Charleston Day 5: Monday

Monday morning we chanced the impending rain and won when we took a carriage tour through downtown. There are three carriage companies and three routes, but the City regulates them. So the consumer picks the carriage company but only after the carriage has launched does the City randomly choose which route the carriage will take. For someone who wanted to see all three routes, I'm not sure how one could ensure that, especially given that the tours are pretty pricey.

We enjoyed our tour well enough, but weren't super thrilled that the tour guide made jokes about Christian beliefs and talked about adult subjects in a way we thought a little too graphic for children riding along and listening. The tour guide wasn't even "above and beyond," just typical of modern conversation in mixed company. But hey, that's why we don't let our kids listen to regular radio or watch regular television!

Watching a baby miniature donkey while waiting

Watching the shoeing of a horse while waiting

Asleep on the tour

Afterward, we walked through the Charleston city market, which is the gathering place for the carriage tours. This market was the first but not only place we saw for sale boxes of real crickets flavored like potato chips (e.g., sour cream and onion flavor).

  

Instead of eating crickets, we ate lunch at the famous Hyman's Seafood. Servings are big! Instead of ordering three children's dishes, we could have ordered one to split and still had some leftover.

After quiet time, we visited Charles Towne Landing, which is the original settlement in South Carolina. The settlers lived there from 1670 to 1680 before relocating the village about three miles away to what is now Charleston. I love historic stuff like this!

Attached to Charles Towne Landing is the Animal Forest, 22 acres of outdoor enclosures showing the kind of animals that lived in South Carolina at the time of its settlement.

First we came upon this GIGANTIC SPIDER living loose alongside the path. I don't think you can really see it in the photo, but its body was at least one inch long and its legs at least three inches--which is a lot bigger than those measurements sound. Later Mary wandered off the path and I asked her to come back. John remarked, "She's standing right next to another one of those spiders. Actually, two of them." I said, horrified, "She is not!" My old eyes couldn't see as well as John's but closer inspection revealed that Mary was mere inches from having walked right into one of those webs. I told her I was so glad that she hadn't walked into it and she asked why. I said, "I don't think the spider would have hurt you but I would have had to use my hands to bat it off of you and then I might have fainted dead away."

River otters

There were two puma in the exhibit, and this one had what appeared to be crippling arthritis. I imagine it was rescued from the wild where surely it could not survive.

Black bear

Despite being on a five-foot path in between the puma enclosure and the black bear enclosure, the children were far more interested in a little green lizard they tried to catch and this unusually shaped snail.

Bison

Turkey

Indentured servants' quarters

We got to visit the Adventure ship, a reproduction of "a cargo vessel that would carry supplies, provisions, commodities and livestock between New Amsterdam (present New York) and Barbados in the West Indies."

The creek upon which the Adventure traveled

How to pump water out of the ship

The ship was quite exciting for the children, who had many questions for the historian on board, but immediately following we discovered approximately one zillion crabs on the muddy shore, which proved exhilarating. The crabs were nervous about us and were moving en masse slowly, slowly, ever slowly sideways to escape. But then I'd jump and all zillion of them would scurry very fast for a few inches, creating a neat visual image. The children asked to hold hands with me and we all jumped together to make the crabs go from slow-slow-slow to fast-scurry-scurry! We were laughing and having fun.

 

The various ponds at the settlement all had these helpful signs, "CAUTION ALLIGATORS."

For our last dinner in the city, we ate at Monza Pizza. The food was good but let the artful interior, tinkling glasses, white linen, nearly silent atmosphere, and waitresses wearing what were practically leotards be clues that the restaurant is not an excellent choice for those bringing children.

And speaking of children, the winner of the Remark of the Day received by me was from a woman who glanced at my children (behaving well at that moment) and said, "There are so many of them!" before walking away briskly without waiting for my reaction. The comment has been on my mind since as reflecting something so sad. We can get into arguments about what constitutes "so many" children, but, really? Three? One child can't possibly be "so many." Two is quite typical in this country, so can't be "so many." So how does one more than two result in "so many"? And "of them"? Like she was  talking about vermin crawling all over or something else repugnant. Her comment was a sad reflection, I believe.

Charleston Day 4: Sunday

We attended Sunday Mass at the historic Stella Maris parish.

They have a weekly Latin Mass but, unfortunately for us, it is at 5:30 p.m., so we missed that one. In fact, we did not end up attending Mass in the true historic church, which was packed full. We walked over to the parish hall where a simultaneous Mass is held: not just simulcast, but a priest and an altar having real Mass. Even that one was overflowing and I guessed there were 500 people total in attendance, which was more than we were expecting for a tiny island with a population of about 2,000.

