I've been meaning to catch you up on this last vacation for several days now, but I was so annoyed that I couldn't post video that I stayed away from blogger for awhile. Plus, the kids are still at home, so I don't have a lot of free time to tell stories. Luckily, Sarah goes back tomorrow and Andy starts on Monday, and then life will get a little more scheduled and back to normal. Thank Neptune! That still sounds weird, April.
Anywho, our second vacation was to Myrtle Beach. We got home on Thursday evening from Estes Park, I did laundry and packed on Friday (with a short trip in to see Sarah's therapist because her new braces were causing enormous blisters on her sad little feet), and we were on a 12:40 flight to Myrtle Beach on Saturday. The packing wasn't really that bad. I had already set aside clothes for the kids when I was packing for Colorado, so I just need to pack myself (Charlie packs for himself) and repack things like shampoo, hair dryer, etc. that were already near the bags. Somehow, even though we finished packing early for once, we still managed to stay up until midnight. We suck that way. We just can't go to sleep because the kids aren't around to bother us and it's the only time we ever get to do anything for ourselves. Every time we go on a trip we say that we shouldn't stay up late the night before, because we get really cranky with the kids when we are lacking sleep and that does not make for good flying, and yet we do it anyway. This time it really came back to bite us in the butt.
We had been asleep for about 30 minutes when Sarah started crying in her room. Charlie went to check on her and then brought her into our bathroom. It seemed like it was taking forever, much more than just a trip to the potty, so I got up to see if everything was okay. Everything was definitely not okay. Sarah had thrown up all over herself in her bed and then a couple of times once they got to the toilet as well. Charlie was in the process of getting her into new pajamas and cleaned up. I went into her room, stripped the bed, started a load of laundry and then came back up to see what I could do to help. We got Sarah situated on the futon in our room and not 30 minutes later she threw up again. And again. And again. More laundry and new pajamas. I'm not sure when she stopped throwing up, but it was probably around 3p. I can't even remember if I got up with the baby at some point in the adventure, but knowing how she was sleeping during that time period I'm sure I did that as well.
We were finally all back asleep when Andy came into our room around 5 a.m. He said his stomach hurt and he thought he might be hungry. Uh oh. We gave him some soda crackers just in case, but within the hour he was throwing up as well. Super. What a great way to start a trip. We called to pediatricians office as soon as they opened (thankfully they have Saturday hours) to see what we should do. I know it sounds funny, but our kids never throw up. Seriously, NEVER. In Andy's seven years of life I think I can count on one hand the number of times he has thrown up and before that incident Sarah had only done it once. So, we weren't sure what we needed to give them, if they needed to come in the office, if they were contagious, if we could still travel. That was the big question. Could the kids get on a plane to Myrtle Beach that day and would they contaminate all of our friends once we got there. The nurse assured us that as long as we washed our hands carefully and frequently that it was only a 12-24 hour thing and they wouldn't give it to anybody else. She also told us that after the vomiting using comes diarrhea, so watch out for that.
So now the decision was, what to do. This was our first family vacation in months. We were meeting our friends and didn't want to miss out. We were paying a lot of money to stay at this house and we wanted to make sure we maximized our money spent, and trying to reschedule our flights and car was going to be a super mess. We waited around until 10:30 a.m., the kids were keeping everything down, in fact Sarah was pretty much over it by then, and decided to go for it. Probably not the best parenting decision in the world but we were kind of at a loss of what else to do. Andy threw up two more times that day. Once at the airport lot where we parked, and once on the plane. He really was a real trooper. We made it to Myrtle Beach without anymore issues and thought we were done with it.
That night, we went out for Mexican food. I'm sure you can guess what happened next. Not the kids, me. I started feeling bad on the way back to the house, and by 10 p.m. felt awful. Charlie was sweet and tried to help but there wasn't much he could do. Let's just put it this way, I didn't have to worry about any calories from that meal or anything I had eaten for the previous day or so. The next day I felt gross and weak all day, but I didn't get sick again and the kids were back to normal. So, it seemed like it really was a 12-24 hour thing and then gone.
We enjoyed a trip to the beach on Monday. Amanda was a maniac. We've never taken her to the beach before and she absolutely loved it. She kept crawling towards the waves and wasn't afraid of the water at all. I got a great workout chasing after her. Andy and Sarah had a blast as well, and enjoyed playing with Amanda on the beach and making sand castles with Charlie.
The guys golfed on Tuesday and we just hung out around the house, and the girls got the afternoon off on Wednesday to go to the outlet malls. I don't know why I love going to the outlet malls so much, but I do. When we finally got home from shopping, Charlie wasn't feeling well. He didn't get sick, but he had a migraine most of the afternoon and went to bed early. Of course he was okay to golf on Thursday, so he bounced back, but it still was a little nerve wracking. Thursday night, however, the craziness began. Jason was feeling awful and went to bed super early. The next morning, we found out that he was feeling better but his wife, Lisa, had gotten sick. Then, April told us that her husband, John, and kids were all throwing up all night long. Ugh. The only people who never got sick that week were April, Amanda, and Jason and Lisa's little boy (who is six days older than Amanda), Joshua. What a crappy week. I was really worried that we had gotten everyone sick, but come to find out John was sick for several days after we left, April ended up getting a fever and a headache for a few days, and their daughter, Anna, had a couple days of fever and a rash all over her body. I don't think our 12 hours stomach flu four days earlier gave them that, or at least I really hope not.
So, overall we had a good time in Myrtle Beach this year, as well always do with our friends, but it was very weird from previous years. One of the families couldn't make it, everybody got sick, we didn't stay up late and drink and play crazy games like usual because nobody felt up for staying up late, and I didn't gain any weight. I always gain weight at Myrtle, but if you aren't drinking and eating junk late at night and lose a couple of pounds purging yourself of all remnants of food at the beginning of the trip, it's a lot easier to keep the pounds off. The one positive thing is that we weren't as sad to come home this year. Plus, our friends are coming to visit in October, so we have something to look forward to.
Hopefully next year we will be back on track and our 11th year at Myrtle will be one worth celebrating!
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