone sang to her. She would start crying just watching video of her birthday party. And she's gotten tearful at other birthday parties when it has been sung. Maybe she's picked up her dad's loathing of being sung to, rather than my own enjoyment of limelight. Regardless, it was a wonderful day.

I'm happy to have another year of life, and I will never complain about getting older! I have purchased some anti-aging foundation though, so Geritol may not be far behind.


This isn't my actual birthday cake, of which I didn't actually take a picture. Rather, this was what they brought me at Mi Piace. Isn't it pretty? Rebecca blew out the candle for me. In respect for global warming, only one candle rather than 31.




We have had a very busy and fun long weekend. My mom arrived on Wednesday night. Thursday, we visited my mom's cousin Linda in Redlands. Actually, Rebecca and my mom visited her while I had a meeting at LLU, then we went to lunch with her. Friday, we went shopping at Santa Anita (yes, right next to the racetrack where Seabiscuit raced.) It was critical that we do some shopping at Janie and Jack, of course. We ate at Rebecca's favorite - California Pizza Kitchen, AKA CPK. Rebecca mixes up the acronym a bit and calls it "see-kee-pay." Saturday, we spent many many hours at Disneyland! I've got a ton of pictures to edit and I'll most more about our day then. Sunday, we were all tired from our long day at Disneyland and planned to sleep in and go to a later mass. Rebecca, however, was wide awake at 7:00 a.m., asking for cereal and wanting to watch Mickey on television. I tried sleeping on the couch while she watched television but wasn't too successful in that venture! My mom goes back to Tennessee tomorrow. Hopefully there won't be any meltdown when Rebecca knows Grammy is leaving with Mommy and she isn't going. Last time, we were low key about it, and she was fine.

Energy

This was Wednesday when we were on our way to go pick up Grammy from LAX. Rebecca was quite excited!





We're having a great time with Grammy here. Yesterday, I had a quick (and useless) meeting at Loma Linda and also needed to drop something off there. I took Rebecca and my mom to visit Aunt Linda in Redlands. Apparently Rebecca had a great time playing with the cats and cat toys. We went shopping most all day today, and Rebecca particularly enjoyed the carousel ride she got to take at the mall. Of course, Rebecca possesses Grammy while she is here. Boy does Rebecca know how to pull some heartstrings. Coming home, Rebecca was in a very loving mood. She rolled those big brown eyes up to her grammy and said imploringly, "I need you, My Gammy... I lof [love] you, My Gammy...I want you, My Gammy." At that point, Rebecca could have gotten a Leer jet from Grammy if she'd wanted it!

We've got some more exciting things planned for later in the weekend. I'm looking forward to posting pictures from them!

Rebecca funnies

I realized I need to keep a record of some of the funny things Rebecca says and does, because I will want to always remember them, and they will soon begin to escape my recollection. So here are a few from the past few days.

- Rebecca has learned the art of excuses. Her go-to excuses are "I seepy [sleepy]" and "I busy." She believes that if one doesn't work, you should try another. A typical scenario is that she pulls a bunch of toys from her toybox and strews them on the floor, with the warning that she has to put back whatever toys she gets out. (She usually says, "Okayyyy" in a sing-songy voice that really means she isn't concerned about that at this moment). Inevitably, the time comes to put away the toys and sometimes she doesn't want to do so. She'll then say, "I seepy!" When she is told she can put away her toys and then go to sleep, she says, "No, I busy!"

- Rebecca has recently been insistent on wearing dresses...every.single.day. I usually ask her what she wants to wear, and she replies, "pitty dess." I wanted her to wear a capri pants outfit, so I waited awhile before trying to get her dressed. When I got the outfit out and ready to put on her, she tilted her head down so that her chin touched her chest. Then, she looked up at me with just her eyes and said in a low voice, "That is not a dess, Mama. I wanna pitty dess."

- Rebecca is well versed in the art of shopping. As soon as she sees the familiar outside of Gymboree stores, she runs inside shouting "Gymbee!" and heads to the back of the store where the tv is. We were walking through the mall recently and passed by Janie and Jack. Rebecca looked in the window and said, "That a pitty dess." (It was indeed - very colorful and pretty). I showed her a simple white and ecru eyelet dress and asked her if she liked it. She looked at it for a few moments, looked up at me, and then turned around to the "pitty dess" without comment about the one I had shown her.

