A trip to Anchorage for the girls!

Our trip to Anchorage turned out to be a very long day. We had to be at the PAX terminal by 6am this morning. Fortunately, I made some blueberry muffins last night and tossed some in Megan's backpack with a pear and a bottle of water for breakfast. She was so funny when I went in to wake her up today. We had really been talking up our adventure all week long. At 5am, I barely cracked her door open and she bolted upright and said 'I'm ready for the girls' adventure with Mommy'. I'm shocked that Daniel slept through the excitement.


We got to Anchorage in no time at all. However, we didn't get off base for over an hour. The base was in lock-down looking for a suspect involved in a hit and run accident. Interestingly, Megan and I happened to see the young man get arrested about 10 feet away from us. All of a sudden lights and sirens and squealing tires were coming down the road pretty fast. I scooped Megan up and stepped inside the building we were standing in front of. The MP's got out with their guns drawn and cuffed the guy and hauled him away. Megan was really interested in the 'boys with the guns'. And as they walked over to give us the all clear, Megan said 'thank you for keeping us safe', it was precious in her adorable little voice. Another funny Megan-ism today was when we were walking outside on the base because it was a beautiful day and I was trying to burn off some of her energy. An man in his late 40's/early 50's wearing a cammo uniform was walking toward us on the sidewalk . He got to where he was just about to pass us and Megan looked at him and said 'hey, my brother has those same pajamas.' The man laughed and smiled at Megan.

Megan and I went to Chuck E Cheese for lunch today. Enjoying some Mommy and Megan time playing games together was well worth missing out on going to the mall. We had a great time and I am amazed at how smart she is and how kind she is to other kids. She's such a little mother hen in the toddler play area.





Her eye appointment went very well. I really like the way the eye exam was done. Much more thorough than the quickie exam Megan had at her preschool physical. (Yes, that would be the physical she had for school, but yet didn't start school this year.) She did great with both eyes and her right eye, but as soon as it was time to check that left eye, she started turning her head to the side and really struggling. Dr. Arnold was incredibly patient and answered my million and one questions about Megan's vision. She does have a deficit in her left eye, but it seems to be getting somewhat better, but definitely not getting any worse. He wants to see us again in 6 months or before we move from Alaska - whichever comes first. And he knows a few good ped eye docs in the Orlando area to refer us to. So we have a prescription for glasses that I am to fill if it looks like she is struggling (and he gave me a checklist of a few signs). She was quite grumpy after having her eyes dilated. She complained that things were 'bluwwey' which I would imagine means 'blurry'. So along with my marching-to-my-own-beat middle child behavior, she has also inherited her left eye vision problems from me. I even made a special point of wearing my glasses today on the trip in case she had to come home with glasses on.

We had a great flight back. We were stuck at the PAX terminal in Anchorage for almost 2 hours waiting for our pilot. He had gotten stuck in traffic. Fortunately, Megan had a new coloring book and some markers in her back pack, and she stayed busy. I was so happy to have a friend of mine on the flight that I could sit and chit-chat with during the wait. We didn't get back in the house until almost 8pm. Keith and the boys were watching Superman. Of course I gave Keith the evil eye because I didn't think the boys needed to be watching Superman. But Keith said Joshua's first choice was Shrek, so I conceded to letting them watch 15 more minutes of the movie before teeth brushing and stories.