Tuesday, June 22, 2010
Dear Max,
What an exciting, fun, miserable, lonely, bonding, celebratory and exhausting trip! The "trip" started early for you and Daddy, leaving on Thursday. Your final destination, Grammie's house. Daddy's final destination, Duck Creek. I joined you, Grammie, Aunt Jali and your cousins, Daniel and Natalie on Friday up at Grammies, it was great to join the party, already in progress! We decided to head down to the park by Grammies house to enjoy the beautiful weather outdoors. It was such a fun time, running through the park, this park has a great play ground, water area and a huge patch of grass to play on, with virtually no one there. It was great! After leaving the park, we decided to have a quiet night in with the kids going to bed early and the girls staying up late for chick flicks. So when we got back to the house, we were on a mission of showers, baths and jammies. Grammie was reading stories to the three of you, when suddenly, Natalie spewed all over Grammie! She seemed to rally quickly, and made it through the rest of the night. Us gals were getting a little worried, with you still having the "runs" and now Natalie "spewing" but we remained optimistic.
Saturday, June 19th, we woke up early to get all the kids packed. You got to spend the day with Kierra, one of mommies friends, while us ladies spent a day getting pampered. We should have known things were not going well, when Grammie complained of an upset stomach and couldn't stay out of the bathroom for longer than 20 minutes. But we did what we do best... "powered on!" We were doing great on time, we got you kids dropped off, it was so wonderful to see that they had prepared for your arrival. Blocked off the stairs, had brought some toys up for you all, it made it that much easier to relax knowing you were in such great hands! Grammie, Aunt Jali and mommy had a BEAUTIFUL day at the spa. We each indulged in a pedicure, facial, an hour long massage and then a deep conditioning on our hair and a hair style. It was such a relaxing day and so fun to spend this time together! Aunt Jali came out from her massage and said, "I can't remember the last time I felt this relaxed, wait, I don't think I have ever felt this relaxed!" I couldn't have said it better myself! We felt like new ladies, it's nice to have a break and get to be pampered every once in awhile. We left the spa for an early dinner at the Pasta Factory. As we were enjoying our mounds of noodle love, suddenly, the power went off! Yup, completely dark! Good thing we were carrying some cash so we could pay the bill. Due to the inconvenience, we had a HIGHLY discounted dinner. $12.00 bucks for the three of us! Doesn't get better than this. It was time to go get you little rug rats! You were all so excited to see your mommies and grammie and we were equally excited to see you. We got home, went for our nightly ritual of baths, jammies and story time when suddenly Daniel said "I don't feel good, I think I'm going to..." and just like that Daniel spewed! Oh boy! The new total:
Max - Runs
Natalie - Spew
Grammie - Runs... wants to Spew
Daniel - Spew
This is not going as planned....
Sunday, June 20th. Father's day and we have a new total, another casualty in the night... Aunt Jali - Spewing and Running! Oh boy...so far I'm the only one to escape the wrath of this! Being that it is Father's Day, and all our Daddies are on the mountain in Duck Creek at the cabin, we had made plans previously to all drive up and have a dutch oven dinner at the cabin together. However, due to the current condition of over 90% of our household, things were not looking favorable that this activity would take place. I felt good, and you were acting fine, even though your insides were acting crazy, and I knew how disappointed your Daddy would be if we didn't make it. And in their location, their is NO cell service. We would have no way of letting them know we were not coming. I couldn't believe how scared I was of driving up their alone.
Fears included:
Driving alone with you and risking at any moment a "blow out" of epic proportions!
Driving alone in our sweet "classic" navigator, that I'm starting to trust less and less.
Loosing cell signal once we hit the "scary" part of the drive.
Driving up the mountain with a cliff on the one side!
And finally, the largest fear of them all... the final hill up to the cabin. The last time I visited, Pappa was driving and we were headed up the hill and we started to slide back down the hill in the truck. Now, all I know is if Pappa had trouble getting up the hill, this city girl didn't stand a chance!
But I "pulled up my boot straps" and we headed out. I only stopped a grand total of 3 times in 45 minutes up to Cedar City. Each stop was prompted by a "mommy...owe" and I was convinced that the "blow out" had happened. You kept it clean, however, I wasn't truly relieved...I just knew it was going to come at some point! Yet, glad we had made it past this part of the trip
I gave Grammie the "final" call before all cell signal was lost. And headed up the "cliff" I had a white knuckle grip on the steering wheel the entire drive. I can not even tell you how many prayers I said as I drove up the cliff. Oh, and I must mention, that at one point, the road had fell away along the cliff side, and I had to go into oncoming traffic to avoid a 10 foot pot hole that would have taken us over the side.
I'm pretty sure you could feel my nerves, but you remained a good sport, watching your movies and making little noise.
