A Little Christmas Eve Miracle

Mark and I loaded up the kids and went to finish some shopping. And by finish, I mean by myself something to wear on Christmas day to church. I ran in and he drove the kids around. I came out, went down a block to pick up some lunch, came out and Mark said “I think one of the kids just had an explosion back there.”  I looked back and realized Marky had thrown up. And it was all over his car seat, his blankie, clothes and it was SOOO stinky. This was his first time throwing up, other than spit-up as a baby. So we undressed him, I jumped in the back seat, we buckled him up and drove straight home snuggled next to me. Then out of nowhere, he pulled out THIS black familiar looking item ↓

My sweet little green-faced man found my long lost camera. I knew it was somewhere, just didn’t know where. Now stay tuned for day 4 of our trip. It gets it’s own post. Thankful for please-help-me-find-what-I’m-looking-for prayers being answered. And to me, the camera being found was a tiny Christmas eve miracle. And the fact that my Marky wasn’t otherwise sick.

Day 1, 2 and 3… I think

Our trip was so great. We were gone for 11 days. We visited family, friends, strangers and many parks, rest areas and malls along the way.

We set goals to get a certain distance each day. We knew with both little ones, we would have to make frequent stops. So in order to allow plenty of time, we broke down the drive to Chicago into 3 legs.  And speaking of legs…look at all that leg room.

Day 1 our goal was Atlanta. It was a gorgeous day. When we stopped for a late lunch/early dinner break at a rest area. Mark and Marky walked around while I prepared sandwiches. We were lucky enough to spend the night with my Aunt Sandy just north of Atlanta.

 

Day 2 Goal: Get through GA, TN and end in Louisville, KY

It was so great to travel through the mountains and enjoy the scenery.

Babies sleeping

Can you believe they still use pay phones? In the middle of TN? Weird.

We made a fabulous stop in Bowling Green, KY. Highly recommend the parks there. WOW. It was beautiful. In the van that night, the kiddos fell asleep so we kept going. We made it to Indianapolis, IN. Which meant we were only 3 hours from Chicago.

 

Day 3 Goal: Get to Chicago

We loaded up after a great breakfast at Waffle House and hit the road. However, we stopped at the mall in Indy to let Marky enjoy the play area and I got to enjoy some retail therapy. Too bad to one kid’s version playing meant busting Marky’s mouth open from being rough.  So back on the road.

The kids slept the WHOLE way to Chicago

Indiana was so pretty from the backseat.

And look at that cute baby. Just want to give a shout out for my little pork chop…She is 5 months old today. We’ll see about throwing her in here later.

Back to Chicago…We got checked into our hotel and hit the streets. Saw lots of awesome stuff in Chicago.

Santa’s Visit 2011 Round 1

 

Marky and Callie sure do love Santa…

and this Santa is their Pappaw.

Good News/Bad News

Remember when I mentioned my camera broke? Well, I figured out (just in time for Marky's birthday in Sept) that if I used it upside down, it worked. YAY!!! So we got some awesome video footage and everything. Then we got to use it on our AWESOME trip. We came home from our trip at ridiculous o'clock in the morning. That evening, we went to a high school homecoming football game where our niece was presented as the Junior class Princess (I'm a VERY proud aunt) and went home. After settling in from getting home Mark bought me a laptop. So I was all ready to load pics and our camera that we thought was broken but we could still use is NOWHERE TO BE FOUND. :( I'm devastated. I have avoided blogging from all the disappointment. And man, there was some great stuff on there. I'm still praying it appears. In fact, I just said another quick silent one. Now I shall move on...