Update

I know some of you have been waiting for an update from the weekend, so here goes...

It was the best of times...

Saturday was awesome. The boys did so well--they really had a great day. We started out with swimming and then headed over to base ball. We had brought their trucks and I sat under a tree while they roamed around and played. The rule is they have to be able to see me (and in this case they couldn't go out on the fields while the base ball games were going on) but they were able to wander quite a bit and had lots of fun exploring. We went back to the hotel in the afternoon so they could rest--and they slept for 2 hours. :) I knew they'd be up late that night so I wanted to make sure they had the opportunity to rest, and they definitely took advantage of it. They almost fell asleep in the car on the way back to the hotel! That evening was the potluck and then they had a caller for some square/contra dancing. Zhenya decided to participate and danced with Mark and I while Dima climbed all over a wagon. The boys got to see stilts and play tug-of-war (which of course they loved). Then we all went out for chocolate nachos--my favorite part of the weekend. Everyone crashed that night (even with the extra sugar).

Sunday Mark and Paul headed out to base ball and the boys and I went swimming. Sunday morning was the first time I think they were really comfortable in the water. They were swimming around on their own (with water wings) and had a lot of fun. But when we got out, they were really cold. We went back up to the room and Dima had a meltdown. Thirty minutes later he was fine and we headed to base ball. We met up with the guys, had lunch, played on a vintage playground (in the historical village), then Zhenya had a meltdown. So during the guys' last game both boys had to lay down on the blanket next to me, and they both slept for about 45 minutes.

It was the worst of times...

The boys woke up right before the end of the game which was perfect timing, so we packed up and headed to the car. I used the key to roll down the windows (a nice VW feature to help vent your car before you get in) then we loaded everything up and got in. I went to start the car...and nothing. It didn't turn over, it didn't crank--it didn't do anything. In fact, it actually turned the clock off and reset the trip odometer. Ummm..help? Thankfully there were still lots of people around. We had several people try to jump it--with different cars AND different cables, and still nothing, although we did get enough juice to be able to roll the windows up. We caught a ride back to the hotel with a couple of the other guys on Mark's base ball team, who were kind and generous enough to offer to stay an extra day to help us out. Our options were as follows:

1-Have the car towed to a mechanic, who would not be able to look at it until Tuesday. One or all of us would stay in Columbus.
2-Rent a car dolly on Monday and tow the car back to St. Louis. One of the guys who stayed has a big truck and was willing to tow our car back, but it would have been a long ride with 6 of us in the truck.

The boys were being thoroughly entertained during this time by one of the other guys on the team and their uncle Paul. We were past dinner time and they were already tired so it was wonderful to have people distracting them--thanks, guys!

So...we went back to the hotel and I said duh! I need to get to TDIClub (I'll explain all of that in a separate post). I went online, posted our dilemma, and within an hour our mechanic from St. Louis called to see what was going on. I explained, and he told me who to get in touch with. Brian (our mechanic) was outside Cincinnati for TDIFest and was willing to drive the hour+ up to us to come look at the car, but he didn't have any tools with him. Instead, I got in touch with Glen, who lives just east of Columbus. He had also been at TDIFest and had driven back home Sunday night. He met Mark at 7:30am on Monday to try to diagnose the car--and diagnose it he did. They went and got a new battery, Glen ran a few more tests, and we were on our way.

The funny thing is that it didn't mess up our schedule at all. We had planned on dropping Paul off at the airport about 1pm and heading home after that, and that's exactly what happened. We made it home late Monday night, but the boys slept the last couple of hours in the car. And so far, we haven't seen any behavior repercussions from being gone over the weekend. If we make it to this weekend without any, this will be the first overnight trip we've taken where we didn't have a rough week afterwards. Progress!