Before we had children, I worked for a small construction company that took good care of their employees. We had an annual safety banquet where they gave out amazing prizes like flat screen TVs and snowmobiles and a Caribbean cruise vacation. They gave a hefty turkey and a giant poinsettia to each employee every Christmas. They awarded "safety bucks"- an incentive program with gift cards to we used to purchase a $500 video camera (which we never use anymore) and Jason's bike (which 12 years later, needs to be replaced). We had company lunches and awards banquets and it was just fun. I thought every company was so generous to their employees.
Well, Jason also works for a fantastic company. They supply him with a car (complete with insurance and gas card), a computer, a smartphone with a generous data plan. He travels and they pay for it. It's a wonderful company. But there are no poinsettias or turkeys or safety bucks. There has never been a family BBQ or dinner or any kind spouse recognition. Ever. I like to tease Jason that when he's running the show, there will at least be an annual company family picnic. But for now, there isn't much.
So when we found out that a seed company meeting that he had to attend in Omaha was also hosting a family night at the minor league baseball field afterward, we decided to pack up the family and join him for the two hour drive to the west. Jason dropped us off on the east side of Omaha at the Lauritzen Botanical Gardens then headed to his meeting. We were there for about 4 hours and had a wonderful time... mostly.
The gardens were beautiful- really so impressive for Omaha (because I'm slowly learning to keep my expectations fairly low here in the Midwest). It was hotter than we would have preferred, and the girls didn't have the best walking shoes on, but we had plenty of water and were so excited to check out this amazing new place. Emma and Leah pretended they were statues throughout the gardens, and Emma found three different heart-shaped leaves that she shared with me, "for love".
We wandered through the rose garden, the Victorian garden, the hidden stream, and ran through a heaven-sent sprinkler to cool off after a bit. Then we found the trains. Oh my goodness, these trains were amazing!
An entire village built into the hill with tracks made out of thatched branches and at least a dozen working trains zipping through the tunnels and overhead on the bridges and stopping at the tiny lit up houses and stations to pick up the imaginary people that lived inside. It was amazing- a delightful discovery in the middle of the garden. I think we all could have stayed there for the entire afternoon just to hear Noah say, "too-too! too-too!" and watch him chase them down their tracks.
After we finally had our fill of the trains we made our way over to the children's garden. The kids set up shop in the wooden cabin and launched an elaborate game of pioneer children while I studied the map to figure out what was left to explore in our two remaining hours. There were three garden workers nearby that gently scolded us for leaving the spigot water running after refilling our water bottles. Everyone was getting tired and it was getting hotter.
We had been sitting and playing and resting there for about 25 minutes when Adam came up to me in the cabin with a worried and confused look on his face. He told me that a wood chip had gotten into his shoe, so I sat him down next to me and took off his shoe to check it out. There were three small splinters in his foot- two that came out easily and one that was wedged under his skin pretty deep. I took out my first aid kit and started squeezing and digging at it a bit, but it was stuck tight. Adam didn't love that, but he was handling it pretty well. I asked him how he was doing and told him to remember to breathe deep and that it was okay to cry about it if it hurt, but he was trying not to. After I cleaned the area with an antiseptic wipe and put a bandaid on it, I gave him one more squeeze to tighten the band-aid and... Adam stopped breathing. He turned completely gray, his eyes rolled back in his head, and he slumped over onto the bench. I took his shoulders and propped him back up and said, "Adam! Are you okay? What's wrong buddy?" He opened his eyes (which were HUGELY dilated) and he looked at me with a completely confused and tired face. He swung out at me as if he just wanted me to go away so he could go to sleep and then slumped back over. I scooped him up in my arms and started calling out to the garden workers, and suddenly I could hear the words of a frantic mother coming out of my mouth.
"I need help! Something's not right. He got a splinter and I was picking it out and he just stopped breathing and I need help! I don't know what's wrong but I need help."
