back from travels abroad

Or at least travels across the country. We had a wonderful though busy christmas this year. We spent a week in Pensacola, FL and a week in Rockford, MI. This doesn't sound like a lot when I write it down, but really it was a long time to be on the road with a 9 mth old. It was great to see as many of the family as we could. The problem with travel away from keyboard is that I don't usually journal on the road. So many many stories are lost. Here is my best recollection.

1. the sickness. Tobo picked up stomach crud from our travels and was having a rough night last night. Today has been better. He managed to keep everything down we've given him. I'm happy about this because last night was a very icky night. It didn't help that I myself was getting over freak bad cantaloupe poisoning from the day before. (also foul)
2. epiphany! Today, as well as being a certain niece's birthday, is Epiphany. With a sick little boy at home I made a run to target to get the last of the holiday discounts. It was a lot of fun, and tobo was thrilled with his gifts (photos later) all made possible by generous grandparents and great grandparents. Thank you progenitors!
3. the pot roast that I rocked Ok, this is not very note worthy, but I once again made an awesome recipe the first time by changing it. I doubt I could make it this good again. But it really was nice to have a good solid meal after 2 days of not much interesting because of stomach bug. I must say i love my slow cooker.
4. the trip Tobo was again an excellent traveler, sleeping on all the flights and goggling at all the airports. He was a real trooper considering we left at wee'crack-of-dawn in the morning o'clock for two legs of the trip and crazy late in the afternoon for the leg home.
5. while we were in PNS... In PNS we stayed again with a great short term renter I found on craig's list. If you ever need a place to stay there, please let me know and I'll put you in touch with Debra. She put us up in a very nice 2 bedroom apartment decorated in honor of new orleans marti gra. Paul told me I couldn't get a certain niece marti gra beads. I thought he was a party pooper. While we were there we hung out with my nana and mom and dad. Tobo thought that nana's walker was the best toy ever. We all trooped off to Christmas eve kids service (which, btw, with our crazy flight schedule was the ONLY church service we could get to since Dec 14 -- almost a whole month!). Tobo wowed everyone by sleeping again through the whole service. Christmas itself was a quite get together. (my mom was a bit under the weather) Tobo got a little bucket with shapes toy which he had a great time with. And we found him the most awesome $2 green ball which I think is my favorite gift. Later in the week Paul and I took Tobo to Joe Patty's to get fresh shrimp pulled from the bay? gulf? Large body of water south of town. While we waited, one of the servers held up fish for Tobo to see. We were impressed when he held up the salmon and we found that it was only 4lbs smaller than Tobo. *yikes*
   
6. before we got there... We were able to eat at a Friday's in Fort Worth courtesy of nana, who slipped Paul some cash and said "have a nice lunch." It was fun because we left so early that we got in in time for breakfast. Tobo did pretty good, though he was fascinated with our servers raider's shirt. (the hated raiders!)
   
7. while we were in GRR... We saw snow. And more snow. And flood waters. It was really a exciting michigan christmas. Tobo had better shoes than we did because of last minute bad-packing decisions on my part. The first night there was christmas. Than our camera ran out of batteries and we will have to rely on our family's visual records to recount what really happened. As far as I know, no one ever found the angel ornament, which means its out there...lurking. We were in Meijer's about a million times since they put one in in Rockford. We were able to catch the van eeuwen clan before they crossed back over to the east side of the state. It was really quite awesome to see the two little boys together. I hope roman had a good time. He was off and exploring for most of the time Amy and I hung out together. Charley made the first move but Sam almost immediately started babbling back at him. This is a first since tobo has a tendency to be reserved with other kids (and grown ups, relatives, etc.) It was just really good to see them even if it was short. We also got to hang out for a bit with clan fessenden and check out their new digs. Too bad tobo was turning into a pumkin that night. Paul spent new years day watching football with the boys. I don't honestly remember what I was doing but mainly chasing tobo around. Paul and I also got out to see the Dark Knight on our own with no child for the first time since March 08. One of my new years resolutions is to go out on a date at least once a month in 2009. I've already blocked of March and July for two movie releases. (Harry Potter and Watchmen)
8. the not sleeping...Tobo did not sleep well on this trip. To prove it, he came home and slept for 4 / 4 / 2 chunks of sleep the second night we were home. (of course he was getting sick...) Before he got sick we did two nap times of crying it out/comforting. Hard to say if we got anywhere. We'll try again when he's well. Please keep the prayers and encouragement coming on this one. We waiver. I did type up _a_plan_ and pasted it to his door. Hopefully once we get him putting himself to sleep for naps, night time will be a breeze. This sickness has proven though that he can do without a meaningful bottle for 8 hours. I think we'll be switching to water at night to see if we can curb the up all night problem. Again, after he's better.
9. the un mentioned I know there was so much more to the holiday than what I've written here. Much of the presents are coming by mail and I am overdue for thank you's, work is beginning to wonder where I am, and I should write a prayer letter for January yesterday, but all in all it was a good christmas and hopefully the beginning of a good year.