so i'll never forget: vatation

We had a short week of family vacation (or as Simon says, "va-TAY-shun"). The locale was not glamorous (Branson) but just getting away from the house and focusing on being together is the best kind of vacation for us. We stayed in a huge house with seven bedrooms thanks to someone in the church who so generously loaned it out to us for the week! Simon thought the house itself was vacation, he even called the bathroom the "vatation bathroom." Things started out bumpy with Ella waking up with difficulty breathing and a fever the first night. She'd been fighting a cold but it waited till we left town to rear it's ugly head. She spent some time hugging the toilet and couldn't decide what would make her feel better. It was a challenge in a less urban area to find Motrin and a cool mist humidifier at 3 am, but Super Dad made it happen thanks to the super Walmart 2o minutes away. The next day, we tried to make her rest, but she couldn't stand not getting to go to the pool with Simon and Dad. So, we let her do what she felt she could handle. The fever subsided and she just fought the cold the rest of the time. The kids spent lots of time swinging on the porch swing, swimming in the pool, taking baths and being forced to rest. Ella drew lots of pictures for Elijah and Anna who came along and enjoyed time outside with Anna picking wildflowers.

We ventured out with our friends who came down for part of the week, The Clevengers, to Silver Dollar City. That was an adventure, especially since our kids have ride anxiety after visiting a carnival with their grandpa a few weeks ago. Ella cried at the thought of boarding a butterfly ride that just went a few feet off the ground. All it took was seeing Isabelle Clevenger riding it without fear to convince her she could do it. Both kids ended up enjoying the rides quite a bit, except for Simon on the boat ride which was really wet. There were some middle school kids who kept spraying younger kids with the spray guns and he was horrified by their torment. (He continued to mention it to me tonight at bedtime telling me he "didn't like those big tids at the pool." That was kind of sad.

On our last evening there, the kids were at the pool and playground for a while and Simon began to get tired. When we got back to the house around 5 pm, he laid down on the couch and fell right to sleep. Turns out he had a fever. He slept for 15 hours that night! When we got home, we took him to urgent care and he's on antibiotics for infected tonsils and ear. So...the vacation was chock full of virus trouble, but it was still a blast. We all relaxed, saw friends, celebrated Elijah's 21st birthday, played outside and I didn't worry about cleaning, laundry or loading the dishwasher.