Wednesday, November 30, 2005
Cruise Preparations: Expecting the Unexpected
We leave for my parents' 40th Anniversary cruise in a few days. This is our first cruise and we're still finding last-minute things to take care of.
Some of them, like a rushed trip to the vet to get Biscuit's bordatella shot current so we can board her at the kennel, would have needed to be done for any vacation. Others -- like digging through boxes last opened when we moved here, looking for notarized copies of birth certificates and/or passports -- are kind of cruise specific.
Last Saturday, when the boy crawled in bed with Dina and me at 4am, we figured out another thing we had to handle before the cruise. Phil will be sharing a room with his three cousins on the trip. Dina and I will be a room or two away. The 4am visits needed to stop. So we're bribing the boy with Hot Wheels.
Long-time blog readers will remember we used this strategy to keep Phil in bed when we took the side rail off his crib. Thankfully, Hot Wheels behavior modification still works. Phil stayed in his bed the last two nights and earned a Hot Wheels car (he's allowed to get up and pee, but he has to go back to his own bed afterwards). If he makes it through the next three nights he gets another.
Some of them, like a rushed trip to the vet to get Biscuit's bordatella shot current so we can board her at the kennel, would have needed to be done for any vacation. Others -- like digging through boxes last opened when we moved here, looking for notarized copies of birth certificates and/or passports -- are kind of cruise specific.
Last Saturday, when the boy crawled in bed with Dina and me at 4am, we figured out another thing we had to handle before the cruise. Phil will be sharing a room with his three cousins on the trip. Dina and I will be a room or two away. The 4am visits needed to stop. So we're bribing the boy with Hot Wheels.
Long-time blog readers will remember we used this strategy to keep Phil in bed when we took the side rail off his crib. Thankfully, Hot Wheels behavior modification still works. Phil stayed in his bed the last two nights and earned a Hot Wheels car (he's allowed to get up and pee, but he has to go back to his own bed afterwards). If he makes it through the next three nights he gets another.
Mikesell
