California, Here I Come!

I arrived at LAX at about 10:00am local time. After a four hour flight I was happy to be grounded again. I was totally unimpressed by the airport though. It looked as if maybe they were doing construction..? Either way, I felt like I had to walk miles to get to baggage claim and then catch a taxi.

Once I hopped into the taxi it was only a couple miles to the hotel. Holy ish!! Those couple of miles took over an hour! It's ridiculous! I checked the GPS on my phone once we 3 miles away and it said that with traffic it'd take 15 minutes. Um excuse me, what?! I wasn't overly impressed with the appearance of the area either. I always tell Hubster that once he's out of the army, if there's one place that I refuse to move back to, it's Miami. Scratch that. Los Angeles now tops that list.

Both of the hotels that we've been at have been very nice though. The picture in this post is from the Shangri-La hotel in Santa Monica. We are right across from the street from the ocean and a very short walk from the pier. Santa Monica is beautiful. Traffic is still awful.

The west coast is completely different from the east coast. And I thought the driving in Miami was bad..! can't wait to see more.

Fellow Moms: Help!

I'm at my wits' end with trying to figure out how to get V to bed at night. After Hubster left to Afghanistan in December, I had the girls on a pretty strict daily routine. It made it easy to plan daily activities, meals, shopping trips, everything. Since we've been back from our R&R cruise though, I've had the most difficult time getting V to nap and go to bed at night which pretty much throws everything off.

The face of an angel...

 Before leaving her with my parents, V used to go to bed at 8:30 and sleep perfectly through the night. Now it's a miracle if shes in bed by 10:30. Along with going to bed way too late, somehow she makes her way down to my bed at night. I usually don't even notice until the morning. I know this all has to do with the fact that she slept between my parents for a week and usually they are up until 10 or 11.

I've tried going back to our normally routine, to which she violently protests. Warm milk doesn't work. Children's cough syrup with sleep aid doesn't work (in my defense, she did have a cough). I locked her bedroom door and she busted the lock. I've let her fall asleep on the couch before taking her upstairs. One night I tried letting her sleep on the couch. So moms, any ideas for getting this bundle of joy to sleep in her own bed all night? I don't want her in my bed and I don't want her screaming through the house waking up the baby..