Leah, Emma and Noah gathered around me quickly. The workers had a small utility vehicle that they helped me and Adam into (he was still in my arms, a complete deadweight) but there wasn't any room for the other kids. Two of the workers stayed with them. My brave little Leah stood there with Noah and Emma, holding my backpack and Adam's shoe. She nodded at me when I looked her straight in the eyes and said, "I'll meet you in a few minutes. It's going to be okay." I took a deep breath, squeezed away the tears that were threatening, and we zoomed off to the garden center.
Adam started to wake up as we drove along, and the color was coming back to his face. His lips were pink again instead of gray, his eyes brown instead of black. But he was quiet and small and seemed so fragile. My little monkey man who is pure muscle and energy, who hangs from everything and climbs on everything and runs everywhere and never stops moving all day long, sat quiet and still as we zipped along the path.
Once we got inside the garden center he perked up a bit more. He settled onto a chair with his feet propped up and enjoyed a cold drink of green tea (the sugariest drink they could find) while I filled out an incident report and explained with a nervous chuckle that no, we didn't need an ambulance and yes, the area we had been playing in was clear and clean and that yes, he probably was just really hot and thirsty and passed out from the combination of the heat and the splinter.
And then the second cart pulled up and there were my other babies- also somewhat quiet and still and wide-eyed about this sudden change in plan. We all hugged and talked about what happened and just sat together, happy that it hadn't been a real emergency after all. We settled down for drinks and bathroom trips and even a show on my phone because we had nearly 2 hours to kill before Jason would be coming back to pick us up and I was in no hurry to leave the comfortable air-conditioned garden center, even if they were setting up for a wedding. But after an hour or so, Adam was totally back. Happy and chatty and leaping over cracks in the floor and asking so many questions but not really listening for the answers... so we moved our party outside and finished up the first part of our Omaha adventure.
These two huge trains loom over I-80 West as you cross the Missouri River into Nebraska. They are part of the gardens, so we hiked up the 61 steps to check them out. We were all disappointed to discover that we couldn't climb on them, but it was still neat to see them. Now we'll always see those trains with a different eye when we cross into Nebraska.
And finally, four very adventurous hours after he dropped us off, Jason picked us up and we were onto the baseball game! The hosting company was very generous- a huge dinner in an open-air suite, seats behind home plate and an ingenious kids area with carousel, bounce houses, and a huge playground set to keep the kids happy all night long. We didn't see much of the game, but still we had a great time snacking on indoor s'mores (a staple from my childhood Seattle Mariners games), posing in the photo booth, and riding and bouncing and climbing to our hearts content.
Adam was 100% back to normal by this point. He loved the children's area but also enjoyed learning how to read the scoreboard and studying the players on the field. Nothing could kill this sweet boy's enthusiasm for life.
Noah was overjoyed about his first carousel ride, and I loved watching my cute boys hold hands as they zoomed down these huge slides.
When the game was nearly over we headed back to the hotel room that was provided for us. We hadn't realized ahead of time that they were offering hotel rooms, so we hadn't planned to spend the night, but the room was a much more desirable option than driving home at 10 PM. So with no toothpaste or jammies in sight (but somehow with all of the blankies, stuffed friends and changes of undies and diapers the kids needed), we crawled into our beds, watched an episode of Full House (which Leah loved), and called it a very busy, very fun, and very memorable night.
It was a $15 trip. The cost of the entrance to the gardens was our only expense for the trip, and it was just as fun, and certainly just as memorable as the trip we took to Kansas City last month. Adam decided that we need to take a "monthly vacation"- last month was Kansas City, this month was Omaha, and next month is Indianapolis, and he'd like to know what he can look forward to after that.
And boy, if we could spend just $15 on an overnight trip to a nearby city, and guarantee that it wouldn't include any passing out or frantic mom moments, I would absolutely have to agree to a monthly vacation with this sweet family of mine. This one was a trip that we will never forget!
(And I have to add a post script about how much I adore this family picture- it is our family to a "t"- Adam and Emma overcome with the joy of life and silliness, Leah dutifully and beautifully smiling for the camera, Noah casting a suspecting and unsure glare at the cameraman, Jason smiling through his teeth while holding his breath and trying to tell the kids to just look at the camera already, and me, slightly tired, also talking through my teeth and loving every person I'm surrounded by and creating this wonderful moment with!)
