Patience is a virtue...or so I've been told

I kid you not, this is us when we go on vacation or at least it looks like it when you pack up a baby, 2 adults and 2 dogs for a week away from home. It drives the Hubby crazy! He always says we're never going to fit everything in but we always do thanks to my dad teaching me how to pack years ago. Anywhoozle, over the Memorial Day holiday we packed everything up and headed to the parentals for a week at the beach (they live in Beaufort, NC now). The night before we leave, we had a big rain storm. It had thunder and lightening, typical summer thunderstorm so I thought nothing of it. Until I woke up and realized that our brand new, pretty red umbrella was no longer on the deck...nor was it on the ground...or in the yard. So a-hunting I went. Here's what I found when I looked up:

that's our roof and it's in the top of the trees

Apparently the wind literally picked it up out of the patio table and blew it in to the trees. Here's a few more angles so you can fully appreciate how buried it was in the tree tops...

So just before we are supposed to leave Friday night, we - and by "we" I mean the Hubby - had to climb on to the roof and fish out the umbrella. Just what we needed when we're trying to pack up everything and everyone, including the kitchen sink and couch if you ask the Hubby. If you've ever traveled with pets or children, you know it takes forever to pack up everything you'll need, especially for a full week.

can you tell he's thrilled I decided to document and blog about this?

he's using a giant yard rake to fish it out of the trees

almost have it!

 And did I mention that it's about to storm and we hear thunder and see lightening all around us? And of course I keep saying, "honey, pose for the camera" and he keeps yelling "no! I'm a virtual lightening rod up here, leave me alone!" Ahhh...such love in our house.

Yeah! He got it! My hero!



Sadly it was broken beyond repair. We didn't even get to sit under it yet! Boo Hiss. We were still pretty excited about going on vacation so this didn't really set us in a bad mood, just an hour in leaving.

After traveling 5.5 hours Friday night, totally not wanting to drive another minute, we got back in the car on Sunday to drive 2.5 hours to visit my brother and his family for our nephew's first birthday party. On the way there, we stop at McDonald's. I'll spare you the details but lets just say that the Hubby ended up with human exrement on his shoes (and not the liquid kind) from a disgusting bathroom and to top it off, a poor customer service response from the staff. Now there's not much that sets the Hubby off but poor customer service is one of them. Patience...it's what we've decided the Lord is teaching us this trip...but it's not fun.

The week goes by, our little peanut (Charlie), sleeps through half of it since he wants to take an insane amount of naps all of a sudden (maybe teething?). And before we know it Friday arrives. Boo Hiss. Big sad face. Since our other nephew, Brennan, couldn't come visit, we decided to drive home Friday night so we have all weekend to get back on schedule. We've learned the hard way that driving at night is much better for keeping Charlie on schedule than during the day since he sleeps through most of the car trip (and so do the dogs).

Driving down the road I hear a *pop* type noise. Nothing was in the road so we didn't hit anything but I instantly thought "we're going to get a flat tire soon". Not 1 minute later Daniel says "I think we have a flat tire". REALLY!? I have an exhausted 7.5 month old, 2 tired dogs and a 5 hour car drive left ahead of us! I just want to be HOME!

Here's what it looked like:

I mean it's not just a flat - it's dead as a doornail. But the Hubby was fabulous and patiently got out of the truck while I held the dogs and the baby and proceeded to start the changing process.

While the rest of us watched in the parking lot (I had both dogs on a leash and Charlie sitting with me in the carrier). Thankfully we had a nice breeze or else we would have roasted. Stella was with us for a while until she lost priveleges and was banned to the truck cab where she proceeded to hop back and forth and drink most of my ice cold lemonade.

She looks sweet and innocent but don't let the looks fool you. She's pure mischief. 





Jackson and Charlie, as always were happy-go-lucky.

my child loves to have his picture taken!

Jackson is always watching out for our little peanut

But it did take about an hour to fix the tire because our jack wouldn't work right and lets face it, it's just hard work changing out a full size truck tire with a full size spare by yourself. But my hero Hubby saved the day and got it fixed up...just when my parents arrived to rescue us in case the jack wouldn't work. So they saw us off again and off we went.

Way to go honey!

So as we now have spent the last hour and a half getting gas, getting take-out, and changing a flat tire...we're finally on the road home. It literally took us centuries 7 hours to get home. At one point as we were driving down the road, I looked at Daniel then up and said "OK Lord, can we stop with the patience lessons for a little while? I think we passed the tests this week and we're tired!" The 7 hour car ride was another test of patience for me being 5.5 months pregnant.

As my grandmother used to say "every bit of patience I have, I had to learn." Guess we just learned a little bit more! And before you think we handled all these situations with ease and grace...don't be fooled. Once we got back on the road, we were...lets just use the word grouchy...and rode in silence for several hours. If you don't have anything nice to say, don't say anything at all.

Patience is a virtue...or so I'm told.

Side note: If you're wondering where the saying "dead as a doornail" comes from, as I did when I was using it in this blog, click here.