We just returned from an eight day trip to visit Christopher’s family in Texas. It didn’t go exactly as planned. Allow me to (briefly) elaborate on the first six days.

* Annabelle had the worlds worst blowout as we were pulling into the airport. Never had she ever done such a thing. Christopher stripped her down in the parking lot while I attempted to clean her car seat, gagging the entire time.
* She choose sitting on my lap on the plane as the perfect opportunity for her first time to throw up all over herself, the seat, and me. I walked through the airport smelling like a garbage heap and not looking much better. I had no pride left.
* She had two more blowouts on the way to the hotel.
* Vomit City, USA
* Christopher and I were hit with the same cursed virus.
* She lay on the hotel bed calling for her Memere and saying “tummy, tummy” over and over.
* We visited four (count them- 1,2,3,4) urgent care centers/er’s because she kept getting sick, having blowouts, burning with fever and barely eating or drinking. I was so worried she was dehydrated. On the way to the last hospital I told Christopher that I wouldn’t leave until they gave her an iv. The doctor refused and the only thing that kept me from hurling the stool at him was that I was holding the sick baby. Five days later and I’m still so mad at him.

All I wanted to do was curl up and take a 72 hour nap.

But it certainly wasn’t all poop and puke. We went swimming and to the playground with the cousins and to a candy store Christopher visited when he was little. We spent a few hours at the beach.

Annabelle’s grandmother and aunt had a little Hawaiian birthday party for her. She was somewhat of a stick in the mud the whole time but I thought it was the sweetest.

Our fourth anniversary was on Wednesday. The traditional four year gift is fruits and flowers we thought it appropriate to visit a botanical garden (which turned out to be a rainforest as hot as the surface of the sun) and aquarium. We were childless and carefree, just like back in the olden days of early 2014.