THE BEST IS YET TO COME.

Happy belated New Year! I wish my first post of 2014 was laden with all of our magical wishes for the new year, and our game plan of how we are going to make them come true. But truth is, we rang in the new year with the stomach flu. It sucked. Big.

This was the first year in many that our annual go-to New Years Eve party was no longer annual. The group we've been partying with was just getting too big, too many kids to wrangle and not enough spaces for everyone to sleep, so it sadly was nixed. Aside from feeling a tad like a loser for staying home, I was mostly okay with it. I mean, I didn't have to mess with cranky kids up past their bedtime, and I would feel like a million bucks come morning. Or so I thought.

As it turns out, it was a blessing we were at home, because from 11:30pm on, I rang in the new year trying to aim a two year old's vomit into an ice cream pail. That went about as well as you can imagine.

 

Seeing as Orelia had already had the stomach flu twice this winter, I assured her up and down there was no possible way she would get it again. Because really, how is that even possible? Well turns out, I'm a liar. I got to pull another all nighter as I coached her through her vicious vomiting every half hour from 9pm-5am. It was rough. Sister knew what was coming and cried hard.

 



 

We made it a whole two days with no more vomiting in our house, although the kids were not quite up to par. We did the polite thing and canceled our play dates and stayed put. I would have felt terrible if we passed this along to any of our friends.

 

I cleaned and washed and sanitized. Sanitized, washed and cleaned.

 



But that bug is a nasty little sucker, and claimed another victim. This time it took down the babe.

Seeing him sick like that was pretty tough on my Mama heart. He had no clue what was coming. But I did get a whole bunch of snuggles, so that helped.

After nursing three little ones back to health, Nick and I felt pretty cocky that we were still standing. I even said to him "I don't care if I feel like crap. As long as I'm not throwing up, I can deal." Well then, wouldn't you know, this was my view the very next day.

Man, was it rough. I just laid there the entire day staring at that dang ceiling fan. I couldn't read, watch tv, nothing. It was awful.

It's been two weeks now, and Nick never did get it. Seriously, how is the guy who never washes his hands the lone survivor?! Not fair, I tell you.

But alas, I hold out hope for this:

 

Wishing you all a happy and healthy new year, with magical dreams that come true.

xx