Well, you gotta know that I'm jealous that you can do a trip with your mom! Keep on thinking about inviting myself along. I figure since YOU are nice and sweet and don't think I'm obnoxious, then your mom must be awesome too, and maybe she would like to adopt me.
Well Molly, I hate to say this because I know it sounds really bad, but I am nervous as all get up about bringing my Mom. She has always been "quirky" to say the least, but as she has aged, she has gotten more so! I hope that she will actually be able to relax and go with the flow and enjoy the time with the kids. I think she will, and if she does, we will have a wonderful time. If not, then I will take a deep breath and be tolerant, and still we will have a wonderful time. I have to be careful not to talk politics, and not to really have opinions as she tends to be very argumentive for the sake of arguing, really. Drives me batty I tell ya! I wouldn't mind so much if I thought it was because she really believed in something, vs. just enjoying stiring things up somehow. But, I am really trying to focus on enjoying my time with her, because I know she won't be around forever, and her sister has early onset Alzheimers(sp?) and you just never know what is coming down the road, so I am just seizing the moment. I would truly share my Mom with you in a heartbeat, but I'm not sure it would be that good for you You know, there are those kids that only a Mother could love? Well, there are also those Mother's that only a kid could love...
The trouble is that nearly everything in on my must do list.
I have that same problem!
If you've never had a passport, then you all are first time applicants, and must apply in person. We went to the post office for E, since kids always have to be done in person (after making sure which POs do the passport stuff).
Unless you're renewing you are charged the passport fee AND an administrative fee.
For people 16 and over,
right now, before the 13th, for the passport book, it is $75 and $25.
For kids under 16, it's $60 and $25.
On the 13th, it changes.
Adults (aka 16 and over) = $110 and $25
Under 16: $80 and $25
I was approaching two deadlines. You have 15 years from the issuance of your passport to renew. That 15 years is up on the 25th of July. The discount on renewing is that you do it by mail, and aren't charged that administrative fee. And then if we'd done it after the 13th, it would have gone up more b/c of the fee change.
If you can get everyone's birth certificates, your IDs, get the forms filled out AND manage for you and hubby to take an hour or two off work either today or Monday so you can get in and get the kid's applications in, it might be worth it (if you can swing it, of course). I know that I REALLY miss Canada! It's *right there*, and of course it's closer for you! But I also want the option of the world, which is why I didn't just do the more limited passport card. Since we haven't been able to use Robert's ff miles on this Disney trip (yet), they might just sit there, waiting to be used by me and E to follow him some place fun!
There is also the passport CARD, depending on your travel plans:
...and then he doesn't go anywhere!!
He had some things that couldn't be trusted to the moving company, so I'd picked them up and today brought them back, and we got to sit and have a coffee off the public space of his building (we weren't allowed to his actual offices today).
Fremont. We have friends that just found a rental house up there for just about what we're paying on this condo. If we lived there, Robert could buy a bike and get to work that way. (knock wood here that all remains the same OR better in a good easy no company changes or work changes unless he initiates them way) And I'd have a PCC. 
Maybe we've been too often in the last 4 years. 
