Since I Last Wrote...

I got in the "clutches" of the ICK!
Yep.
Stomach bug got me.
Majorly yuckish.
Then my dad went down, then my mother.
Good grief.
And yet, somehow, through this all,
Ethan remains well.

Oh me, oh my am I waiting for the other shoe to fall........

(more on the real answer to what still has me in it's clutches as soon as I can)
J

Where HAVE you Been?

Shhhh... not that I want to jinx it, but the weather here has been... better. Here is today's pic and actually I have seen the sun more this week then any other week since November. Really. I record stuff like that. So as to my long absence.
Well, I decided a whole post of excuses would be lame and boring to read.
So, I lapsed.
That's it.
However I am back now. I have a post below (be sure to read it... called "Visitors") this one to explain some of my absence. An unusual amount of sickness here lately too. I hope that the sickness is all over soon. Not sure it will be though.

So... the only other reason that I am going to admit to is that I have been in the clutches of something.
Do any of you have a guess what that is?
Just some hints of what it's not...

1. I am NOT pregnant and if any of you even THOUGHT that I want you to poke your eye with your pointer finger right now. DON'T even go there!

2. It does not involve any TV show (although Idol is fantastic this season).

3. No other "person" is involved.

Good luck with your guesses... who knows what the lucky winner might get in the mail....

PS - Happy Birthday Beckala!
Happy Birthday Tamaramaroooooo!
Happy Birthday Emma Bemma Bo Jemma!
Happy Birthday Meme!
Happy Birthday Ona!
Happy Birthday to Tyler who just turned 2!
Happy Almost Any Day Now Birthday to John's sister!
and very soon.... another birthday is coming!
(man, I know a lot of people born in early March and/or leap day!)

Visitors

This past weekend we were so lucky to have Auntie Laura (my sister in law) and Ruthe (only niece, so far anyway...) visit us here. We had a wonderful time. Now, the time wasn't without some, um... issues, but overall it was fabulous. I love having my family around. Always. Love guests. Want more (hint! hint!).

So one of the things we did when Laura and Ruthe (pronounced ruth*ee) were here was go to see Lake Michigan. At least that's what I thought we'd be doing. On the way down we spoke to Ethan and Ruthe about touching the water, seeing how cold it was, seeing if there was ice floating on it.

Okay, so we were certainly correct about the ice. If you look carefully at the picture you will see the ice floating around - it was hard to see with the naked eye, at first we thought the ice chunks were waves. It was a VERY windy and VERY cold day.

What we didn't expect was the sand/icebergs. Where you see those hills... that is usually the water. The water was so far away because of those dune ice things that we couldn't even walk to it to touch it. This is the view from the car... an overview of sorts.I think I mentioned it was FREEZING. It was actually too much for Ruthe even after we bundled the kids up like this. Ethan is just older enough (Ruthe is only 22mos) that the thrill of the sand, the rocks, the shells was enough to keep him out there. Here are Laura, Ruthe and Ethan at the edge where the ice starts. It was so cool, beautiful and strange to see this. I was awed.This last shot isn't of anyone I know... just wanted to show you the scale of the dunes of ice vs. people. You see if we didn't have the little ones I know that Laura and I would have walked out there too... but the sign saying don't cross the ice and the fact that it was cold with a whipping wind plus the fact that we would NEVER put our little ones in any kind of compromising condition stopped us. But I wanted to go... man did I ever.Realizing this is anticlimactic after the ice shots above, I still wanted to include it. This was one of Ruthe's favorite places (I believe anyway) and she enjoyed getting down with the Cheese man. The big kids had Friday off while Auntie was here and so we were able to spend the day doing fun things with them too. Turns out it was lucky we did because...

By late Friday night both Abbie and Max had the stomach bug full force. Ew. That is why only Laura and I and the two little ones were all got got to go and see the lake. Poor DH had to stay in the house of vomit. Luckily the virus was a quick one. Unluckily Ruthe was vomiting too by Saturday night and poor Laura had to fly with her on Sunday.

She wound up doing fine on both flights and now they are home safe and sound. We miss them dearly. Thought the sickness was over here too... but Max's sore throat that we thought was from the vomiting (TMI???) was actually a sign that he had something else. He has been home sick since Tuesday and most likely should not have gone to school Monday either.

So you see why there was some complications to the visit, but we made the best of it and had a wonderful time.

Okay out there - who's going to be my next visitor!!!??? Get workin on those plane flight people!!! ;)