Good Day, Bad Ending

Saturday we went down the hill to civilization to take the kids to see the new Madagascar movie. While Jake has now been to the movie theater a handful of times now, it was our first attempt to have Jadyn sit through an entire movie. On that front, I will consider our excursion a success. Despite what seemed like a million previews and thanks in large part to our preparedness in the snack department, we were able to enjoy the entire movie. Jadyn did however, fall asleep during the last 30 minutes or so. The movie, while not quite as good as its predecessor was very entertaining.

After the movie we wanted to run a few errands while in the area but we knew after an hour plus car ride and two hours in the theater, the kids would need to burn off some energy so we took them to a park a friend had recommended. The park has sprawling paths, bridges, a duck pond and a wonderful playground. My only regret is that I did not have my camera to take pictures of the kids marveling at the ducks as we fed them chips. Then again it was kind of nice to just share the moment as a family and not have the pressure of taking good pictures at the same time. It is definitely a place I would like to take the kids back to the next time we are in the area.

We were able to successfully run our errands and were about to embark on the hour drive home when out of nowhere Jadyn threw up in the car - all over herself, the carseat, her Leapster video game and the seat next to her. What a mess! We did our best to clean up with baby wipes, a change of clothes and some random items we had in the back before crossing our fingers that we could make it home before the urge hit her again. I was hoping maybe her tummy had just gotten a little upset from the flu mist she received on Thursday. We were about 20 minutes from home when Jadyn started whining followed by another round of puking. Again, with very little available to us, we cleaned her her up as best we could and told her to try and hang on as we hurried home. Once home, she was immediately taken the bath and the carseat was immediately disassembled, hosed down and washed. Jadyn meanwhile, went to sleep quickly and slept through the night without further incident but we were not so lucky to be out of the woods yet.

Flash forward to Tuesday morning, when Jadyn woke up throwing up again only to be closely followed by Jake who started getting sick around noon. Poor Jake has such a weak stomach, I am pretty sure he puked once an hour the remainder of the day and finally was able to get some sleep around 3am. By the way, although not as sick as the kids, I have not been feeling so hot since Saturday either. So far, Joe has managed to stay unscathed but only time will tell if he has escaped the virus all together.

So that is where I have been - taking care of sick kids with the distant memory of our wonderful Saturday spent leisurely together as a family. I will be glad when this bout of illness finally passes and frankly, if we were going to get sick, this wasn't a bad week to have it happen. Soccer is over, Monday was a holiday from school for Jake, the Twilight movie comes out next week and then Thanksgiving is in another two. There really was not much going on this week. So we will take the extra time to relax and work on feeling better. I can only hope that the worst is behind us.