The final day of our Island Park, Idaho vacation was our last attempt to salvage a weekend gone wrong. Mountain Dad’s broken ribs along with my and little g’s illnesses were shaping the trip into a negative experience. We had such high hopes at the outset of enjoying the plethora of snowmobiling trails but unfortunately we had not been able to enjoy much of anything. Because of this I decided that the last morning we would force some fun…at least for our kids.
Big E and his cousins had spent some time digging in the snow outside our condo. The result of their efforts was a cool snow fort, complete with tunnels and penguin slides. On our final morning the kids got all bundled up to enjoy some final sliding around.
After playing in the snow we tried snowshoeing. With the metal maws strapped on their feet they stomped around the field out back for about ten minutes before declaring that it was too cold and coming back inside.
By then it was time to pack things up so Heather and I loaded kids and stuff (including the puked on port-o-crib) into her car and started out. Mountain Dad had decided to tempt fate and go on a snowmobile ride with my brother-in-law Jonathan. After all, we drove the machines all the way out there and he didn’t want all that effort to be wasted. On one hand I appreciate that sentiment, especially since I did all of the loading for the trip. On the other hand his ribs were broken. He had broken them by snowmobiling…how wise was it to go again?
While Mountain Dad and Jonathan snowmobiled out to Big Spring, Heather and I drove back to her place and started unpacking and cleaning. One of the unfortunate truths of motherhood is that sometimes you have to handle disgusting things. This was one of those moments. Despite rinsing out little g’s soiled bedding the day before, the stench of vomit was quite strong. Being nauseated myself, smelling the fumes wasn’t the best, but I managed to plug my nose and get everything into the washing machine without puking. The real trick was how to wash the port-o-crib frame and mattress, since they were too large and bulky to wash by traditional means. Had it been summertime I would’ve hooked up the hose and sprayed everything down outside. It was winter, however, so we had to come up with something else. Thankfully, my sister inherited my mom’s MacGyver talents and using her jetted bathtub and overhead showerhead we created an oversized washing machine in her bathroom. I added some soap, let the jets run for 10 minutes and by the end there was no trace of little g’s mess from the night before.
Soon Mountain Dad and Jonathan joined us and reported that their trip had been successful. Apart from his ribs being excessively jostled by every bump on the trail, Mountain Dad survived the trip, enjoyed the scenery and was finally able to snowmobile. Success!
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We left my sisters and headed home, happy to have had some good times amidst the bad. At least Big E had a great weekend of playing with cousins, sliding on snow and swimming. For him it was probably his best vacation ever. For me…well, not so much.
