Puke, Turkey, and Gratitude

I hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving! We're getting back into the swing of things after a less than ideal break, but it certainly wasn't all bad. 

To begin this post, I want to show a paper Bren brought home from school the day before break began:

And, this is one Brianna brought home. I thought they were both so nice!

The week of Thanksgiving, the kids had school on Monday and Tuesday. The Friday prior to this, Bren had been sick with a stomach bug. It was fairly short lived, but he threw up quite a bit in a 12 hour period of time. There were 9 other kids from Bren's class alone that had the same junk, so I was definitely expecting that at least part of the others of us would catch it. On Tuesday before Thanksgiving, Brecklyn had some diarrhea, but never threw up. By Wednesday, I assumed the rest of us were in the clear. 

You've probably already figured this out by now, but I was wrong. WRONG.

Chris took off work the Wednesday before Thanksgiving, and we spend most of the day putting up indoor and outdoor Christmas decorations. This was our year to spend Thanksgiving with Chris's side of the family, and they always observe the holiday on Friday. Mom and Dad were spending Thanksgiving with Lisa's family, so we planned to spend Thursday at Lisa's and Friday at the Homestead. 

Thursday morning, we all got up and ready for the day. Brooke complained several times that her tummy was hurting, but it didn't really register with me that maybe she had the stomach bug. However, when I look at the pics I took of the kids before we left the house to head to Lisa's, I can see that Brooke's eyes look like she's not feeling well :-(.

They are all still cute, though!

All of my kids make a very distinct sound right before they throw up . . . like a little warning signal. As we were driving to Lisa's house in the van, Brooke said again that her tummy hurt. About a minute later, she made the sound. Chris and I immediately looked at each other and started scrambling for the puke bags we keep in the van. I handed it to her, and she threw up almost immediately. Sigh.

Chris pulled the van over, emptied the bag, and I put it in a spare Wal-mart sack I had in the glove box. We were only about 7 minutes from Lisa's house, so Chris offered to drive us to Lisa's, drop us off, and take Brooke back home for the day.

Brooke knew that she was going to miss out on the day's festivities, so she immediately began telling us how she was not sick. She was so emphatic about not being sick that it brought tears to my eyes. I was so sad that she and Chris were going to go back home, and I was so sad for her because she so badly didn't want to miss it. And honestly, I'm just exhausted of having sick kids during vacations, trips, holidays, etc!

Chris dropped Brecklyn, Brenson, Brianna, and I off at the Earl's, and headed back home with Brooke. Brecklyn was so funny without Brooke . . . we could all tell she felt out of sorts without her partner in crime!

The rest of us enjoyed a delicious meal and a nice afternoon together visiting and playing a few games!

Bren and Momma

Brecklyn and Aunt Lisa

Brianna and Chloe Jo

G-Jo and Brecklyn

Russ getting ready to grub on some pie!

Our typical holiday meal protocol is to eat our big meal around noon or shortly thereafter, then have dessert a few hours later (simply because we're all too stuffed to have dessert immediately). When we were all getting dessert, Russ opened the microwave to reheat some coffee and found that we had left the green bean casserole in there UNTOUCHED! Haha . . . I guess we didn't miss it! (For the record, we don't cook any food for our Thanksgiving dinner in the microwave . . . we were just using it as a place to store the casserole until we were ready to serve the meal.)

My kids love my sister's cat, Thisbe. I'm not sure the feeling is mutual, lol. 

The weather was beautiful, so the kids were able to spend most of the afternoon playing outside. This was good for all of us!!!

Meanwhile, poor Daddy was stuck at home catching puke all afternoon :-(. Brooke was so sad - and at times just plain MAD - to miss out on family time. I did fix him a big plate of food that Dad and Russ drove over to him after we finished eating. 

Chris is pretty much never home by himself or with just one or two kiddos, so he took the opportunity to be productive while Brooke rested. He made some shelves for me in the attic to get a few things out of the way. Yay!

Grampy drove us home around 7:00pm, and poor Brooke was already asleep for the night. Brecklyn couldn't help herself and climbed right in bed with Brooke to give her a hug. Then she said, "Brookie, I missed you so much!"

Brooke threw up several times (probably about 10) over a 12 hour period, just like Brenson had done. Although she wasn't throwing up any longer, she was so exhausted that I decided to keep her home on Friday, as well. This time, Chris went with the other kids to the Homestead to celebrate Thanksgiving while I stayed home with Brooke.

We had another day of gorgeous weather, so the kids spent most of the day outdoors again. They love the tire swing at Meme and Papa's house!

Brecklyn and Brianna

Brianna, Brecklyn, and Brenson

Brenson (on a different tire swing)

Chris, Brenson, and Papa

Brianna doing a little bike riding

Zeke, Abby, and Brianna

In addition to playing outside, the kids also helped Meme put up her Christmas tree.

And, Abby and Brenson spent some time target practicing (with adult supervision, of course!)

Brenson loves to shoot . . . he couldn't wait to tell me allllll about it when he got home!

My kids always love playing with their cousins, and this makes me so happy!

Zeke, Abby, Brianna, Brenson, and Brecklyn

While they were all having a fun day at the Homestead, Brooke and I had a leisurely day at home.

We watched a couple movies, napped, and I even spent a chunk of time wrapping Christmas presents since I have the majority of my shopping finished!

Chris and the other kids got home around 6:00pm, and we all relaxed and went to bed fairly early. Our plan was to put up our big Christmas tree and finish decorating the house for Christmas on Saturday morning. Sadly, those plans changed when I woke up at about 4:00am with the tummy bug. UGH. It hit Chris about 10:00am, and we were both miserable. Brianna was doing a great job being "in charge" of everyone while Chris and I both tried our best to parent from the bed/couch. THEN, Brianna came down with it around 4:00 that afternoon. The younger kids were pretty much left to fend for themselves at this point! Thankfully, they can all be mostly trusted to make good choices, take care of their business, and even get food for themselves. 

Just like with Brenson and Brooke, the misery lasted about 12 hours for each of us. Mom and Dad - who had been staying at Lisa's - ended up going home on Saturday morning because Russ and Chloe also had it. There are some things we wish weren't shared so easily! We spent Sunday at home taking it easy, trying to recover from a rough Saturday.

Although the break definitely didn't go as we had planned, we were all thankful to be feeling much better and ready to start the week on Monday. The bug was pretty brutal, but we're grateful it was short-lived. And, we didn't have to completely miss all the time with family! There are always things for which to be thankful!