- I asked Rebecca whether she wanted to drink some chocolate milk. She stopped in her tracks, looked back at me, rolled her eyes, and exclaimed, "Ohhh, yes!" as though it were the answer to her need to quench her thirst.

- I was sharing a bowl of chicken and wild rice soup with her, and she announced she wanted some juice to drink. I said, "I don't think juice is going to taste good with soup." She paused for a moment, then said, "Ummmm, how 'bout water?" "How 'bout" is another new catch phrase. I told her that Grammy was coming to visit and she looked up and said, "How 'bout Aunt Mah-get?" as though she were in negotiation.

- Any small enclosed space is a subject of interest for her. She sees the little sheds at Costco, points it out and says, "That's 'Becca's house!" She "helped" her aunt Theresa put together a little pen for Riley (Theresa's new puppy). After completed, Rebecca crawled in it and announced, "This 'Becca's house!" and lay on the ground as though she were sleeping, before summoning the puppy to lay down with her.

- One of Rebecca's favorite new terms is "I need." Whether it be a hug or a cereal bar, she announces imploringly, "I need a..."

- Rebecca is also quite technologically aware. A favorite thing to do is to climb into the desk chair and proceed to press various and sundry buttons on the keyboard, while proclaiming to us, "I emailing." I asked her if she was ready to get dressed and she replied, "No, I need a email!"

- When she wakes up in the morning or when she is sleepy, Rebecca likes to have some cuddle time. This morning, she awoke as I was getting ready to leave to go to work. Sleepily, she looked over and said, "Mama, I NEED a snuggle!" Similarly, she's also telling us frequently now, "I of [love] you."

- Rebecca's favorite fruit is blackberries...so much so that she believes all blackberries are intended solely for her consumption and to the exclusion of anyone else. At Costco, we went into the cold section to check out the produce (thank goodness they have quarts of blackberries for $4, because that only lasts Rebecca 2 days). Rebecca immediate spied the blackberries and announced, "Becca berries!" This morning, I asked if she wanted some fruit with her waffle and yogurt. She said, "I want Becca berries!"

- Tonight, we were talking about Grammy coming tomorrow. She told me that Grammy was in "Tissee." That led to a recitation of all the other "people" who live in "Tissee," including Daisy, Shujuh [Sugar], Shakey (all of these are dogs), Aunt Mah-git..." Then Rebecca said, "Where Jesus? At church?" I told her that Jesus wasn't just at church but that we can find him anywhere. She said, "on the wall" (referring to the crucifix that is on the wall in our bedroom). I explained that was just a picture of Jesus, like we have multiple pictures of her on our mantel. Then I told her that Jesus lives inside her heart and tapped her on the chest as I said it. She looked at me with an incredulous look and said, "Dat my SHIRT. Jesus on WALL!" Clearly, we have much religious education to go!

A night with the girls

On Saturday, we met up with our friends Vincent, Madeline, and Paul for dinner at Wood Ranch. We were celebrating Vincent's new job as in-house counsel for Apex Electronics. Rebecca was especially excited to get to hang out with her older girlfriends, Rachel and Ashley. She had such a good time with them and didn't want to leave them, even though it was late and she had not had a nap all day. Rachel and Ashley are so sweet with Rebecca. They were reading to her, and she wanted to give them lots of hugs. Rebecca always wants to pet Ashley's hair, for some reason! (Fortunately, Ashley doesn't seem to mind).

Rachel reading the kids' menu to Rebecca:


Rebecca and Rachel:


Ashley, Rebecca, and Rachel:


I think Ashley should be a model when she grows up. In every picture I have of her, she is posing! Rebecca was so excited to hold hands with them and walk around with her older girlfriends.


Rebecca was a bottomless pit for dinner. She ate bread, salad, steak, corn, part of a hamburger, and then was still more than willing to help Ramy out by helping him polish off some ice cream!

