Five years later found Seth and I spending the wee hours
of the holiday at the mercy of crowded airports, early morning flights, long
security lines, oversized suitcases, and a sick and cranky baby. The business
of having babies shifts the paradigm more than a little, and we were making the
holiday rounds this year. Not without protest. Finley and I feel roughly the
same way about holiday travel:
Although one of us did get to sleep on the plane. Thank
God for Seth, who is willing (and able) to wrestle a thrashing baby into
cherubic, sleepy submission. When I fly with her alone, it's looks a lot like this.
Finley, who had been sick with a high fever, causing an
eleventh-hour race to the doctor's office to find out whether we should cancel
our trip, turned out to be a real trooper. She was under the weather for most
of the trip, but charmed her way across the state of Missouri with minimal fuss
and only a few temper tantrums.
We at least partially credited this genius invention ("best $14 ever spent," as we affectionately refer to it) on the long drive to and from the Lake of the Ozarks.
We at least partially credited this genius invention ("best $14 ever spent," as we affectionately refer to it) on the long drive to and from the Lake of the Ozarks.
We also benefited from the reinforcements provided by Ana
& Ata, with whom Finley had a joyous reunion (reminding us just how much we
missed having them down the road). They took her beer shopping
and to the famous Versailles Christmas lights.
and she watched her share of football with Ata in the
townhouse we had VRBO'ed on the lake. (Best. Plan. Ever.)
She did, however, sleep through the epic drive-thru
Christmas lights in Laurie, as well as her walk to see the completely random
exotic animal farm.
Missouri sure delivered on the weather: it was in the
upper 30s and raining for virtually the entire trip. (After a beautiful, sunny
Thanksgiving dinner on Thursday at Katie's, that is. Which Finley spent most of
outside with Ana & Ata, trying to eat the landscaping rocks.) Poor Seth sat
in a rainy ground blind for days without seeing a single deer, while I bundled
up for balmy walks with Mom. This picture made me laugh.
But as with probably all of the families for whom I had
felt sorry from my perch atop the Pisgah Ledge, we ended up feeling like the odyssey
had been worth it. It was nostalgic and funny to see Finley crawl around with
her second cousins, as we had done with the Walters cousins decades ago. It was
indescribably special to see her point at the painting of the old man that's
been above the Grans' fireplace for as long as I can remember, and show the
Robinson side of the family her comes-by-it-honestly red-tinged hair. And of
course it was wonderful to introduce Seth around, and spend time with aunts and uncles
and cousins we hadn't seen in ages, and catch up on new babies and life changes
and do a bit of reminiscing over pie.
That doesn't mean I won't insist that my own kids (I
finally look and feel pregnant enough to think of that in the plural!) spend their
fair share of Thanksgiving holidays eating turkey sandwiches around a campfire.
But it does mean that we now understand why those security lines at the airport
are so long this time of year, and we were definitely glad we had made the trek
(and grateful to everyone who accommodated our whirlwind tour of the Ozarks!)
And, because we're on the topic of gratitude, we
celebrated Seth's third "alive day" on Friday. It was very low key
this year, but it's never far from our minds this time of year. Grateful, as
always, doesn't begin to describe it, and we feel more so with each passing of
November 27th.
We didn't take as many photos as we had intended, but
snapped these photo of the week doozies. Finley's exuberant discovery of
luggage carts,
and the devouring of one of Mom's famous cinnamon rolls.
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