We then took a driving tour of some little islands around Charleston before lunch back at the same fun and funky pizza place. The children are still talking about watching the man hand-toss pizza.

Dancing to the music at the restaurant

After an attempted nap and quiet time back at the hotel room (which I was starting to think can never work), we took the hour-and-a-half harbor tour.

Me being a Nervous Nellie around water, this was a stretch for me. However, I ended up enjoying myself, even when we were up on deck. And nobody fell in the water and was lost! The narration of the area's history was very interesting and I enjoyed spotting many dolphins. Poor Mary never could spot the dolphins in time, which resulted in tears, so ultimately I stopped even pointing them out to her.

Apparently there is an architectural rule in Charleston that no building may be taller than the church steeples. Pretty neat priority!

Fort Sumter

Mary finally took her nap . . . in Daddy's arms.

Charleston Day 3: Saturday

On Saturday morning, we took a trolley down to the South Carolina Aquarium. 

The aquarium is a lovely one and we were practically the only people in the place on that weekend morning!

I really enjoyed seeing a bald eagle up close, Liberty being a rescue from losing half a wing in the wild.

The albino alligator was also fascinating to me. I had been wondering how the removal of an alligator from the wild was ever tolerated these days when I read that an albino alligator is considered to be unable to survive in the wild, both because alligators depend on camouflage for survival and because they need to warm up in the sun (whereas an albino creature will become sunburned!). So, when this albino baby gator was found in the wild, it was promptly rescued and placed into captivity.

See, Mary could move her injured right arm, but virtually never did because of the pain.

On our way back to the hotel room, we strolled through a vibrant farmers' market in Marion Square outside our hotel. The kids even got to ride ponies!

We had a much-needed cool-down and food fuel-up in the hotel room. Then Grampa Neil, Chris, and John visited the U.S.S. Yorktown, an aircraft carrier.

  

I hear that the visit was extremely cool and well worth it, but there are no photographs because a certain camera was forgotten back at the van.

My afternoon was hardly the rest I had quite hoped it would be. I managed to get Margaret down for a much-overdue nap, but then Mary (whose Quiet Time never resulted in sleep) began tantruming again. It is so obvious when this girl is overtired because she then transforms from her charming, bubbly self to her monstrously out-of-control self. By the time Mary was quieted down, I lay horizontal for five minutes, which was just long enough to start to feel like I could take some quiet breaths when Margaret woke from her nap. So, we set about doing laundry instead because if Mama can't rest, she might as well be productive! I am very grateful that this hotel has a guest laundry room, but it was a bit laborious loading up the girls in the stroller back and forth with our bags of laundry every so many minutes.

As of Day 3, I am decidedly understanding why families rent houses or condos. Before, I was focusing on the fact that a rental house costs money while we stay in hotels for free, using Chris' travel points (from his business travel). Also, I wanted to go on a vacation. Staying in a house isn't a vacation for a mama! I'd have to haul in supplies, go grocery shopping, do laundry, cook most of the meals, and clean up as we left. That didn't sound very different than my normal life to me. But now it is really sinking into my mind that the idea of a vacation as "not doing work" is pretty much gone for these decades. I got to laze about and let others plan and arrange my vacation days when I was a carefree, self-centered teenager and I hope to do it again with my husband when our children are grown, but I don't really foresee doing it during these years. I may not be cooking on this vacation, but herding the children through restaurant meals three times a day is work, costs an arm and a leg, and probably takes just as long as cooking. Trying to get them to nap (which they won't) and then dealing with the exhausted consequences is work. The examples are many, so suffice to say that I am seeing now why vacations begin to look very different as families grow in size.

Speaking of families growing in size, being here in Charleston--out of the bubble in which I live--I am experiencing stares at having a "big" (hardly!) family. As I walk through the hotel, I literally see people (grown adults!) point at us and make comments to each other. I have had some strangers walk up to me to comment on our family size, and I am grateful that they have been polite so far (even if I can tell they are picking their jaws up off the floor). It is so hard for me to understand because I live in a microcosmic world in which my serious Catholic friends are having families of 8, 10, 12 . . . one friendly acquaintance is pregnant with #15. And my children who are two to two-and-a-half years apart are positively "widely" spaced compared to every 18 months or even Irish twins. So, I don't see pregnant-with-number-four-in-six-years as freakish at all, but apparently our Culture of Death does.

Back to our vacation . . . the gentlemen straggled in grinning and hot from their visit to the aircraft carrier. The children now each have sailor hats, which helped slightly with Mary's weeping when she realized John had been taken somewhere without her whereas previously she had felt like the belle of the ball to have been my Big Special Helper at Doing Laundry. We tried to explain that there was a great amount of climbing "stairs" (ladders!) for which she would have needed two good arms, and she was still walking around like a bird with a broken wing.

