A few months ago we got a State Parks pass. We decided that once a month we would venture out to a different park. This month we chose Dinosaur Valley in Glenrose. Once again, Lucy had ballet on the brain as she proceeded to call it “Dinosaur Ballet†the entire time, despite several of her siblings numerous attempts to correct her. So Dinosaur Ballet it is.
We had a fun time, in spite of the fact that I spent much of the time being an overprotective mother. We began our day with a hike, a hike up and down some steep trails. Trails which Lucy wanted to go up and down very quickly, like any normal 3 year old! It’s times like these that I view Lucy as a-not so normal-3 year old. Her track record on falling has not been great over the past month. Fortunately, Shanti decided it would be best to just stick her on his shoulders for a bit and we got to enjoy a “normal†hike. Can you call a hike “normal†with five kids? We had to cross over a river to get to the trail we wanted to hike. On our way out of the trail we were crossing back when another group was crossing over. They made our, not so normal, group look pretty normal. There seemed to be a few pairs of adults with a half dozen boys or so, several of which were “riding†their bikes over, through and all around the river, I’m assuming, on their way to a trail. That was the lsat we saw of them but I’m glad we didn’t drag any bikes along. After our hike we headed over to a different area of the river. If you have ever been to Dinosaur Valley you know that the Paluxy River runs through it and there are some great areas to swim. We have been there many times and once before at this time of the year when the river was completely dried up with the exception of some stagnant pools of water, in fact, that was when I was pregnant with Lucy. This year we were blessed with a flowing river, flowing, yet very warm and not something I wanted Lucy to swallow. All the kids enjoyed the swim but we soon left to go eat some lunch. We happened upon a wonderful restaurant in downtown Glenrose, Riverhouse Grill. Great fresh food, grass fed beef, very friendly staff and owner! If you plan to visit Glenrose Texas I highly recommend it. It’s well worth the drive.
Some other news since I last wrote is that Lucy is officially over her addiction to her “plugâ€. We have had a few weeks of going to sleep better and not asking for or even mentioning it. Thank God for that!! Even though it was hell to go through that abrupt detox, in hindsight, I’m glad we did it now rather than right before or right after her surgery. This will make that very strenuous time a little less chaotic. Speaking of “plugsâ€, Lucy’s guardian angel has been hard at work again. She was playing with a metal slinky in the same room as me. I didn’t notice until it was too late. My vacuum was plugged in to a wall socket and she was putting the slinky on the cord, with the cord up between the slinky “ringsâ€. I’m assuming she was sliding it all around the cord playing with it, probably pretending it was a ballet dancer and then decided to hang it up near the top where it was plugged in. Ely and I were not more that three feet from her and saw this giant flash, her throw half the slinky one way and the other half the other, smoke and the wall socket and vacuum plug were completely black. The slinky was cut in half and she made such a shock that she blew the circuit breaker. I am so thankful we have the circuit breaker as she would have been much more severely injured had it not tripped. She suffered a very small burn on her finger that blistered up in the shape of the metal. Lucy was very shaken, as were Ely and myself. I quickly became upset with her as she has done this once before in her bedroom while playing by herself. That time it was a metal necklace and I wasn’t in the room. In fact, I didn’t even find out about it until I found the severed necklace and the blackened plug and wall socket. Needless to say, she had already been spoken to thoroughly about the dangers of playing with things near the plugs/outlets, but she gets very stuck in her imagination when she is playing. I think this time it scared her more, along with the shock she received from it. Hopefully, she will NOT do this again.