Island Park, Idaho Day 1 – Packing

With that said, in my personal life, Mountain Dad is still responsible for the traditionally male roles of car maintenance and heavy lifting. I didn’t realize that I took him for granted in those areas until this last weekend when I was expected to do fill his role as well as my own.

This last weekend we went to Island Park, Idaho for a snowmobiling vacation. The way things worked out I was in charge of packing up clothes, food, snow gear, snowshoes and the snowmobiles and driving the truck and trailer through the Salt Lake City airport to pick up Mountain Dad. Friday I spent most of the day doing laundry, finding outfits, matching gloves, and loading everything into the truck.  It is shocking how much stuff we needed, but after meticulous planning I was sure that I had thought of everything.

While taking the seemingly endless trips back and forth to load up the truck life plummeted into chaos. On one return trip I found little g crying and Big E half naked.  Apparently he had peed his pants and when it was suggested that he put clean pants on he refused.  Little g could not believe that I had deserted her and was loudly complaining about it.  My sister-in-law Chelsea was there helping to feed, clothe and comfort them and it was still chaos. Because of the time constraints I did what I often do in these situations – ignore the madness and complete the task at hand.  Luckily Chelsea is a competent feminist woman and got things settled.

I finished loading the truck and turned to the most intimidating part of the day, hooking up the trailer.  Normally I am Mountain Dad’s assistant in this particular task.  He drives the truck in reverse, carefully lining up the hitch with the trailer attachment while I stand there waving my hands at him to tell him which way to go.  The last time I drove the truck with a trailer I ended up jackknifing the thing and paying for body damage so, needless to say, I was a little nervous.

I had asked a neighbor to help, and was grateful I had since I couldn’t even unlock the trailer lock.  It apparently requires a special wiggle or twist of the wrist that I get to impatient to handle.  Once the trailer was unlocked and the tire chalks removed I cautiously drove the truck into place.  My first attempt left the truck and trailer a good three feet apart.  My second attempt blocked the road, much to the concern of oncoming traffic.  My third attempt luckily was successful and my neighbor helped me lock the trailer onto the hitch.

There I was with the truck bed packed, the trailer hooked up and everything ready.  I had planned and prepared and felt a surprising sense of accomplishment for having loaded up everything without my husband.  It was hard and I did it!  I was awesome!  With kids in the car we took off to pick up Mountain Dad at the airport and begin our awesome adventure.  Big E and little g fell asleep fairly quickly and the ride was going swimmingly.  It wasn’t until I picked up Mountain Dad that I realized that I forgot a very important item – night diapers for my three year old.

So much for my feeling of accomplishment. We ended up stopping at Walmart in Blackfoot, Idaho.  Oh well, one extra stop is worth not having an extra week’s worth of laundry and a suitcase that smells of pee.