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Parenting

07th Aug 2016

Holiday Diary By Dave Moore, Aged 41 And A Half

Dave Moore

A busy weekend

Saturday

Morning:

Had friends over. 10 kids, 5 adults, 3, count ’em, 3 sets of twins. Walk on the beach, everyone swam, everyone wet and covered in sand. Home. Change. Lunch.

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Afternoon:

Pack for holidays tomorrow. Surprise the lads with tickets for Barcelona v Celtic at the Aviva. Samuel’s first game. Park at friend’s place at the Gasworks (Thanks, Stephen!), a good 15-minute walk. Took 35 minutes because Sam’s legs are small and he has to ask a question every 11 seconds. Got there. Wee time. Found our seats. Wee time. Kick off. Wee time. Met Ken Doherty for chats. Wee time. Get food at half time. Wee time. Actually fair enough. Back to our seats. Wee time. Left early to beat the traffic. Wee time. I think Sam just likes holding his pee-pee.

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Evening:

Get the lads fed and to bed. Obviously, more wee time. Continue packing. Sleep.

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Sunday

Morning:

Cross things off list on blackboard to do before this evening’s flight. This takes all morning.

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Afternoon:

Take the lads to their last swimming lesson before the pool on holidays becomes the bane of our lives. “Dad, can we go swimming?” “Sam, it’s a 4am. Go back to sleep.”

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All the wee times happened, you don’t need details. Shop for baby food for holidays. So many Ella’s Kitchen pouches. Panic pack cos we’re not ready. Bundle all 6 of us and the luggage into the VW Touran. Airport. Bags are overweight. Riain from Aer Lingus sorts it with zero hassle, and we’re off!

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Evening:

Flight is packed. We have 4 of 6 seats across one row. The lads are grand. The girls are more of a challenge. Pity the people in the 2 remaining seats in our row. They’re going to become impromptu babysitters. No. Wait. Jennifer from Aer Lingus is a winner, and she has relocated the other passengers so now we have 6 seats. Still a flight of carnage and baby-chasing and wee time didn’t come quick enough for Samuel during take-off so we had to use the “emergency pants”. Note: ALWAYS carry emergency pants.

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Touch down, collect luggage, bundle that and us into an identical VW Touran in Malaga, and we’re off to Nana and Grandad’s rural Spanish getaway. Bliss. Midnight swims. Vino. Chats.

But wait…

You see, now, it’s 2 am and I should be in bed, but a terror grips me. I’m sweating and afraid.

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And none of it is because of the balmy Spanish weather. It dawns on me. I have to face a challenge unlike any other. Trust me when I tell you, you haven’t experienced true fear until you try, in the pitch black, to climb awkwardly into bed over your sleeping wife and right next to TWO travel cots containing your lightly-sleeping twins…oh, and, once you get there, you have to plug in your phone.

Aaaaaaagggggghhhhhhhhhh!

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Still, nice to get away for a few weeks.

I am David Zachary John Moore. I am married to Tracy (who used to be Velcro Girl on 2Phat). We have four kids. We have a dog called Lorna, a lurcher we rescued in 2005. She can leap a nine-foot wall in one go. I am tired.