Oh, What a Night!

Have you ever had a horrible vacation experience? Well, so far, I think our horrible experiences outweigh our incredible experiences. Most of you have heard our "Gulf Shores story." If you haven't, drop me a line and I'll be happy to give you the short story version of it.

Anyway, our latest experience was just last night. Since Chris was going to be out of town, I decided to venture out and visit my sister who lives in Rock Island, which is only about an hour and a half away from here. Her husband was out of town, and my dad had to work last night, so my mom and I took off for a one night "vacation" at her house on the river. Well, everything was going well until about 9:00 last night. Avery was beyond tired, was incredibly cranky, and he wanted no part of going to bed in a strange place. (Have I mentioned the fact that we don't travel very often?) He finally drifted off to sleep in my lap at around 9:15 or so. I carefully put him in the bed that I was going to sleep in. Immediately, he woke up very upset. It took a couple of minutes, but he finally calmed down and went back to sleep. "Whew!" I thought. "That was a close one, but that was pretty easy." **Note the foreshadowing!

I decided to go and check my email on my sister's computer. I was just shutting down the computer when Aaron appeared by my side with a very disturbing look on his face. He said, "Mama, I don't want to spend the night. I want to go home." He looked as if he were about to burst into tears. I asked him what was wrong, and he said that he was feeling sick and needed to throw up. Of course, every mother hates to hear these words. It is bad enough when your child is sick at your own house. But, when you have a sick child, you're away from your own home, and you're in the home of someone without children, it can be even more disturbing. We immediately went to the bathroom and patiently waited for the inevitable. After about half an hour of vomiting and diarrhea, he finally began to feel well enough to go and lie down.

I decided to sleep on the floor beside Aaron since he wasn't feeling well in case he may need some help. In the meantime, after we had all gone to bed and had gotten comfortable, the cuckoo clock on the wall in the hallway just outside our door, struck the hour of eleven. After it finished "clucking" Avery woke up, fussed a little, but eventually plopped his head back down on the pillow. I thought, "Oh, no! He is going to wake up again at midnight. I hope he will just roll over and go back to sleep." Sure enough, midnight came and so did the bird in the clock. Once again, at the end, Avery woke up. This time he flipped out and was hysterical. I couldn't calm him down, and I couldn't go anywhere in the house to escape others' sleeping ears. After about fifteen or twenty minutes, we finally sat in the living room until he decided that he was ready to go back to bed.

I wound up sleeping on the bed with Avery, the acrobat. You know...feet in my ribcage, on my forehead, head boring a hole in the nape of my neck. I think I slept a total of thirty minutes between "acrobat Avery," worrying about the cuckoo clock waking him up, and wondering if Aaron was going to have another "episode."

Fortunately, Aaron did not get sick anymore that night, and he even woke up the next morning and commented that he felt great! Avery also slept pretty well, despite the fact that the cuckoo went off every hour and half hour. I think I heard it every time.

Anyway, I'm so sorry Candy, that we kept you up. (Did I mention that she is very pregnant with twins?) And, thanks for inviting us and trying to salvage the night. I'm sure we'll be up for another visit...when the kids are grown. I'm wondering...should we really still entertain the thought of going to Disney World next year? :0)