We're back from Georgia!

My boys and I had a great time with my sister and her kids. I'm not going to go into too much detail (yeah, right) because you can read about and see what we did using the Pictures in a Slide Show link on my main page.

We headed out at 6:30 A.M. last Saturday, June 7th. The ride down went unbelievably well. You might have thought I was traveling with older kids and not a one and almost three year old! When Bryce got fussy, he was easily satisfied with a snack or a sippy. If we didn't have a DVD player he may have been more of a handful, but the drive down was uneventful...except for one little thing.

The last time we traveled a long distance both boys were in their cloth diapers and both boys had poopy diapers, one creating two stinky surprises. I have what's called a wet bag, a place where you store wet and dirty cloth diapers, but it's not a zipper top only a draw string, so with those three dirty diapers in there, my van got a little stinky. I decided to buy some disposeables and use them during the 735 mile trip south (with an hour long lunch, we made it there in 13 hours).

We were somewhere near Lexington, KY and passing some orange construction signs when Devin, still in his onsie PJ's and a disposeable diaper, says to me, 'What happened to my diaper?' I look back at him and he's holding his left leg up and pointing down and I see a big glob of poop out of the diaper and on his leg and car seat! Ack! By then we had entered the construction zone and we were going barely 10 MPH. I told Dev not to touch the poo and try to keep his leg up and I looked for an exit but there wasn't one ahead and even if there was, it would take me forever to get there at that pace. I pulled over and cleaned both Devin and his car seat up, all the while leaving the van running with the air conditioning on.

When Devin asked me that now memorable question, my van had just beeped at me, alerting me to the low fuel level. I don't know how long it took me to clean up the stinky mess, but when I got back in behind the wheel, that gas needle was almost on empty! I don't know if it was actualy construction or rubber necking, but traffic speed had picked up and I made it to an exit and coasted as much as I could to a gas station. I did not need to be running out of gas at the halfway point!

Six hours later we were greeted eagerly by my beautiful biggest sister and her giggling children and so began our week long stay in Northern Georgia!

Karyn planned for just about every minute of every day! If we weren't on a big field trip, we were on smaller outings or swimming at indoor water parks (because K'ryn didn't want us to have too much Georgia sun too soon) or just playing in the sprinkler and water squirters at the house. Between my sister and I we took quite a few photographs to remind us of this busy but much enjoyed and loved week together. I hadn't been to Georgia since her wedding back in 1995!

With two boys close to the same age in the house, there was bound to be trouble. Devn and Kyler were at each others throats sometimes, but other times they were the sweet angels we knew they could be. Both Karyn and I had moments where we had to count to 10 and remind ourselves that we love our children and that we wanted to have them. LOL

Hunter and K'ryn had some moments and although I heard Hunter sounding impatient at times, I never heard K'ryn get mad at him. I know she had motive to be. She asked me if I would talk to Hunter about not putting stickers on the faces of her friends in photographs on her bedroom wall. I definately did talk to him because that involves a lack of respect. Karyn told me on the phone earlier today that K'ryn found the letters H, U and N written in ink on the ceiling of their van. Karyn wasn't worried about it and told K'ryn it wasn't a big deal and I don't really care that the back windows of my van, and for some time the back outside of my van, had stickers all over it, but I do care that Hunter wrote on somebody else's van. I did talk to him about that.

Bryce was the best behaved of them all! I think I have Karyn's agreement on that one! :P He did make a mess when he dumped the cats water bowl all over the floor and got mad at us as we fished out some cat food from his mouth. He also made one heck of a racket when he pulled all the metal bowls out of the cupboard. Other than that, he was a happy, agreeable baby, even while being in the van as much as he was and taking his naps in strollers or on my chest in a swimming pool!

There was one short stretch in there where both Dev and B must have caught a bug. They both threw up a little bit and Dev had a bit of a fever and was ornery, but they both were fine and activities only delayed.

Devin continued his odd sleeping behavior at his aunt's house. I slept mostly on the bed (Kylers room) with Bryce and Devin on the air mattress next to us. It was a double size mattress, but many mornings Devin was on the floor and sometimes part way under the bed! On the morning we returned to Ohio, I was woken by a muffled voice calling for me and asking for help. Devin had found himself not just under the bed, but all the way across it and next to the wall. Even on my belly and part way under the bed with my arm stretched, I had to coax Dev to scoot toward my voice so I could get a hold of him and help him out! I put him back in the middle of the bed with his pillow and blanket, and the little stinker was back to sleep in minutes. Bryce didn't make a sound. I was awake and looked at the time. It was just before 5:00 A.M. I decided to finish up my packing and load the van, leaving for home earlier than planned.

Our return trip was actually delayed by a day. The plan was to return on Saturday, but the weather had other idea's. If I had left at that time, almost my entire drive north would have been in rain and thunderstorms. All the way from Georgia to Southern Ohio was nothing but inclement weather. I talked to Tim, and even though we'd be getting home the evening of Father's Day, he was fine with that. He didn't want us driving in the rain all that way either. Karyn, the kids and I had no complaints ourselves!

Karyn and the kids are heading to Northern Michigan on the 30th. We've since decided that they will come here and stay the night and in the morning we will caravan to our hometown and arrive at the grandparents house all at once! We thought about carpooling, but we each have other places to be so decided just to follow each other. Less than two weeks away and we'll all be together again! Any of you ever try to take five kids on a field trip? LOL It was fun!

Thanks for reading, now go see the pictures!

Oh, wait. Come back. I had a realization this past week that Karyn helped me to see. I've shared with you all about Hunter and his poo accidents. I didn't realize how often he was having them until now, when school is out. Whatever room he is in, it's smelly. Today he went through four pairs of underwear.

K'ryn had climbed a rock wall successfully and Hunter wanted to give it a try. He didn't make it very far, but he tried! I knew he wasn't going to make it very far because he has such low muscle tone. There's a medical term for it, a condition some kids with autism have, but I don't remember the name. Karyn and I were talking about it when it came to us that maybe that is why he's having these poo accidents. Sorry if this is too much info, but the anus is, after all, just a muscle.

I have a message in to the DAN! Doctor in hopes to gt a referral to someone who can help us with this. I had to leave a message and haven't heard anything back yet because this doctor is actually a psychologist and does the DAN! protocol on the weekends. I'm hoping it won't take until then to check her messages.

Thanks for reading.

Love to all,

Yo