Crazy Summer Madness

OK, so as many of you already know, we have had a crazy summer so far.

First off, we went to Virginia on a family vacation with the Larson's for Christelle's graduation. It was so so fun! Here's a few pics of the trip:

Ferry Ride at Busch Gardens

Smithsonian Dinosaur

Virginia Beach

Picture with Grover at Busch Gardens

Washington Monument when we drove up to DC

On the train

Crazy scary fun roller coaster

We got back from Virginia on Father's Day night. Tuesday night it was time for Brad and I to go to Houston in search of a house-leaving Isaac with his grandma's. Our plan was to leave at midnight on Jetblue standby buddy tickets to JFK in New York, then fly from New York to Austin, then drive 2 hours to Houston. Reaching Houston at about 2 to 3 PM the next day. Using standby tickets this was the cheapest fastest route. Still a huge trip though. So the day we were supposed to leave, things were not looking promising as far as getting on the JFK flight. Unfortunatly Jetblue only flies to 2 destinations from Salt Lake, making it easy for the flights to fill up, and harder to get on standby.

So we decided a plan B trip would be to drive all night to Vegas, and get on a plane there at 7 am, cause it's easy to fly standby from Vegas. Plus my grandparents just bought a house down there, so we'd have a place to park our car. Before we jumped to plan B, we thought we'd at least show up at the airport to see if there was any chance of someone dropping out, and us getting on. We went to the airport around 9, checked in, and started the waiting game. As it came closer and closer to boarding time, we got more and more nervous- wondering if we were going to have to make a long 6 1/2 hour drive to Vegas that night. Finally it was time to board... but they weren't handing out standby seating assignments yet. As the plane was boarding we went up to the ticket man to see if we were gonna make it on. We got a smile, and he said, "you guys will make it"!! YES! We made it on, and we didn't have to drive all night.

So needless to say, by the time we got to Houston the next day, we were positively exhausted.

We got a hotel room, and crashed. The next day our first day of house shopping began. I could go on and on with the details of our house search- but I'll just write it all up in a nutshell. The first day we looked in northern Houston, a little farther away from Brad's school with a grumpy realtor. The second day we looked and condo's and apartments as a plan B in case we didn't get a house in time. The third day we looked in Southern Houston, a little closer to the school with a really good realtor. It ends up we liked a house in Northern Houston the most, so we decided to put an offer in the the good realtor. We decided to offer 6,000 bucks less then asking price (which is alot when you are dealing with a house as cheap as this), expecting a counter offer. The next day we got a call from our realtor saying our offer had been accepted!! We were so excited! We are going to get a house! The house we chose has been basically completely redone- so it will really feel like we are moving into a new house. So we officially had a successful Houston trip.

Other then house shopping, we did a few more fun things in Houston- I'm having too much trouble posting pics, so you can look at facebook for that. :)

So the following Monday came around- the day we were supposed to go home. We got word from Brad's mom that there was no chance of flying into Salt Lake on standby and there wouldn't be for days. Ugh.. not again. So plan B- fly into Vegas. So we drove our car back to Austin, jumped on a plane to Long Beach, then finally got into Las Vegas where my grandparents were nice enough to pick us up and let us stay with them. By this point, as you can imagine, I was missing my little boy so so much! It was so sad to see the plane leave to Salt Lake from Long Beach, and not be able to get on it. At least we'd get to see my grandparents new house. We ended up spending a day and a half in Vegas- then finally started the long drive home. 7 hours later we pulled into my parents driveway, and I could finally see Isaac again! I ran up to greet him, and he looked at me like I was a stranger, wanted nothing to do with me! It totally broke my heart. When Brad approached him, we was just fine with his daddy- but he seriously didn't even want me to hold him. We finally figured that he was mad at me for abandoning him or something. I think nothing breaks a mother's heart like her child not wanting her after not seeing each other for a week. So I'm slowly getting his forgivness back. He'll now let me hold him, but still doesn't want to give me "loves" or anything. It's even more heartbreaking to think that I have to leave him again on Monday for Honduras :( We'll be gone for 11 days, I don't know how I'll handle that. Plus this last week that we've been seperated, Isaac has grown and learned so much! He is basically running around now- when we left a week ago he was barely able to take a few steps. So I'm sure I'll miss so much in the next couple weeks too.

Ok, I'm done complaining about being seperated from my baby. Over-all we had a wonderful trip, and we got a house! We are so dang excited- and life is good. Brad, me, and my sister Steph will be in Honduras from the 5th-16th, so I'm sure I'll have some fun stories to tell then. Happy 4th of July everyone! Thanks for reading my novel- ha ha. This turned out a bit longer then I thought it would.