When last we heard...

... from our fearless wanderers, we were leaving Albuguerque and heading toward White Sands, and we did spend some time at Holloman AFB (Alamogordo, NM), but unfortunately, we were made to feel incredibly unwelcome, and were told that the kids were not allowed to go into the bathhouse (shower rooms) or laundry without accompaniment. For kids who are used to having a level of freedom, this was absolutely stifling.  C usually does our laundry, if not entirely alone, largely by himself. He was crushed to find out he wasn't allowed to go into the laundry room unattended. They actually told us that the boys were not even allowed to go into the shower rooms by themselves, and that I would need to be IN the room with them. :( Needless to say, we stayed one day and headed on south toward El Paso and Fort Bliss.

At Fort Bliss we found a large base, er, post, with an exchange that looks like a shopping mall with a huge food court as well as a Texas Roadhouse and Buffalo Wild Wings. The RV park is not actually on base, which makes me a little nervous, but that is okay, it doesn't feel unsafe. We were at Fort Bliss for but a few days, and B decided to ask for some cheese and when no one moved fast enough for her highness, she decided to get it herself, and removed the blade guard, slicing her thumb in the process.

It wasn't super deep, because, after all, how deep can a cut go on a four year old's thumb, but it was doing the arterial spurt thing and I couldn't get it to stop, so we caught a kid on the alley at the corner and asked for his parents and I asked where the nearest ER was located (because of course, parents know where the ER is). They sent me to an Urgent Care type place, that is an ER, not an Urgent Care, but this is so different from anything I'd seen before - a free standing ER. The NP who attended us, debated stitches, but decided to try the superglue method instead, because with the other kids around, I don't think she wanted to attempt needles, and honestly, it was kind of borderline whether it needed three stitches or not, so she went with the glue. Which was great. Until... an hour after we were home, she busted that stuff up, and ended up bleeding again. Being a good mom I slapped a bandaid on that and called it good. She says it was fine this morning and she has only opened it again once today.

My wounded princess

The glued up war wound

We decided that after two days of incessant rain, we needed to get outside, so we headed back to Alamogordo and White Sands National Monument. We picked up Junior Ranger books and headed to the dunes, where we had a great time sledding on the stupid little plastic dishes. I was not sure if they'd even get badges for this park, it is just so much fun. I explained to them that this would have been the trade off for staying here at Holloman, dealing with the enforcer at the restrooms, in exchange for playing in the sand all day. But, luckily during our extensive time travelling sans RV, we had topped off our Holiday Inn Rewards points (okay, hubby's points), so we decided to stay in Alamogordo for the night so we can get back out there sledding in the morning.

Meanwhile, I am still having phone issues, and it is very frustrating. I just don't want to purchase a new one, but am leaning toward a prepaid because I am tired of the junk. But I have unlimited data and that would be hard to leave. And before it is suggested, I don't do anything Walmart, so that restricts some things in the prepay arena. )sigh(