The travel agency handling the Cancun trip sent some documentation with flight times and some info, and it said we should have current passports, and if not you need to take a bunch of stuff like your birth certificate, drivers lisence and marriage certificate. So, I decided I’d better get a new passport (International traveler that I am.) Neither Ryan nor I could find or remember where we’d filed our old passports, but he eventually found both of them. His had just barely expired and mine had been expired for 6 years. An hour at the post office and $350 later, we’d completed our passport applications.
My advice to you–get your passport, or if you have one, renew it before it lapses. It will cost you SO MUCH LESS if you don’t have to expidite it. The regular processing takes 6-8 weeks, so if you need one before then, they hit you with almost double the cost to get it in 2-3 weeks. So be like Sandra Bullock in “While you were sleeping” and get your passport, even if you have no plans of traveling. It’s good for 10 years, and chances are you’ll need it in the next 10 years, right?
After torturing my two small children in the post office for a long wait in line, we got out of there. They hadn’t been bad, but they hadn’t been especially quiet, either. They had found three other children whose parents were also waiting in the long long line and started playing hide and seek. Not much of a challenge when there’s a bench, a display and your mom to hide behind, but they still had fun. After I left with the kids, Ryan stayed back to talk to a cousin of his who was there at the post office, and he overheard a very large man say rudely, “I didn’t know this was a nursery.” Well, excuse me, mr. Large man, but what else are the kids supposed to do while moms wait for an hour in line? Maybe you don’t have children, or have never been around children, but those kids were behaving pretty darn well considering the circumstances. As long as they aren’t screaming or hitting you or throwing up on you, why don’t you give those kids (and their parents) some slack?!
I wasn’t actually there to overhear the rude comment, because I was on my way to the library, where we got a much better deal. For a mere $2.60, we were able to check out two DVD’s, a VHS movie, about 24 books, and 3 CD’s. It would have only been $2 had I not had a fine, but since the Library is not in my own little city, I have a hard time getting things back in the required time, and most every time I go in I have some kind of fine. Oh well, I consider that part of the price of checking out books. My kids were so happy to get new books, and when I got them all home it was a sight to behold–all of my kids sitting and reading new books. That’s what I call a bargain!
Tom and Simon are going to the Bahamas for Spring Break and I am in the process of getting Tom’s passport and all three kids done. Since both parents must be present to obtain a minor’s passport it’s taking us an extra long time to find time for both of us to be present.
Today at church, a lady who was visiting to watch her granddaughter in the Primary program said very loudly, “This is the loudest Sacrament Meeting I have ever attended. In my ward, the kids aren’t this loud.” I almost turned around and said, “Well then, would you please attend YOUR ward.” It is like people forget how little children are!