Two weekends ago, I spent 48 hours straight on the couch while Joey took care of the girls in his always capable, super Dad fashion while I suffered through some weird stomach virus and the nausea that went along with it. Hoping it was behind us, we spent last week in our usual routine of play dates and trips to friends' houses, and prepared for an eagerly anticipated wedding of a dear friend of mine (who I've known since I was 10!) in St. Louis - and looked forward to seeing my family again. On Friday night, weather between Nashville and St. Louis was downright awful with gusting winds, pouring rain, and low temperatures - and so my paranoia of taking my 3 favorite people in the world on potentially icy roads for 5 hours straight, in the dark, got the best of me and we decided to stay in Nashville Friday night and leave early Saturday morning to make it just in time for my friend Joelle's 2:00 wedding.
In hindsight, that was a good decision to stay for many reasons - as I awoke to Margaret screaming at 3 in the morning, grabbed her out of her crib, tried consoling her in our glider...and noticed an odd smell. I took her out in the hallway, and sure enough - she's covered head to toe in her own vomit. The night went downhill from there - as the poor girl threw up for 3 hours straight, and after multiple clothing changes and clean-ups, she fell asleep exhausted and drained.
The next morning, we gave her a very necessary bath and made breakfast...at which point Joey started feeling not so right, sealing the decision to stay in Nashville. He ended up catching the same virus, as did Anna, and luckily I remained standing and spent the weekend doing a lot of laundry, clean up, and baby/husband care, while I watched them all suffer and couldn't do much to help anyone.
The good thing is - everyone's feeling better, so we have so much to be thankful for - and that was a much needed though painful reminder to all of us to not take good health for granted. And despite the rough weekend spent entirely indoors, as well as a missed wedding of a dear friend - there were some funny moments. Like listening to the girls newfound love for animal sound impressions (their elephant and tiger are the funniest, and when I ask them what a dog says, they strangely pant instead of saying "woof"). Or watching them and their fixation with picking out their clothes - the recent obsession is wearing patent leather shoes and winter hats around the house, which makes for an awesome fashion statement.
By Monday night, everyone seemed to be feeling back to normal, despite the girls' runny noses and Margaret's molars coming in, which are causing some pain for her. Just before their bedtime, Joey put on some music in the kitchen and we had a very goofy, spur of the moment family dance party - basking in the euphoria of feeling great again. I am so grateful to be surrounded by so much love and laughter.
