home sweet home...hubby sick hubby...

the kids and i arrived home safely last friday afternoon...thank you for your prayers as we traveled almost 2,000 miles to visit dear friends. brian was on travel last week, and he worked out his return flight so that i would not have to drive the whole way home from kristi's house. it was such a blessing to pick him up at an airport halfway to our house and to be able to spend some time with him in the car while we returned home as a family! ethan and caroline were SO HAPPY to see their daddy!!!!

as soon as we rolled into town, we enjoyed dinner with my uncle, aunt, and my mom. my uncle lloyd & aunt susan have never met ethan & caroline or seen our house, and we were their last stop on THEIR road trip. we spent a good part of saturday with them, and it was so nice to visit and catch up and let them play with the kids a little bit. i'll try to post some pictures of their visit eventually (they're actually still on my camera, which is very unlike me!).

we said our goodbyes saturday night after dinner, and then at some point later that evening, brian started feeling not-so-good... by the middle of the night, he was hugging the toilet, and that's putting it mildly. poor thing! he was in bed all day sunday, which was no fun for several reasons.....1- he was sick, that's the obvious one. 2- i hadn't been at our church in a month, and i was really looking forward to being there. 3- it was yet another day of me and the kids.... i'd been missing brian for 3 weeks, and this was the first day to get to spend together, just our family... and he was stuck in bed with a fever. i did my best to suck it up and to be cheerful for everybody. but brian will tell you that i came in to check on him A LOT!!! and i'm sure it was with big ole puppy dog eyes. i was sad for him that he was sick, but i was lonely and i missed him! i'm thankful to say that he is much better and is now just battling a runny nose. i'm also thankful that i was spared whatever virus seized my sweet husband.

so it has been a busy few days since we've been back! i have SO MUCH to share... so many pictures and stories.... and brian tells me not to blog about being behind.... so i won't say i'm behind, but i do have much to share. kristi has already posted about our week together, so click on over, scroll to the bottom, and have a little bite (you'll get what i mean if you read her posts).... but save room for my photography buffet!

update 8.2.07 in response to kristi's comment:

You made it sound like it was just a sweet dream when he met you at the airport and got in the van...

She's so nice, everyone. I'm sure it was lovely to see Brian and all, but the truth is, folks, Ethan had become a human blender in the back seat. Be sure and ask her about that one!


OH MY! i totally forgot to include that huge part of our trip home in my post! maybe i suppressed the memory of the following events while driving down the road only 100 miles from finally seeing brian:

ethan: hollllllllld me mommy!
me: stop whining, ethan. mommy just stopped the car to turn on the movie for you. what a treat! now watch your movie.
ethan: mommy! mommy! hollllllllllllllld meeeeeeeeee mommy!
me: ethan, honey, i can't hold you right now. if you don't stop whining, i will turn off the mov---
ethan: blaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!

that's right, my poor little boy vomited all over himself, his car seat, and one of his favorite books... and then he did it again and again. and of course i had just passed a big cluster of exits.... can i just say that i get 5 stars for being prepared and packing a roll of paper towels in the car??? and kristi, it's a good thing i bought wipes at walmart before i left your house!! 30 minutes and 300 wipes later, ethan was almost as good as new. :) his car seat was a different story, but oh yes, i also had a can of lysol with me. :) so at least 99.9% of the bacteria ejected from ethan's stomach was killed in 30 seconds!

i am thankful that the throwup was confined to the carseat and his clothes. i am thankful that kristi MADE me do laundry before i left and that i had clean clothes within arm's reach in the back seat.i am thankful for wipes, paper towels, lysol, and a shady place behind a shady gas station to clean up the big mess on a hot hot day. i am thankful there was just one throwup episode (though he apparently passed it on to daddy!). it could have been much worse, though at the time, it seemed pretty bad.

later in the day, when he was feeling better, i let ethan feed himself applesauce in his seat, since it was already a mess... so of course he was covered in applesauce... and he had scabs allll over his legs from mosquito bites in kristi's backyard... and he had a runny runny nose... what a mess! we were almost home, and since i knew we were meeting my aunt & uncle for dinner (i know i'm a bad mom, we should've just stayed home since he threw up!), brian and i were discussing logistics for our arrival home. i casually said, "we need to give ethan a bath, right?" and brian's response was classic:

"our son looks like he's been through a BLENDER! yes he needs a bath!"

(sigh). so i guess that's another patch for my mommy scout uniform!