A Wonderful Trip Home!

It has been a couple of weeks since I posted, and to be honest I hardly even noticed my absence from the internet.  We spent two wonderful weeks back in Washington State with our family and friends, and we are already looking forward to our next trip back to visit in March (God willing).  The following will be an extremely abridged version of our trip, though it is still really long. 

We were originally going to leave at midnight of December 22/23, but because of weather we ended up leaving a couple of days early and left at midnight of December 19/20, which was really awesome!  :)  The couple of days leading up to our departure were really hectic because of John's work schedule, finishing Christmas presents for family, packing, cleaning, etc.  In the end though, it all worked out and our friend Bre from high school (she lives in southern CO now) drove up and met us so she could ride with us back to WA.  

Highlights

*Seeing family & friends in WA!!!

*How happy Johnny was to see his grandparents all of the time

*The beautiful northwest with all the trees :)

*Our wonderful parish back home - St. Anne's - we have tried to find someplace that comes even 1/10 as close to being a good parish as this church, and we are still searching...we got to go to four masses & I was able to attend an adult education class and participate in the discussion (oh how I miss discussions on theology!!)

*Christmas & New Year's with family!

*Thomas Hammer - the BEST coffee EVER! (only available in eastern WA state)

*Getting to see my favorite doctor back home (he delivered my son) and him not charging us for an emergency visit the day after Christmas, because he is amazing like that :)

*Eating lunch at a natural food co-op in Bozeman, MT on the way to WA - we had delicious sandwiches there all thanks to Bre's suggestion!

*Everyone being spoiled on Christmas by family, especially Johnny who now has a large army of various dinosaurs

*Hanging out with a lot of our best friends from high school: Katherine, Bre (and her boyfriend Ben), Jess (and her husband Makana), Alek, and Phil

*Being surprised once we were in WA that our friends Jess & Makana were coming home for Christmas from Hawaii after all! It was a total shock and we were all excited to see them!

*A huge sale at Jo-Ann's (closing an old store and moving to a new one, cleaning out all inventory) with my friend Katherine - getting fabric, scrapbook supplies, and sewing patterns for CHEAP

* The sewing machine my grandma gave me - I have really wanted to start sewing crafts!

*Teaching Katherine to knit...and being confident enough to teach someone else even though I've only been knitting since August 

*Dinner with Khalil - a former co-worker and good friend of John's that we always enjoy talking with, especially about things like Khalil's life being oppressed as a Palestinian & human rights

*Making peppermint bark and baking cookies to hand out to much of our family and many of our friends

*The photo tile coasters I made for various family for Christmas, and seeing how much they loved them :)

*The beautiful green beaded bracelet that my aunt Christy made for me!

*Game night with friends - even when it got crazy and people were exhausted

*Lunch at the Sawtooth Grill with our good friends Stephanie, Holton, and their adorable baby Chloe

*Knitting & coffee with Anisha at the Rocket Bakery 

*A turkey dinner with the Kerns and getting spoiled with Korean candy & treats

*Coffee & conversation with my friend Courtney (newly married) at her cute little house

*Finding our wok that was accidentally left at my parents' house before we moved; John has been missing it for the past four months and has already used it to make teriyaki stir-fry for dinner last night

*Going to Madeleine's for the first time and meeting my friend Christina for some coffee/lunch/good conversation - including a lot of talk about theology (we both were religious studies majors together, what do you expect?).  Best of all we are going to start reading books that deal with religious issues and discuss one book a month via phone or when we see each other, since we both are on a break before grad school & miss the intellectual stimulation! :)

* Making 3 day tacos for my parents for dinner while we were there
*Seeing "UP" for the first time after Johnny got it for Christmas - it was a cute movie (sad in a lot of places too)

*Seeing how much Johnny's vocabulary grew & how much more independent he became with every day that passed while we were there :)

*Buying 2 bottles of Longhorn BBQ sauce for John to bring to Denver

*The ridiculously heavy & awesomely detailed world atlas/encyclopedia he got for Christmas from my parents and has since become one of his favorite things

*Eating lunch at The Scoop with our friend Katherine & getting Johnny some delicious ice cream! 

*Decorating sugar cookies with my brother & his girlfriend Angy

*Going to Reconciliation with a priest we love followed by Eucharistic Adoration with a group rosary a few hours before we left at midnight to come home (what better way to spend your remaining time somewhere than that?)

* Spending lots & lots of time with family and friends and getting to be home with everybody was wonderful and rejuvenating!  It was a lot easier coming back to Denver after having been home and knowing that we'll be going back soon. :)  Thank you to everyone who helped to make our trip a great one!

