Dashing through the snow

Remarkably, the fun continues, despite a few hiccups. First, all of us have had a stomach virus since we arrived in UT. My bout was minor in comparison to the husband's and J's was spectacularly violent but short. So far, most of my family has passed the virus around, including my mother who got it on the night and morning of our family photo, poor thing. She put on a brave face for the pics but was totally wiped out before and after. Amazingly enough, given the fact that we had four under two at the photo session, we think we managed to get some satisfactory shots (perhaps with the help of a little photoshop), even though our first choice for location was denied us, and we ended up at another place in front of a winding staircase complete with some sort of art exhibit involving pages taken out of books. Very avant garde!

Then, because it's not a vacation with me unless there is a major crisis somewhere along the line, two days ago I woke up with pre-term labor symptoms alarming enough for my OB to recommend going to a university hospital and getting on a monitor to make sure things were okay. Turns out, I was suffering from severe dehydration (thank you desert), various infections we won't ennumerate, anemia, popped vericose veins, and the after effects of my stomach virus, all of which had apparently sent my uterus into a tizzy. The good news is, the baby was fine, happy and healthy and in no danger of coming in the next two weeks, according to the preterm labor diagnostic test, which strikes me as some sort of voodoo.

Next, we've ended up driving through the beginning and the end of a snow storm so far this week, with another on the way tomorrow night, so we're readjusting our plans on a daily basis to try to avoid any more bad driving conditions. The husband handles them well, don't get me wrong, having grown up here and all, but they make me far too nervous and J gets far too antsy to be patient in the car anylonger than absolutely necessary.

However, despite it all, we are having a great time. J has met and played with all his cousins and fit himself into the clans nicely. On the husband's side, he is the youngest and spent most of his time quietly playing by himself and not even blinking when toys he wanted disappeared. On my side, he is second oldest and one of the four almost two year olds and spent most of his time stealing toys from his less pushy cousins, being entertained by his older cousin, and making way for the youngest, a little girl who spends enough time in daycare she is NOT going to be pushed around by anyone. I was amazed to see how quickly he identified and adapted to his place in both groups of kids. And Santa (and the grandparents) were good to us, so we've all had lots of fun with our new toys and books!