Monkey Girls

On Thursday, Nanny Rebecca brought Rebecca to meet me at Panera Bread for lunch with Julie and Adelaide. I think Rebecca wasn't sure what to think with all of us being together at one time, but she enjoyed it. It was a pretty day out, so we enjoyed lunch outside. Then Addie, Rebecca, Julie, and I made our way to Gymboree so that we could shop their Circle of Friends sale (30% off everything). I took advantage of the fact that they had left one of their previous sale signs up where they had 30% off all shorts to get 30% off of a previous 30% off. For a brief moment, I felt a bit guilty, because it was completely an oversight they had left that sign up. However, I didn't feel so guilty that I didn't go ahead and let them honor it, since I got $23 shorts for $11. I didn't marry a lawyer for nothing!

In keeping with the idea that we were shopping Gymboree and that Julie and I are slightly crazed, we decided we needed to dress our girls in coordinating outfits from Gymboree. So they were both in monkey attire. The print of Rebecca's top is the same as Addie's shorts. Unfortunately, Rebecca had a pee-pee accident and we only had a chance to get a few quick shots of them in their outfits before I had to change Rebecca!

After shopping, we enjoyed a Dolcissimo cupcake and chatted. Rebecca also availed herself of Addie's apple slices, since her own mother hadn't brought a nutritious snack with her! Luckily, Adelaide was kind enough to share.

Swinging....then and now

When I was looking at the pictures from the park on Tuesday night when I downloaded them, I thought, "Haven't I seen this before?" Then I remembered taking a very similar picture last spring. Oddly, the second week of May 2008, I have a set of pics of Rebecca swinging, wearing a white top and denim shorts. What a difference a year makes (or doesn't)!

Evening at the park

We've really been enjoying the nice southern California spring weather the last couple of weeks. On Tuesday, we went to the park after dinner and Rebecca enjoyed playing and running. My daughter ran in a complete circle around the park, in her attempt to get to the playground part of it as quickly as possible. I think she thought the slides might leave before we got there. She loves to swing, climb the climbing rock, and slide over and over again. She has also learned that it is fun to slide down the slide on her stomach. Fortunately, she hasn't yet tried going down face-first! We also enjoyed watching the ducks and geese flapping all around the ground, squawking at each other, the bunnies eating grass with their babies, and the turtles playing in the pond.

Afterward, we got ice cream for Baskin Robbins' dollar scoop night. It was a fun night! Here's a clip of some swinging and laughing. I was trying to capture her talking a little more, but she was more giggly and interested in swinging!

Recap

It seems like the last week has been incredibly hectic. Last Tuesday was a WILD day at work, because they had double booked us with patients. Ordinarily, they schedule 2 outpatient evals for us (1 for me, 1 for my supervisor). We also schedule feedbacks with patients we've finished the reports for and their families either the first or the last hour of the day. At lunch, we have our didactics meeting. I knew that I had to do a presentation in didactics and that we'd scheduled a feedback with one patient that morning and another patient at the end of the day, so I was expecting it to be a bit hectic. However, once I got there, I learned that they had actually scheduled three patients for us in addition to our feedbacks. One of the feedbacks was particularly difficult. It was a case in which we essentially had to tell a guy and his family that the deficits he had currently were, statistically speaking, as good as it was going to get. He asked us how long until he would be back to his old self. Wow, that was a hard thing to respond to, because barring divine intervention, he isn't going to regain any more function and is at a huge risk for another brain insult. It is a very fine line to walk. On the one hand, I never want to discourage a patient from working to get better and never want them to lose hope. And there is always the possibility of divine intervention! On the other hand, I think it is a cruel disservice to spin a yarn for people that makes them have unrealistic expectations. So it was kind of a sucky day, for lack of a better descriptor. My supervisor and I did a strange shuffling of the patients between us to get them all done without too much down time for any of them. I've been struggling since then to get the report done for one of the patients, because she's in a diagnostic gray area, and I am torn on how I want to couch her diagnosis. Eh, anyway...tomorrow I'll have another eval to do, so maybe it will be an interesting and exciting day as well!

