In honor of Dr. Seuss’s birthday yesterday, I made a word cloud from my fav of his work (The Foot Book). Meadow and I have had a lot of good times with this book, especially when she was younger. Ya know the one… “in the house and on the street, how many many, feet you meet? up in the AIR feet, over a CHAIR feet, more and more feet, 24 feet! Here come more and more and more and more and more and more and more and more… feet.”
Going pinata shopping in 90F degree, 90% humidity has its challenges, especially for this Alaskan family that still looks for our winter boots and hat when we’re getting ready to go outside. I can’t tell you how great it felt to leave our down coats in the car at the airport in Juneau.
The phrase traveling light has added meaning when you’re sweating your ass off and smelling your exposed skin singeing from the sun (which is no doubt extra intense thanks to Global Warming or El Nina or whatever). Added to the bag full of sunscreen, water, camera, purse, and sarongs is another item, weighs about 25lb, is often sweaty and sticky, and is known as mi hija (my daughter). Meadow loves walking around in Zihuat, but when we need to get to a place quickly, or when we need to keep her from grabbing every single ceramic frog she comes across (and launching it into a play she’s conducting in which someone is either getting married or is in danger and needs rescue) it’s nice to get her off her feet.
Our lightweight MacLaren stroller works great, only weighs 12lbs, and easily folds into a nifty back slingable package. This package has metal extrusions that dig into my back, and is long enough that the wheels are constantly banging into the back of my legs while the handles are knocking me in the back of the head. So if Meadow’s walking, the thing is a complete pain in the ass to carry around. While expanded, with occupant or not, it’s a disaster on Mexican “sidewalks” and uneven stone tile streets.
The more rustic (fun) locations require something with far fewer wheels and we’ve found that ye olde shoulder ride is an efficient mode of transport. No extra vehicle to carry around, keeps (most) of the sticky sweaty kid skin off my sticky sweaty dad skin, and is really fun when you’re the kid (so long as you don’t bash your head on something).