Not-so-fun parts

*The 20 hours in the car on the way there

*The 21 hours in the car on the way back to Denver

*The UTI I got from sitting in a car for long stretches of time through Wyoming and other places with scarce bathrooms (clean bathrooms were even scarcer); spending Christmas with bladder pain is always a treat...

*Our Toyota Landcruiser getting a flat tire the morning of the day before we were supposed to leave, which coincidentally was also New Year's Day so there weren't any tire places open 

* Getting in only one fight with John the entire trip and it happened at midnight of New Year's Eve because we were playing an aggravating Xbox 360 game together while we were tired (the only time we've ever played a video game together) and ended up missing out on a midnight kiss :(   

*Making a trip to Spokane to have breakfast at The Scoop our last day there only to find out it was closed Jan 1 & 2 for the holiday

* The most disgusting Denny's I've ever been in...probably the worst restaurant I've ever been in when we stopped to eat dinner in Ft. Collins with our friends Bre & Ben on the way back to Denver

*Snow & fog on several parts of our trip back to Denver

*Not getting any sleep before either of our enormous road trips and having Johnny crying & sobbing from exhaustion because car headlights kept waking him up in the middle of the night

*Packing - both before we left for WA and when we had to get ready to come back to Denver

***

All in all this trip was fabulous and all three of us had an AMAZING time!!  We are already looking forward to going back in March. :)  We left Saturday night at midnight and got to our apartment in Denver around 10pm Sunday night.  We were awake long enough for John to unload the stuffed car while I gave Johnny a bath and then we all crashed.  Unfortunately I woke up with a cold the next morning (yesterday), so I have been struggling to heal from that.  We still have some unpacking to do, but it will have to wait until I am feeling better since John has already started school classes and work again. Johnny has been doing well since we got home, though he was a little confused & disoriented with his room and the apartment at first.  The two weeks did seem like a long time, so I don't blame him - I forgot how big our apartment was until we walked back into it. :) 

Here are some of our favorite pictures from our two weeks in Spokane...enjoy! :)

 (the car ride to WA - Johnny is showing Bre how to stick 2 binkies in a mouth at one time)

  

(it was a pretty boring ride)

  

(Lookout Pass on the way there - it was rainy & foggy & super beautiful!)

 

(The 3 Crazie: Katherine, Johnny, & Bre on the way to Thomas Hammer our first morning in Spokane)

 

(The interesting things my friends do for photos in public places...Ha!)

 

(Johnny & Katherine)

 

(Katherine was twirling & dancing with Johnny in the rain)

 

(My son has a foot fetish that doesn't seem to go away)

 

(Cuddling with Bre)

  

(Hard to get a very good picture of these, but here is the set of tile coasters I made for my parents.  Pictures from top left, clockwise: my dad & Johnny before his heart surgery, John & Johnny at the ocean, Johnny & me at The Scoop for the 1st time, Johnny in the NICU when he was one day old, Johnny grinning on a swing at the park, Johnny walking with John on DU's campus the day before Thanksgiving, John & me cutting our wedding cake at our wedding, and my mom holding Johnny in the NICU the night he was born.  Each set for different family members had some similar pictures but also had unique pictures to them in the set.)

(John help Johnny open up one of his presents on Christmas Eve - it was a dinosaur.  Shocking, I know.)

 

(Johnny & his robotic dinosaur that he got from grandma & papa - John wishes he had something like this when he was Johnny's age.  That is how cool it is.)

 

(Papa showing Johnny how to make his castle do different things)

 

(I asked him to smile for the camera and this was what I got)

 

(playing with cars & dinosaurs that he got in his stocking on Christmas morning)

(Johnny playing on the slide at John's family's get-together on Christmas Day)

 

(Johnny & his great-grandma Wannie on John's side of the family)

 

(Johnny & Miyo - not too happy I interrupted their games with the dinosaur to take a picture)

 

(Trying to get great-grandma to sneak him some more chocolate cake)

 

(John helping Johnny color his menu at Sawtooth Grill, lunch with Steph/Holt/Chloe)

 

(All of us girls - still best friends almost 5 yrs after high school)

 

(Deeply engrossed in lining up Star Wars figures in The Scoop)

 

(Johnny getting kissed by his cousin Olive on New Year's Eve...a few hours before midnight, but hey at least he got a kiss!)

 

(Olive, Johnny, & Ivy - New Year's Eve)

(According to John, Johnny zones out like his mama when he's tired)

(Johnny & his great-grandpa Joe on New Year's Eve)

We hope everyone had a Merry Christmas & a Happy New Year!  May God bless you and keep you safe in 2010! :)  Love to all!