We're back home! We headed out Friday night for a quick weekend trip to see Grandmas and Grandpas, cousins, and aunts and uncles on both sides of my family. We planned to leave after work so the kids would sleep on the way. I dressed them in PJs for the trip, stocked up on DVDs from the library, snacks - you name the need and I was prepared...and off we went. The kids were brilliant! We stopped in Iowa City to eat dinner - get the kids out of their car seats for awhile and stretch our legs. About 45 minutes later we loaded back up and hit the road again. Just before the Mississippi River we pulled off at a rest area so Mark could use the restroom. The kids were still great! And then....just as we were pulling out of the rest area...it happened. VOMIT! Lauren - for maybe the second time in her 2 years of life threw up. It was EVERYWHERE! Soaked her pjs, chunks all over the car seat, the car seat straps - oh...and saturated the DVD headset she was wearing. G-R-O-S-S!!!

Where do you even begin with such a mess? Now Grant is bawling, Bailey is fighting back her own urge to puke now...ugh. I stripped her of her PJs and took a wipe and cleaned her up the best I could before wrapping her in a towel to carry her back into the restroom to change her clothes and get her cleaned up more. That left Mark to the disaster that was the car seat. Oh I just wanted to hold her the rest of the trip...but aside from being illegal, it wouldn't have been safe. So Mark did a pretty good job of wiping up the seat, which was till wet, lying down a receiving blanket to try to keep her dry...and spraying perfume throughout the van so we all wouldn't be sick. We ended up throwing away her PJs at the rest area dumpster...which inspired a thought. I wonder what else lies within the rest area dumpster? Scary thought. I'm sure evidence of many highway tragedies are in there.

I believe Lauren was just car sick. She felt instantly better - asked for a snack as a matter of fact. But no WAY was she getting food after that! And no more movie-watching either! Luckily she slept.

The cutest part? She said "I not spill my hiccup again." What an accurate and innocent description of what happened to her. Poor baby.

More on the trip tomorrow.