We rallied one last time to go to dinner, this time choosing a diner we saw on "Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives" instead of any local restaurant in historic downtown. They may advertise as being friendly to family tourism, but I just don't feel comfortable with my children around white linen, tinkling glasses, and exotic local flavors, no matter how nice the wait staff tries to be. Having French toast at a greasy diner tonight followed by 79-cent drive-through dessert ice cream was a much better fit!

Charleston Day 2: Friday

Inexplicably, the baby woke at 5:30 after such a rough night, and I still don't know how to keep an 18-month-old quiet so both other kids soon woke. Then began the trick of trying to keep everyone quiet so as not to wake our neighbors! (Increasingly seeing the wisdom of a rental house!)

After breakfast, we headed to Edisto Bay for the kids' first opportunity to see the real ocean. Wow! We bought sandwiches and chips for lunch at the state park. [This funky picture needs fixing.]

Then we marched over the sand dunes to play at the beach. The kids had an absolutely fabulous time. It was a joy for me to watch them and reminded me of annual vacations with my dad to Cape Cod.

We chuckled when another family came to the beach whom we recognized as Certainly They Must Be Homeschoolers: six children within about a ten-year age span whose mother was wearing a denim skirt as long as my khaki one! At least we can laugh at ourselves, right?

Poor Mary was still in great pain from the internal bruises from falling out of the tree. It is unmistakably obvious when her medication has worn off because she begins weeping in pain. Even with the meds, she was moving gingerly and mostly leaving her sore arm limp by her side. As it was, I miscalculated our plan of the day, so left the medication back at the hotel room because I thought we'd be back by the time it was due. Well, no, we were just leaving Edisto when Mary's meds ran out and she cried for about the half hour it took us to get to a store to buy new meds and then a bit longer until they took effect. That was so pathetic and sad to witness!

We drove back to Charleston, during which time Mary unfortunately did not nap despite still very much needing naps at age three, and washed off the loads of sand in the warm bath. 

Then it was off to dinner where Mary's fatigue caught up with her even though it was only five o'clock. The uncontrollable weeping began when she ran out into oncoming city traffic and Daddy caught her, thereby saving her life and simultaneously causing what was apparently Great Offense to her, as Mary then screamed and wept for, what?, twenty minutes?

We sat with weeping Mary in the restaurant debating whether Daddy would simply take her back to the hotel. By a narrow margin, she calmed down enough to stay for dinner, but we experienced various other weeping dramas, such as when she spilled her water. Ultimately, Daddy left to take Mary back to the hotel immediately after dinner so Grampa Neil and I could take John and Margaret through a stroll downtown.

Daddy had the great spontaneous idea to hire a pedicab (rickshaw) to give Mary and him a ride through the historic area and back to the hotel . . . and John witnessed them getting aboard. Thus John seriously dampened what would have been an enjoyable walk by spending the entire time pouting, punctuated by frequent complaints and occasional tears. When we got back to the hotel, Daddy was extremely kind to take John right back out for his own pedicab ride, thus putting both big kids on Cloud 9.

Charleston Day 1: Thursday

On Thursday, we did a blitzkrieg preparation to go on vacation to Charleston, South Carolina, one day earlier than planned. Normally I pack up the family in a well-organized two-day process, but this time did it in about two hours! I had no idea that this historic city is fewer than four hours from our home, so the drive was pretty easy except for some short stretches of Margaret crying.

After dinner at a funkypizza joint--great pizza with olive oil base, golden beets, feta cheese, and bacon!--it was time to get the children to bed.

Except that they couldn't fall asleep.

And thus began a two-hour process, which should have been much shorter based on how tired they were. Our lovely top-floor hotel room had a "park view," which meant that it was overlooking a historic park. The only problem with that view on Thursday night was the event involving a Jumbotron, raucous music, loud movies, and crowds of people drinking beer. The noise transmitted well through the historic glass windows (not exactly modern double-pane jobbers!). The kids were awake. The baby was awake. 

That was when I began feeling that even an Embassy Suites, with its bedroom separate from living room, is getting tight at three kids. I don't see how this will continue to work with a fourth baby. As it was, finally the two kids fell asleep in the bedroom and the baby fell asleep in the living room, but then I could not move a muscle, nor make any noise. So, the two adults sat in the dark silently. 

Now I realize why our various friends have mentioned how nice it is to rent a small, inexpensive house or condo off the beaten path for vacations. Buy grocery food, eat at home, avoid melt-downs of over-exhausted children in a restaurant. Have bedrooms in which children can nap, parents actually get to stay up past 9:00 and talk out loud or have the lights on. Let's just say that now I get it. And after getting one or two hours of sleep that night as well as the toddler being woken countless times, I really, really got it!