Exhausted

We did the massive flight back to the States yesterday. Doug has a conference in Denver and Mary, Adam and I tagged along for some food, adventure and SHOPPING! We're also flying over to Kansas City next week to visit Doug's family for 3 weeks. We'll be getting Adam baptised and my parents are hopping in the car and driving all the way from North Carolina to be with us for the wonderful occasion...and I think they want to see their grand kids again.

The flights here were pretty painful. I definitely know why we only do it once or twice for a full 3 year tour and I also see why we don't have many visitors. Actually, the kids were great. Adam is an awesome traveler. He barely fussed and was happy flirting with all the ladies he could find. I will say the bassinet on the big flight from Tokyo was a life saver. It was so nice to be able to put him down and let him stretch out. Mary did better than I had expected, esp. missing her nap and having to sit still for so long. We had to literally run through all of the airports for our connecting flights and she either held our hands and ran or let Doug carry her all with no fuss. See, there are miracles.

Last night was pretty rough, but looking back on it, it doesn't seem as bad as it could have been. Isn't that the case for most things? We had a nice solid chunk of sleep from 3:30am to 6:30am. The problem is single room living. Oh boy, if Mary starts crying, Adam almost always has sympathy crying too. Don't they understand it makes it so much more stressful for us to calm down 2 children instead of 1? Today at nap time, Adam started fussing and Mary woke up at the same time with a bloody nose...and I mean bloody. This was the worst one she's ever had. I attribute it to the super dry air on the airplanes, the dry air here in Denver, and the fact that she almost always has a finger up her nose. I was trying to get Adam settled down, Doug was trying to calm Mary and apply pressure to her nose, but she kept blowing it and making it worse. I finally got Adam quiet and we switched kids only to have him start back up because I put him down. Oh boy, it was a stressful situation for a while. The whole time I kept thinking that thank goodness Doug hadn't started his conference yet and was here to help me. I don't know what I would have done if I was alone. I will say that "twinkle,twinkle" is now our magic song. Repeated over and over, it calmed down both kids and even made Mary smile when I made up silly lyrics to go with the tune.

It wasn't a horrible day, we had a great visit to the Denver Children's museum and the Platte trolley ride. But that will have to be saved for another day, when I can post pictures of Mary and Adam having some fun exploring and playing. **I'm posting pics now**

Doug starts his conference tomorrow and we are on our own. I hope we have a better night of sleep. I really want to get the kids (and me) back on schedule.