Nanny Rebecca came down with a horrible case of bronchitis that turned into pneumonia, so she was out the end of last week. I kept Rebecca with me on Wednesday and Thursday while I attempted to do some writing (hmmm, maybe that's why the report was so hard for me to write!). On Thursday, we had a lovely little meetup with Julie and Addie, for which I posted a cute picture. I had taken more pictures, but apparently I had the camera on some weird function that made things kind of blurry. Not to mention the horrid flourescent lighting. But hopefully I'll have more opportunities to get some good snaps of the girls together. Earlier in the week, Rebecca went on a playdate with her friend Charlotte. I've got pics of that I need to edit and upload too, because they're so cute! Rebecca is about a month older than Charlotte but is probably 4 inches shorter and at least 10 pounds lighter. Yesterday, she wore a skirt that was size 3-6 months. Good grief!

I had the most lovely Mother's Day. I received several nice cards in the mail, but the nicest were the cards I got from Ramy and Rebecca. Rebecca signed hers herself. Clearly, she is destined to be a doctor, because she has the signature down already. I was taken for a delicious brunch at my favorite restaurant, Louise's Trattoria, in Los Feliz. Afterward, we went up to the Griffith Park Observatory and enjoyed the gorgeous weather and beautiful scenery. Rebecca thoroughly enjoyed playing in the grass!

More favorite Sedona pics

I took some pictures of Ramy and Rebecca when we were in Sedona that I absolutely loved. There was this whole little series of pictures of them playing at a stream. Rebecca loved the water and walking around on the rocks, and she mostly enjoyed having Daddy's help exploring such a new environment.

I've got another sweet little vignette of pics of the two of them, but I'm going to save them for something special.

Mother's Day

This is my third Mother's Day as a mother.

I remember the last Mother's Day before I had Rebecca all too well. We were into the second year of attempts to have a baby, starting our fourth and final round of intrauterine insemination, and already knew that it didn't look too promising. If that round didn't work, as my reproductive endocrinologist didn't, then we would be moving on to in vitro. Although I knew that eventually I'd have a child one way or the other, I wasn't sure when or how long it would take. The idea that we were really quickly going to be at the last hope for having our own biological child was difficult to swallow, and patience has never been a virtue of which I've been in possession. I remember trying really hard during the mass, which was about motherhood and how blessed mothers were, to keep the dam of tears from bursting. My prayers for a baby that day were probably something like, "Please give me a baby at the right time, and please make that time be right now." It seemed as though there were babies and pregnant women everywhere, and I'd had a few more questions about when we were going to have a baby and why I wasn't pregnant yet than I could handle. In short, that Mother's Day 2006 was a difficult one.

Little did I know, but just a few short weeks after that eternally long and miserable mass, we would learn that Miss Rebecca was indeed on her way to brighten our days and fill our lives with more joy than we could have imagined at the time. I couldn't know then just how motherhood would affect me. There's a quote by Elizabeth Stone that I think is so true, "The decision to have a child is momentous. It is to decide forever to have your heart go walking around outside your body." Indeed, I had not realized that becoming a mother would indeed change who I was in a way nothing else has. My education has changed my perspective on the world. Falling in love and getting married changed my priorities. But becoming a mother changed my very being, as every thought, every decision, every breath has Rebecca as at least a very strong factor. Nothing could be more precious or more sacred than the responsibility or the privilege of being a mother. I'm grateful for the blessing of being Rebecca's mother, and I'm humbled by the fact that she was entrusted to me for her earthly care and teaching.

Motherhood is indeed a daunting task. I remember periodically thinking in astonishment, in the weeks before Rebecca was born, that they were really going to just let me take this tiny little person with me and just trust that I knew what I was doing when I had never taken any proficiency exam about child rearing, written a thesis on the subject of baby care, or even taken a course in the subject. My mother always said that when a baby is born, a mother gets a little package of maternal instincts. I'm not sure if that is also brought by the stork or what, but I think that I just as often fell back on what I'd learned by example. I was indeed blessed to have learned the art of motherhood from an expert, and I hope that I can live up to her example. There are so many things that I want to show Rebecca, to teach her, and to provide her with experiences - from baking the best pumpkin pie to appreciating Les Miserables. However, those are also things that she can very well learn on her own. The thing I learned from my mother that is a top priority for me to pass on to Rebecca is the knowledge and security that she is loved. It's something I never had to question, and I know it has made the difference in my whole life and every decision I've made and every challenge I've attempted. It, along with the fundamentals of faith, are absolutely the best legacy I can leave my daughter.

