I Can Show You The World

Riley's first 6 months of life weren't all that exciting. Pretty much just hanging out at the gym and at home, so we decided to really kick things into gear and schedule 4 plane rides and a road trip down to San Antonio between July and October.

Before we get into that we had an awesome visitor a few weeks before we left Fort Worth. We were lucky enough to have mom come visit!! Since I wasn't just recovering from a c-section and mom wasn't really sick we got to go out and venture a little bit more this trip. We went to Benbrook Library for a 0-2 yr old story time. It turned out to be singing time with a book or two thrown in there. It was fun seeing Riley just stare at all the kids jumping around and when we get back in town we are definitely going to try and go to that regularly.

I also took my mom to the Y and she hung out on the treadmill while I went and did a Zumba class. It wasn't a very long visit, but I really wanted to get in a trip to the zoo so we went for a bit one morning. We only saw about half the zoo exhibits, but Riley was pretty done by the time we were leaving. She's gotten to be a pretty good sleeper at home, but that means that she doesn't like to sleep other places than her crib. She used to fall asleep fine in the carseat, but she fights it sometimes now, especially when she's uncomfortably warm. At home and in my car we have fans that blow on her. Basically we've spoiled this girl so much she doesn't want to leave the house for very long :) This was part of the reason our trips for Ben's school have had me a little nervous, but so far we are doing okay! Ben was deep into his 2nd board exam studies, but he decided to take a few hours off to come join us at the zoo. I was so happy he did! At first, I had thought having my mom come when Ben was busy was a good idea because we'd have fun while he was studying, but then it turned out I just wanted him to come have fun with us! Mom also treated us to a chik-fil-a lunch and of course helped lots with Riley so that I could cook up my slightly ambitious dinner menu. Mom's learned after coming to our house a few times now that we are a board game family so when evening arrived she'd ask, "What game are we playing tonight?" (Sidenote: When Mom and Dad were here for the baby blessing we played a super fun game called codenames with them. Can I just say it's a travesty we didn't force Dad to play more board games with us growing up because every time I've played a game with him as an adult hilarity has issued. It was Dad and Ben vs me and Mom, I was struggling to think of a clue so I asked Ben if he'd allow something that wasn't necessarily kosher. He said he thought it was fine, but when I said it Dad was not so thrilled! He couldn't believe Ben had allowed such a thing! I wish I could remember all the comments he made during the game, it was seriously the best game of codenames.) It's so fun playing games with Mom now that I'm older, Mom would say that she felt like a "woman of leisure" at our house. Play games, reading books, and holding babies. That's life at the Jack/Messerly home!

After we said good-bye to Mom it was time to get serious about our upcoming trips. Ben took his big test on Monday and then it was lots of paperwork, packing, and cleaning.

Riley and the Hat: A Short Story

The first step on our summer adventure was heading to Washington DC!! We got up nice and early on Sunday morning and our friend Lizzy drove us to the airport. The first hurdle: get 5 bags, 2 backpacks, a diaper bag, car seat, stroller, and pack n play to the checking counter. I know what you're thinking...well that's what the curbside check in is for. Well the reason we could check 5 bags for free is because Ben is active duty army traveling on orders. The last time we tried curbside the guy told us he couldn't help with military checking bags. I have no reason why that would be because all you do is show your id to the guy...it's not a complicated process. We were pretty sure that guy was just making stuff up, but the line was pretty long so we didn't want to wait in it just to be turned down. Ben ran and stole a random cart that he found and we made our way into the airport. We bought a lightweight stroller for this trip so I could push Riley through the airport easily and it was SO worth it. It made getting through security a breeze. Soon it was time to get on the plane. Duh duh duhhhhh. By take off I had Riley sleeping and I was optimistic that she'd sleep most of the flight. Unfortunately, I forgot that the plane gets real loud when you take off so she ended up being awake most of the flight, but she was honestly a pretty good baby the whole time. She only had one or two fussy moments and I actually did get her to fall asleep again by the end which gives me some hope for our future 6 hr flight. :/

So we landed in DC around 12:45 and now we had to figure out how to get to the base from the airport. One factor was the fact we had SO MANY BAGS. So we obviously needed a big car, but we also knew from past experience that certain drivers can't get on base. Ben had been warned when he was going to a base in San Antonio that they don't let Uber and Lyft on base and only certain taxi drivers had clearance so you'd just ask and make sure they knew you needed to get on base. Well DC was not so kind to share their policies with us. Now before I bad talk the system a little bit let me say that I've actually started to appreciate the army community. Whenever we've interacted with other people in the army it's been a good experience and they've been very sweet. You are all living a unique life so you really feel a sense of camaraderie. So that's the good. The bad is that we aren't aware of an easy way to find answers to your questions before showing up at a base. You can't find any reliable answer on google and there isn't really a website. (I will say that Madigan has proved to have a much better website.) So, we just went with the information we had and since the military said they'd reimburse our travel to and from the airport we just got a taxi. When we were getting the taxi we asked the guy in charge if they could get on base, he assured us that they could. Once we were in the van we asked him if he could get on base and he assured us they could so we sat back and enjoyed the ride. It was a BEAUTIFUL drive. So many trees and we could see a lot of the famous monuments from the road. Well, as you have probably guessed, when we arrived at the base things didn't go a smoothly as we hoped. The lady at the gate informed us that taxis aren't allowed on base. (We found out later that they are and you just have to ask the right company...but whatever.) She made us get out of the taxi on the side of the road. So, there we were, our billions of bags and a baby on the side of the road. Luckily, we weren't there for very long before a nice couple stopped to give us a ride to the hotel. Unluckily, we were told the hotel we were trying to go to was the wrong one. So we ended up being even further away from our destination! Ben explained the situation to the hotel people and after seeing how cute Riley is they told us we could call for a van to come get us and take us to the right place. So after a bit of a wait we finally ended up where we wanted to be! That wasn't the end of our surprises because when we got to our room we discovered there was a little living area and TWO rooms attached! It was our dream come true! We would be able to put Riley in her own room! We wouldn't have to tip-toe around after 7 o clock. We had a slight moment of panic when we thought that could mean we had a shared room...but we soon confirmed that wasn't the case. So, DC is already proving to be a contender by giving us a room for Riley so I don't have to be silent during every nap and hide in a corner while she falls asleep.