Finally the road came to the "valley" section of the drive. I had done it. I had gotten us up the mountain. Now, their was just that one final hill up to the cabin and we were home free. The part of the drive I had truly been dreading the most. We came around the corner by the lake, only a bit from the cabin now, and I looked up and saw the most beautiful thing I had ever seen... Daddy and Uncle Geary! They had gotten worried, and decided to take the 4wheelers down the hill to see if they could see us. I bursted into tears when I saw them and knew that my prayers had been answered. I wouldn't have to take the car up the hill. They could do it for me! Oh the sweetness!
I immediately notified the boys of the status back home. They had their own status update. Daddy was sick on Saturday and Grampie was feeling the sickness that day. I advised that I was going to head back down the hill as to not have to drive at night, but the boys agreed that if I stayed for dinner they would drive me back down the hill. They felt they could use a little civilization and a call back to the ladies would be nice.
Uncle Geary cooked us up some dutch oven potatoes and chicken. Grampie took a nap and while the food cooked the rest of us went on an ATV ride down by the lake. The boys were excited to show us where they had been fishing and spending their day's. After dinner we opened up their fathers day gifts. I had brought up presents from Grammie and Aunt Jali for their "daddy's." We visited a bit longer and then headed back down the hill. I was so relieved to have Daddy in the drivers seat. I will say, I think I surprised not only myself but everyone else that I made the drive! That's not like me! I did it for the love of daddy. He agreed, that he would have been really disappointed to not spend Father's Day with you.
Once back to Grammies, we updated the girls on our adventure and headed to bed.
Monday, June 21, 2010
Our last day in "the homeland" it had gone so fast, and certainly was not all that we had expected it to be. While our spa day was amazing, the other adventures surrounding our "girls trip" had not been what we had expected. Taking care of sick Grammies, babies and mommies is not very fun. It finally seemed that everyone was back on the mend. I decided that instead of going home Monday night, that I would wake up early and go home, driving straight to work. I would leave you with Grammie on Tuesday and Daddy could swing by and get you Tuesday night on his way home. This would give you one more day to fully recover from the "runs" It was the perfect idea!
Tuesday, June 22, 2010
Oh no! Our finally casualty. I woke up this morning, to find myself perched over the ca mode spewing my brains out! This can't be happening! I have to go to work! I have had the past 4 days to be sick! Not today! Not today! Not today! With everything I had inside me, I got dressed and ready for work. I only took to the ca mode to puke about 3 more times before heading out the door. Grammie could not believe that I was going to work. But I just had to! As I drove down the freeway, I just kept thinking...It's mind over matter. The power of positive thinking... "I'm not sick! I'm not sick! I'm not sick" Oh boy... I got to pull over, I'm going to be sick. That is when the road side met my insides and the "splatter" was the nail in the coffin. I can't go to work like this! Sobbing my heart out, I called my work, turned around the car and headed back to Grammies. I couldn't believe it! The "sickness" had taken it's final victim at the most inopportune time! I spent the rest of the day sleeping in Grammies bed. Daddy came off the mountain, not expecting to still see us in St. George. It took all I had inside me to follow Daddy's tail lights home that night. I'm still unsure how I made it! But finally we are home. I don't know if we will be up for a "girls weekend" anytime soon!
FRIDAY
Princess Natalie, so beautiful
Prince Max, so precious
King Daniel, living large and in charge
Our Evening at the Park
Playing in the water
Sometimes you were brave...
Other times, not so much. Grammie didn't mind!
After we played in the water, we headed over to the playground.
Daniel is such a big kid, he climbed all the way to the top and went down the HUGE slide
This was more your speed!
After the playground we ran and ran on the huge field, it was such a beautiful night out and so nice to have all the open space for you guys to run!
We ran and ran until we collapsed!
SATURDAY
Jali getting her hair done at the spa
Our beautiful Grammie
The girls
Later that same day...
Grammie and Daniel, so sick!
SUNDAY
You and Natalie taking a break from playing for literally one second
Breakfast Sunday morning
Enjoying a lazy Sunday, reading books with Aunt Jali
Cooper with his Buddy Daniel
Later that same day...
"It" has hit Aunt Jali
Daniel showing off his "structure" he built
Arriving at the Cabin
You and Pappa
Happy Fathers Day!
You and Daddy
Your shirt says "My dad has Super Powers"
Happy Fathers Day
Papa with his Fathers Day Gift, a route 66 shirt to wear on his route 66 adventure this summer.
You and Papa reading his Fathers Day card
Daddy reading his fathers day cards
Uncle Geary, with his scary knife
You and your daddy
Going for a ride on the ATV's
Uncle Geary and Daddy were teaching you how to start it on your own... I don't know about this!
Look at you... so focused, ready to take off!
MONDAY
Getting ready for the day, Daniel making sure the baby was fed
Playing Trains with your best friend
Making Playdough with Grammie
Daniel and his creation
Grammie teaching Daniel to read
Watching a video about Grandma and Grandpa Snow
Loving your Mommie!
Look at that farmers tan!
TUESDAY
It has finally hit mommy...maybe Cooper too, look at that!
Nevermind the phone sitting on my head, being out of work for an extra day causes you to recover attached to the phone!
When will daddy get home?
NOW! YEAH!!!
Cooper is excited too!
