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Last week I took my first road trip with my two year-old and three month-old sans an adult companion. It was damn hard to get it all together and in bags and in the car and on the road. But then. Then it was just fantastic.
The three of us headed west over a few mountain passes and through a curvy canyon to the open, lakeside city of Coeur D’Alene, Idaho. We went to meet up with my sister-in-law and seven month-old niece who made the trek from Portland, Oregon. This was the most affordable way we could see each other and that was all we wanted: to lock eyeballs, share stories and hug on each other’s kids. We only had 48 hours.
We’ve known each other and been close friends for more than a decade. It’s just a bonus that she’s also family. I am so fortunate to have her in my life and now she, with the help of her husband, created this perfectly lovable Aida Louise.
I kept thinking about those summers we spent washing our stinky Dansko clog feet after a long waitressing shift, laughing too loud as we were perched, hip-to-hip, on the tub’s edge. The hot hikes in the mountains around Red Lodge and cool gin and tonics on her mom’s back deck.
And now we have families. Kids. Cousins. Deeper-cut laugh lines.
We stayed at a friend of my family’s triplex rental unit. During the day we laughed at our kids over coffee, talked about our husbands on walks, nursed our babes. During the evening we made meals while sipping wine, daydreamed about our future selves, cuddled our babes.
We observed and talked about how different our lives are with kids. Like travel is an entire other thing. It resembles pre-kid travel about as much as a goose resembles a pig. They are both animals but one is agile and can fly and the other is slow and lies in the mud.
Our two days were graceful in an unwieldy way. Scrubbing of our ripe feet has been replaced by wiping peanut butter from Margot’s upper lip. Carefree day hikes replaced by walks on the beach, strong-arming a stroller through deep sand.
I don’t know which is the pig and which is the goose. Pre-kid my pace was my own. I could be sprightly or unhurried. Post-kid there are so many considerations. Experiences can be soaring or sluggish. There is so much beauty and fun in both. And, wow, that I have such a cool sister to live it and learn it all with.
A fourth generation Montanan raising a fifth, Nici Holt Cline is a mama to Margot and Ruby, wife, gardener, crafter and runner who loves to write and take photos. She writes regularly on her popular blog dig this chick. You can read “Mama Digs” every Monday exclusively at www.mamalode.com. Read more of Nici’s mamalode articles here.
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It is nice soar like a goose, but there is also something to be said about a warm mud bath fallowed by a blanket wrap to cool off….I know you will enjoy both worlds to the fullest!
xo, your mama
I am so thrilled that your girls get this life; a life of love for family, support, companionship…
I was thinking of you all, proud that you made this happen, loving the images of you having a glass of wine in the hotel room, trying to stifle your laughter so you didn’t wake the babes, making jokes about the gals’ night out…oh man I love you all.