Arizona Tour '09

Three days in a pickup truck. Four adults, one toddler. Jerome, using the wrong directions through Prescott, getting on the right path to Crown King and onto the cabin in Horsethief Basin, then through Sedona and Flagstaff to our ultimate destination, the Grand Canyon. Back through Valle, AZ to see Flintstones Bedrock City and the Chapel of the Holy Dove, through Flagstaff and Phoenix and HOME! If Google Maps is correct, we traveled over 1300 miles. That's true insanity.

Animalia was ok throughout the trip, sometimes complaining that she wanted to go home, asking for her big bed, wanting to see Nanitas, or asking if we were going to see Nina. We were loaded with distractions for the difficult times, having packed several books, some finger puppets from Cayman courtesy of Britta and probably best of all, a Melissa and Doug dry erase/magnetic chalk board that Nana bought her before we went on the trip. She loved the dry erase marker and then the "cleaning" but loved the letters equally.

Destination-wise, she liked Jerome and the wrap she borrowed from begrid to protect her against the chilly air, the lovely shop called House of Joy that used to be a brothel, where she said hi to a fake giraffe outside and told him to say hi to her, reminded herself not to touch anything inside, danced to Russian music and the lady working there (the owner maybe?) asked her name, insisting that we'd see it in lights one day. She loved the cabin in Horsethief as it gave her the opportunity to run around outside with baseball bats and "soccer baseballs" and play with her miniature cast iron skillet. She also seemed to like camping, once we finally settled in at the Grand Canyon Mather Campground. We'd prepared her with the book Maisy Goes Camping and she was pretty happy to be in the tent, just like Maisy. She was thrilled to see a raven the size of a cat in the campground, saying it was the Tata bird and asking where the Aya bird was. And when she saw the Canyon itself? Daht asked her what it was and she responded that it was "a painting."

Other highlights:
At one point she was totally frustrated with driving and started asking to go to the store to buy a bicycle, a toothbrush, and eventually just "stuff." Later, on the way home, she kept asking to stop at the "dancing store." When I asked her where it was she would look around, point at a random store and say "I found it!"
"Where's your mommy?" asked Daht. "Bad boy!" she replied, "Aya's mommy is right here!"
She really bonded with Britta although she called her Brenda for quite awhile til she finally started calling her Brin-ta.
Animalia eating fistfulls of hummus in the truck. She started with carrots and when those were gone decided that she had to use her hands.
Lots of hugs and kisses for me, telling everyone who would listen that "this is Aya's mommy."

Mostly it was a whirlwind, lots of stops, lots of driving, slightly disorganized, sometimes cold. She cried a few times in the car, frustrated at being trapped, but even then I think we were all tired and frustrated so it was understandable. We were thrilled to be home, capping the trip with a car/truck exchange at Nana's and Tata's where Animalia played in her sandbox for a few minutes, touched all her things and took a shower. Then home where she was more than thrilled to see Cooper and he was excited to see her too, nosing at her every time he'd run past her.

There was some laying around for a couple hours, then a dead sleep was had by all and we're back to the routine this morning.