We are now a little over half way through our time here in DC (or at least we were when I wrote this :) and I can say it has been more enjoyable than I thought it would be. I wasn't sure how often Riley and I were actually going to venture out of the hotel, but I soon discovered Riley got really bored just hanging out in the hotel so I decided a daily outing would be important for our sanity. Since the program here won't reimburse us for a rental car we have learned to get around on public transportation. I quickly learned one of the downsides of relying on public transport is that while it may not look like many groceries in a shopping cart it's an entirely different game when it's all on your shoulder. On Monday morning I went to the store with Riley and thinking that it would be hard to navigate a stroller and a cart around the store I wore her in a carrier and then just brought a gym bag to carry home my groceries. Well I filled that bag to it's limit and also had three other bags on my arms. Remember there was also a baby on my chest. It was one of the biggest tests of resilience I've ever experienced. I thought I was going to die! I'm surprised my shoulder still works. When I finally got to the base I had a mile walk to the hotel left. A kind man offered to help carry my bags and I gave him the ones in my arms because I didn't want him to know how ridiculously heavy the one on my shoulder was. The only probably with him being helpful is that meant that I couldn't stop and take rests along the way. I just had to power through! It was rough. Since then I've learned that I should always bring the stroller with me to the store and I can only buy what fits in a basket. That means I end up going to the store 2-3 times a week, but it's okay because it gets us out of the house.

A few months ago I found out that Missy was going to be in Virginia the same time we'd be in Maryland. What a fun coincidence! So we've met up with Missy a few times during our time here and it's been great! It's been so nice to end up having a friend here. We went to the zoo the other day and it was so cute, Riley was kicking and reacting to the different exhibits. (She most likely could see her reflection in the glass and that's why she was happy but I told myself it was because of the animals.)

This thing was HUGE. It terrified Missy's son, Wesley. 

He's a naked mole rat!

It's also been really cool living in a place that has so many historic sites so close. We just ride the metro for 20 minutes and we are in the heart of DC! We were only able to spend 2 days in DC and we couldn't stay for two long because of Riley so there is a lot we still didn't see, but we really enjoyed what we did see.

The White House. Not as many protestors as I'd expected.

Real life.

    

Instagram.

Right about the time we had made it to the memorial Riley started to lose it. It was so hot she was too uncomfortable to just fall asleep. This was the only thing I could do to help her sleep. 

After I could no longer hold the baby I tried to get her to stay asleep in her stroller, but that didn't work. This fountain ended up saving the rest of the day. It was so loud it worked as white noise for her and drown out her screams to the people around weren't bothered by her. She lasted 2 laps and was out. 

Mel questioned if we were supposed to put our feet in the water, if you'll not the sign behind Ben you'll see it was welcomed.

We spent quite a bit of time in the Holocaust museum and one of my biggest regrets from the trip is that we didn't finish the tour. I opted to leave early because I felt like we had to go to the Smithsonian while in DC. Ben would've just stayed in the Holocaust museum, but never one to disagree with my plans we left and headed to the Smithsonian. The line to get in was massive. We got to skip it because we had a stroller and the stroller ramp just let you cut in line. However, once we got inside having a stroller turned out to be a disaster. I have NEVER been is such a crowded museum. See the Holocaust museum is popular, but it's not one that many parents take their kids too. This museum was so jam packed with families and we could hardly get around. We ended up just going to see the Hope Diamond and then saying let's get out of here. Although that turned out to be harder than expected. We walked ALL OVER that dang museum searching for the exit. I was so done at this point. I was worried Riley was going to be over it soon, I was disappointed I made the wrong choice in coming to this museum, and I was hungry. We saw way more of the museum than planned because we would follow exit signs only to find they took us to staff only areas. I'm confident we were missing something. How can it be that hard to get out of a building?? When we finally escaped I vowed we'd never go in there on a Saturday again. If we end up in DC we are going on some random weekday that Ben has off when kids are in school.

There weren't many things to take pictures of in the Holocaust museum, but I really like this room. It was family pictures of some of the Jewish victims. 

Although our time in DC came to a close, the adventure was far from over. To be continue...

Next time on Emilye's blog: A six our flight?? In a middle seat? Will the baby survive??

With a sister just 2.5 hrs away how much time will Em actually spend in Tacoma? 

And will Riley ever recover from a 3 hour time change? 

Tune in next week...or month...or however long it takes to finish my next blog post :)

Oh I almost forgot! The videos from this time period:

Riley reaches this point most nights where she's REAL easy to get a laugh from. It's so fun!

She loves a good game of peek-a-boo.

I know we take a lot of videos that are basically just her laughing, but this one is my very favorite. Listen for the little sound she makes the first time Ben swings her back into the bedroom...it's so cute!

For some reason her kicking in her little sleeper was cracking me up this night. 

I can't believe I almost finished this post without mentioning the escalator of death! I loved being about to use the metro, but in order to get down there you had to take your life in your hands! The first time I rode this I had Riley strapped to my front and had a minor panic attack on the way down. It was SO tall and the ride was SO long. I just kept imagining what would happen to my baby if my knees gave out and we toppled down 3 flights of stairs. I made sure to find the elevator next time.