Crazy times in St. George

It was a strange idea to begin with.  Why don't I hop in the car with Scarlet for the two hour drive to St. George to go see Mulan at Tuacahn and then drive home?  It's quite a bit of driving for a play, but throw in the company of three aunts and a grandma and we were in!

And then what happens when grandma and one aunt bail on you?  And then you realize your husband isn't available to watch the boys during this last minute adventure?  And then you decide you already have tickets, plus extras because of the ditchers so might as well make the best of it.  So, throwing caution to the wind, you pile up all of your children, along with an Aunt Kristy, and make the two hour drive north.

The plan was to take the boys over to play with Uncle Curtis, while the rest of us enjoyed our afternoon at the theater.  Curtis and Courtney were pretending to be homeless (which means they had a fully furnished apartment but were hanging out at a nicer house with friends because, duh, they didn't have internet and what the heck would they do all day long without internet?!) so we drove over to their crash pad.

And I kinda get why they were playing the homeless card.  It was a nice set up.  Curtis wasn't there but their friends were happy to keep an eye on the boys while they waited for him.  It was then that Rhode decided to come with us.  I knew right at that moment that two things should have happened, 1) I should have never invited Rhode, love the kid but seriously, I knew it would be a bad idea, 2) I should have made sure Curtis was there before I left.  These were nice people but they had known my kid for about 10 minutes and Asher just needs a little more supervision than your average 2 year old.

But I ignored those feelings and we headed off to see Mulan in action.  Twenty minutes later, Courtney got a message from Curtis saying he was there, but Asher had taken a fall and had a bump on his head.  I was not that concerned at the time, that is a regular occurrence with that kid.

The play was a lot of fun.  They had great sets and great costuming.  The acting was pretty good, the choreography was a bit lacking, and they had this extra song in there called "Keep 'Em Guessing" that really played up the transvestite aspect of the story along with the fact that it was kind of a jazzy and oh so not fitting in the play... but critic in me aside, it was a pretty good play.

Not so good that Rhode was entertained for more than about 10 minutes, but good.


I even came prepared with candy to make sure my kids kept interest, but there was just no helping Rhode.  He made every comment in his loudest voice and couldn't stay in his seat to save his life.  Thankfully the audience was full of kids, so nobody seemed too perturbed, well except for his mother sitting next to him.

But we survived and made our way back to Asher.  But the Asher I found was certainly not the Asher I had left behind.

My Asher had a regular face.  This Asher had a unicorn horn sized contusion on his forehead along with a bloody nose and scratches all over his face.

 My Asher could also walk.  This Asher screamed in pain and fell to his knees every time he tried to walk on his own.  This was not the small bonk I had imagined, my little guy was injured.

Courtney, Curtis, and Kristy kept my other children distracted in the pool while I assessed all of the damage.  He couldn't walk but, after a ton of leg and foot squeezing, bending and twisting, I couldn't find anything that was causing him pain.  Just the walking pressure.  He also passed all of the signs for not having a concussion, so I calmed down a bit and tried to comfort the very, very sad boy.

The trip improved very quickly after that.  We got to see the newlywed's new apartment and get a little ice cream treat to finish off the evening.  Our ride home went smoothly and I got to spend the rest of the weekend with Kristy and Trevor.  Trevor helped Jon set up some computery things in his new warehouse while Kristy and I played and talked and cooked and played some more.

Asher still continued to limp for the next two weeks (x-ray showed nothing, thankfully but it still took a long time to heal) and there is still a small bump on his forehead but his mood improved very quickly.  So grateful that 2 year olds are fast healers!