The Long Journey...from you know where Part 2

To continue the story about our recent trip to Florida....

We woke up Friday pretty exhausted from the day before. Noah was still sick but wasn't sweating anymore...he fever had finally broken.

We called the front desk to ask about the Contenintal Breakfast. The conversation went like this,

"Hey, we were just making sure that breakfast was complimentary>"

"I'm sorry, sir, it's not."

"Well it was last night when we called."

"Oh actually yes it is. come get some vouchers."

We ventured down into what seemed a twilight zone of all the Floridians bundled up like snow bunnies...inside. Our waiter was a flaming, middle aged, and very UNstylish man who called Barclay sugar one too many times. We ate as retiree after retiree came up to our table to comment on what a cute baby we have. We have mastered the art of acknowledging their presence and what they are saying, enjoying our meal, and having a conversation ourselves:-)

It was at this meal that Barclay smeared banana ALL over the pants that I had decided would last me about 3 days...

We then get ready for our day. I realized the foolishness of packing last minute. I had forgotten any type of sweater or jacket...and it was FREEZING. I also had packed pretty much no pants and no heels for my dress.

We drive around and get fitted for Noah's tux since he was an usher. We then went to hang out Joel's (the groom) new house. Bachelor pad very vividly describes this place. And pretty much the most unbaby proof house ever. The living room had 4 fold up soccer chairs and a card table. The rest of it was covered in wires which created the great electronic man idol. Several video game systems, and a projector. There was also stairs and cold tile flooring.

It is so exhausting watching a baby in a non baby proof house! After a couple hours there...and some very delicious Cuban food from down the street. We went to pick up the tux, and I had to drop Noah off in front of the hotel, he ran up to change for the rehearsal. He got in and I dropped him off at the church. The church is a huge mega church which is bigger than my college campus. It then took me 25 minutes to figure out how to get out of the church. By the time we got back to the hotel, I'm feeling really lightheaded, and the baby is crying. I then proceed to get dressed for the occasion with my very random and mismatched choices. Then we go back to the church and I attempt for 15 minutes to find the restaurant on campus (it's one of 3).

The rehearsal was lovely, but around 8 pm, Barclay was tired and fussy. We finally left and I was feeling worse and worse. We get back to the hotel and thankfully Barclay goes down right away and I can go to sleep.

Noah sleeps with me for 1 hour then gets up to go play kickball with the groomsmen and then to the bachelor party.

He is still feeling rather bad and I'm worried he'll die the next day if he doesn't sleep.

At 3 am Noah gets back. At 4 am, I am awakened by a violent migraine. I jump into a steaming hot bath (my cure all) and try to calm it down (because my IB profen is in the car which as I stated in the previous post so far away from our room). I then start vomiting in the bathtub, then I have to take a bath again. I then wake Noah up crying and ask him to go get the medicine. He was so sweet and did. It was freezing rain outside at this time. I take it and right around 5:30 it started feeling better and I tried to sleep. Then right when we settled down to sleep, Noah's brother Eric messages us on Noah's phone. It was our first contact with him in almost a month because he was hiking the base camp of Everest. Right when they finished talking, and we started to settle in for a few more minutes of shut eye...Wahhhh

the baby wakes up. We then decide in the wee hours of the morning, that in order to save some money, we were going to cancel our last night at the dirty hotel and stay at the grooms house (since he would be honeymooning).

That meant that I had to drop Noah at the church at 7 am (in the pouring rain), to get ready for pictures since the wedding started at 10.

Then come back and prepare myself, and Barclay, pack up in the room, load up in the car (in the pouring FREEZING rain), check out and figure out how to get our refund and take Barclay to my friend to babysit (25 minutes away).

Dropped Noah off...check. Make it out of the church without getting lost....check.

Go back to the hotel and do the major hike to our room with Barclay. Decide I don't have time to shower, throw all our stuff together. Go downstairs for our free breakfast. No one pays attention to us this morning and I'm ok with that. Go upstairs pushing the worst luggage cart in history. It is so old and squeaky. Go into the room, load up our massive amounts of luggage including the pack and play. Barclay is trying to pull everything off that I put on. I corner in him the room, I finish, I am sweating and starting to feel really sick. I try to push the luggage cart out and realize that the pack and play wont fit through the door. The pack and play is at the bottom of the pile. I have to push it in, recorner Barclay. take everything off. push it through the door and then load up again. I grab Barclay who is mad and crying because he wants to ride on top of it. We manage to make our way down to the lobby without breaking anything. That luggage cart was awful though! I then talk to the guy at the front desk (who thankfully did speak English). It took 15 minutes for them to refund me my money for the night we weren't staying. Remember they didn't have computers and they had to wait for a supervisor to look over their shoulder while they did it. I then asked him to keep an eye on my stuff so I could pull under the front awning to load up everything not in the rain. He agreed. I run with Barclay into the freezing rain, load him up...he is crying.

I then pull up and load up all my stuff. I realize I am running 10 minutes late. I drive to my friend Reagan's house who graciously offered to watch Barclay. The GPS said 25 minutes. In Ft Lauderdale because of the horrible intersections, you might as well add 10 minutes to that. I get to the house, and unload Barclay, his stuff and his pack and play in the freezing rain. I literally can't even say hello. But quickly describe what he needed, then I left him. I've never left him with these people before! But I was going to miss the wedding if I waited any longer. I high tailed it back to the church. Made it to the parking lot at 9:53. Got naked in the car, put on my dress, slipped on my lovely, brown old navy flip flops (I forgot heels darn it...;-) brushed through my hair once, put some eyeliner on and RAN to the church. Make it breathless, get seated by a groomsman who asked why I was so out of breath. I am wet and breathing hard...and cold. And my dreams of looking halfway decent are lost...I look like a drowned rat.

*Time out from the horrible trip*

The wedding was one of the most moving I've ever seen. Joel is a close friend of Noah and he has the most amazing testimony. He was burned all over at the age of 2, but he loves the Lord and spends his time, testifying to the Lord's mercy. He married the most beautiful and sweet girl from Columbia, South America. They walked down the aisle to Lead me to the Cross. I was bawling my eyes out. I've been to over 200 weddings and it was by far the most triumphant wedding march I've ever seen. It was totally glorifying to the Lord and such a precious thing to be a part of.

Back to the day.

After the ceremony, I looked like a drowned rat who had cried for 30 minutes straight. Not pretty. My husband looked so handsome in his tux too...and we didn't get any pictures...because I looked...well you know...

We go to the reception which was moved from the beach to an indoor ballroom because of the freezing rain (this is FLORIDA by the way). But it was beautiful and we ate yummy brunch foods and danced. I started feeling the affects of not sleeping the previous night and...the dreaded sickness. It was still such a blast and I was so thankful not to have to worry about entertaining the baby.

We left before the bride and groom and made it to pick up the baby. Within the first 5 minutes, I had broken Barclay's glass bottle full of milk all over the floor. After visiting with our friend and her family, we put Barclay in the car. On the ride to Joel's house I felt like I was going to DIE. I mean I didn't see how I was going to make it I was so tired, sick, cold, TIRED. We get there and I have to entertain Barclay and attempt to keep him alive in this not baby proof house. I am watching the clock tick tick tick slowly closer to bedtime. At 6:30 I put him down (an hour and a half early) and Noah and I collapsed into bed...Sleeping by 7:30...