Summer Vacation Home.. Part 1.. AZ

Tuesday afternoon (July 20) we packed up and flew home to AZ. I wouldn't have called the flight a nightmare.... but I would have if I had been alone. 5 1/2 hours with a 16 month old on your lap and no where to go, is not pleasant. He didn't sleep at all, but he had Curious George to entertain him and a bag full of toys and snacks to tear apart. Luckily, it was a direct flight with no setbacks, so once we landed, we were home free.

Trav's parents picked us up and took us to Gecko Grill for dinner. Words don't describe how much I revere that establishment and their shrimp burrito. Heaven. Then we spent the next few hours at Trav's parents house, visiting. Reddin and Karen stopped by with their kids, so since we had quite a few of them together, we decided to share our baby news. We told them that Collin had some {tricks} to share..... we asked him where his nose was and waited for him to point to it, then his hair and ears... then we asked where the baby was! He was supposed to reach for my stomach, but he hadn't quite perfected that part yet, so we had to help him out. Everyone was really excited and it was fun to have the cat out of the bag. Trav's sister is due the same time I am so it will be interesting to see what we both end up having.

Around 8pm, we realized Collin should probably get to bed (seeing as how it was 11pm, NY time) so we headed to my parents' house. My mom is the video camera queen, so she pulled it right out when we walked in, and we figured it would be fun to again share Collin's {tricks} with the camera rolling. He didn't do so hot the second time. I think he maybe found his nose, before he was tired of "playing". So we helped him again to find the baby. Now it was official... both families knew! 

The next day was my birthday (27th, I believe) and we had plans to go to a new water park in Phoenix, Wet 'N Wild, with my twin sister, her husband, my younger sister, and mom. Well, as is quite typical in our family.... there was an incident that revealed itself that morning that prevented my mom from coming. Thanks a lot, David :) And Marcie bowed out also, so it was just the four of us! First, while we waited for Shelley's husband to get off work we decided to grab lunch at the posh, Crackers & Co. .... in our swim wear. We asked if we could sit outside, so we didn't feel too awkward.

It actually turned out to be a really fun day. With words of warning from my mother in my head about being pregnant, I very cautiously went on ALL the rides :) (minus 1) and screamed my head off the WHOLE time (quite hysterically.... I can't help myself). We dined on nummy pretzels with extra cheese and snow cones, had fun putting scary, or otherwise {special} people on each other's "teams" (thanks Rach!), and were fascinated by the modern day technology applied to the {scan and open} lockers.

On our way home we stopped in at.... can you guess....... Gecko Grill for dinner! We got the same waitress who recognized her repeat customers and made a comment about our obvious like of seafood burritos. :) When we walked in my parents house we were greeted with huge bouquets of ballons courtesy of my mom and a platter of delicious cupcakes made by Marcie..... and an empty house. But we didn't have to wait too long for everyone to show up and for our chance to blow out our candles. Such a glamor shot of that one. I had to take a picture of Marcie with the ominous sign she posted next to her treats. In our house, you can't just write "don't eat" on food... that's not scary enough.... you must make lethal threats to keep your food safe. :)

So it seems I must eat my words from a previous post about birthdays not being such a big deal. I felt like quite a big deal turning 27. It was great to spend it with my twin... have a day without the anklebiter (thanks Paula, Trevor, and Marcie!) ... scream lots, eat lots, and have lots of fun!

The next day I got to spend the morning with my peeps, Jenni and Leah. They brought their kiddos over to go swimming and have pizza. Since we only get to see each other maybe twice a year, we spent lots of time talking and catching up. I am amazed by Leah and all her {political-ness} and Jenni and all her {mother hen-ness}. The girl has 4 kids under 6. Wow. Thanks for coming over girls... I had a blast.

It was also Marcie's birthday that day, so she had a bunch of friends over that night to celebrate.

Since she couldn't get drunk, I suppose spinning in circles and swinging at a pinata is second best. I made a {better than you-know-what cake} for everyone to eat and didn't even get a piece myself because my stomach wasn't doing too hot. This is not unusual for me, but it had been going on for several weeks and only getting worse. The medicine wasn't doing the trick anymore and I was in severe pain to top it off. We were supposed to be leaving to Greer in a day and I didn't know how I was going to manage that with things going so quickly downhill. Since I couldn't go see a regular doctor (with out of state insurance) we ended up going to the ER, late that night. Of course, we waited for hours, had my blood drawn, got an ultra sound to check the baby and make sure it wasn't my appendix, and some other tests, but nothing was conclusive. They basically told me that because I was pregnant, they couldn't do all the tests, and I'd need to see a GI specialists. So they prescribed some pain killers and sent me home. I don't know what I was expecting, but I was hoping for more answers than just a narcotic. I've pretty much self-diagnosed myself with some research (just call me Dr. Stephanie) and I think I have ulcerative colitis. Does anyone have any experience or advice with this? It's in the same family as Crohn's Disease and from what I've read is usually treated with steroids or more seriously, with surgery. Yuck. It's been the bane of my exitstence for the last 10 years and I'm really getting tired of it.

ANYWAY, we got home bright and early Friday morning, around 6:30am and of course Collin was already up and ready for the day. (He didn't do too well with the time change... usually waking up between 5 and 6am. Double yuck) So my mom graciously watched him for the next 6 hours or so while Trav and I slept. That pretty much killed our Friday. The next day we left for Greer to spend a week with Trav's family at a cabin which will be the next post!

Until then, I thought it was appropriate to end with some shots of Collin thoroughly enjoying himself at my parent's house. This is Marcie's stuffed bear that he found and instantly made friends with. He'd literally attack it and then roll around on it, giggling and laughing like it was the most fun he'd ever had. If we could all be so easily entertained...