Friends

On Thursday, Rebecca and I had another shopping lunch date with Adelaide and Julie. Our girls are so cute together! Addie has decided that she sees no point in crawling. It will just get her knees dirty and no one can see her cute outfits that way. So she's just going straight to walking. Adelaide is so cute trying out her cruising skills. Julie and Derek better look out, because one she gets enough confidence to let go, she's not looking back! Rebecca really enjoys playing with Adelaide, giving her snacks to eat, holding hands with her, and giving her hugs.

I know it is quite possible that other people think we are total freaks, because we're whipping out cameras in Gymboree or Nordstrom Cafe. Who cares? We have to capture sweet moments like this!

A few of my favorite Sedona pics

I finally got my Sedona pics downloaded, edited, and uploaded. There's a slideshow of most of the pics we took, although apparently I had some strange fascination with one particular rock that was bizarrely phallic in apprearance. I realized that I took approximately 14 pictures of it from essentially the same angle, plus more from other angles. Not sure what that was all about!

But here are some of my favorite pics:

This is the cool chapel built into the rock - gorgeous!


Here's Rebecca reading up on the tourist attractions to see what interested her:


Cathedral Rock, Coffee Pot Rock, and Chimney Rock

Sunny Sedona

We made it safely home from gorgeous Sedona. Trying to catch up with everything and then I'll be posting a bunch of pictures.

Rebecca was wonderful on the trip. We left before dawn on Friday morning, and we were already into Arizona before she awoke. We took a brief stop to stretch our legs and then drove the rest of the way. We enjoyed a picnic lunch while gazing at the beautifully unusual red rocks and then checked into our hotel. Then we were off into uptown Sedona, where we took a really cool trolley car tour of the area. Rebecca LOVED the trolley car and kept asking us to go back on the train. We enjoyed learning more about the geology of the area and its history, as well as learning all the names for the mountains/rocks. That night, we had a great Mexican dinner and strolled around in Sedona. We ate breakfast Saturday morning at Tlaquepaque, shopped a bit there, and then did a scenic driving tour from Sedona to Flagstaff. Ramy and Rebecca enjoyed playing in a little stream for a bit, and we made lots of stops along the way to check out all the amazing scenery and look around a bit more. We did some more shopping and eating for the rest of our trip, checked out the chapel carved into the mountain, and enjoyed the gorgeous blue skies and perfect temps. We even got to take in the jacuzzi in our room (oddly, it was in the very middle of our hotel room, but who's complaining about a jacuzzi?).

The only bad thing that happened was that on Saturday night, Rebecca woke up around 2 a.m. and starting throwing up. After about five rounds of vomit, both Ramy and I were starting to think that we needed to head to the E.R., but then it passed with no other symptoms and no more episodes. In thinking back about all the things she had eaten that day which could have caused gastrointestinal upset, maybe we shouldn't have been too surprised! The eggs, bacon, toast, and fruit for breakfast was fine, but in the afternoon/evening, she sampled balsamic vinegars, ate beef jerky, drank cranberry juice, had a couple of tangerines, and helped Ramy eat seafood pasta for dinner, which included shrimp, scallops, fish, and tomato sauce, and she had a few bites of a brownie. I'm thinking that might have been a bit too much acidity for a 2-year old!

Our trip home was equally uneventful. We stopped off at the outlets on the way home. Rebecca thinks that Miss Julie and Addie live at the mall. As soon as she saw that we were going into a Gap (outlet store), she started asking about them. It was a really great long weekend getaway. It's always fun to do a roadtrip with my posse, but it was also nice to see a little different part of the country than I've ever seen before. I was struck by the realization of the amazingly diverse scenery there is in the United States - rolling green hills, bayou, desert, jagged mountains, red rocks, black beaches, tropical, arctic, barren, lush... Pretty cool. My dad's birthday was Sunday, and I thought about him a lot on our trip. He would have really loved Sedona - seeing all the places straight out of John Wayne movies.

I'll be posting a slideshow of pics from the trip soon!