an April road trip

This past weekend I took my peeps to visit Nana and Papa in Pennsylvania. Since the older two had Friday off and Dad did not, the trip consisted of one mommy and three kids. We had a great trip there and a wonderful weekend. In the photo above, little Nora is helping pot a tree from Nana's garden to take back home with us.

Cara and I attended a baby shower on Saturday. They had the cutest place settings (to left) with the napkins bundled and tied with little pea pods made out of actual leaves and string wire. At this point, everything was going smoothly. I caught myself thinking how it was no big deal to drive seven hours solo with my little darlings.

Then early Sunday morning reality hit (as it often does) with a 2:00am wake up call...approximately 5 hours before I planned to start loading suitcases and children back into the van for the return trip. Brendan came to my room teary-eyed whimpering about how he had thrown up. I thought I must be dreaming. Everyone was healthy and happy when they were tucked into bed only hours earlier. A quick check of his sleeping area confirmed that indeed Brendan was sick...really sick. The rest of the night consisted of me holding Brendan and clutching "the bucket". Precious sleep was eluding the only driver.

The next morning—despite the worried looks from my parents—I packed up the van including premonitory buckets, bags, crackers and bottled water. We made it about 2 miles before Brendan was at it again. I dumped his bucket, cleaned and reloaded the cargo. Drive. Repeat. Drive. Repeat. Drive. Repeat. Then little Nora announced that she too was getting "car sick." I presumed her words were a call for attention...surely she didn't want to be left out of the fun. Unfortunately, Nora WAS getting sick. Minutes later "it" was everywhere with big sister Cara screaming "eeeeeewwwww". Two hours into my seven hour car trip and the puke is flying. I lost count of how many times. We were officially the Barfmobile leaving a little path from PA to OH like Hansel and Gretel, except with "tossed" bread crumbs. Then as we were approaching home base I started feeling it...not sure if it was because of the two red bulls, one diet coke and huge travel mug of coffee that I had been slugging to keep myself awake or from cleaning out too many buckets. Regardless, I never actually got sick and we made it home safely.

The good news is the stomach bug didn't last long and everyone is feeling much better now. We also have a tree to plant...a little piece of life that reminds us of the happy memories we shared over the weekend...not so much about that return van ride.