Hi folks,
Its been about a week, so I figured I should update you. We might have more piggies by the end of the week (fingers crossed). My knee is much better but I still need to be careful on uneven ground and going up and down steps.
Last week, I went on my first in person work trip in about 2.5 years. They were getting all the folks for one of the programs I work together. It was really nice to see people in person after so long. It was LOTS of fun making it happen though (Can you hear the dripping sarcasm?) A couple of weeks ago, our van started acting up a bit, but seemed to straighten out, so we didn't take it in to get looked at. When I first heard about the meeting, I asked my mom if she could watch the older boys for 2 days. She agreed to do that. I'm so thankful she did. Wednesday afternoon, I worked a half day and we packed up and left to go on the trip. It was the first relatively warm day that we took the van out for a spin. Once we got on the highway, anytime I revved the van over 2500 rpm, It would make horrible noises and the output of power would go way down. We got to Clarksburg to look things over and it wasn't anything we could see that was wrong. So I came up with the idea of renting a car to finish the drive. Unfortunately, none the Enterprise stores in the area had anything for us. They said, "Well, we might have something after 5pm. So we left. I called around and there was a Toyota car dealer that did rentals. All they had available was a Camry or full sized SUVs which were twice as much to rent. Since we only had the Milk Drinker with us, it was JUST possible for us to squeeze all our stuff and his car seat into the vehicle. We were able to leave our van at the dealership. We made decent time all things considered and made it there by 8pm. The drive is 4 and a half hours nonstop, so we only used up 2.5 hours on food stops and getting the rental. Not bad all things considered. The hotel was right next to the new building, which was awesome. It took me 5 min from stepping out the hotel room door, to the hot desk I reserved. It was really nice. If DH had somewhere he wanted to go, he could have bundled the Milk Drinker in the car and gone while I worked. As it was, it was nice to be able to walk back to the hotel for a half hour lunch/nurse the baby stop. All things considered, the Milk Drinker handled things well, he didn't get really fussy until about 30 min before I got back from the meeting. DH said that about an hour before I got back, the Milk Drinker went to the hotel room door, started jiggling the handle, banging on the door, and started saying "Mama" over and over. Poor dude. Once I got back from work, I got connected to my phone hotspot (the work computer didn't like the hotel internet) and we left to visit with some friends for a couple hours. It was really nice to see them as well. They came to visit us last summer and that was the last time we saw them. When we drove home on Friday the weather was a mess. After we got onto I-68 in MD, we were dealing with snow squalls until we got to Morgantown to return the car. There were times we couldn't see the car in front of us. We managed to get back safely and we have an appointment to get the van looked at tomorrow.
Its been about a week, so I figured I should update you. We might have more piggies by the end of the week (fingers crossed). My knee is much better but I still need to be careful on uneven ground and going up and down steps.
Last week, I went on my first in person work trip in about 2.5 years. They were getting all the folks for one of the programs I work together. It was really nice to see people in person after so long. It was LOTS of fun making it happen though (Can you hear the dripping sarcasm?) A couple of weeks ago, our van started acting up a bit, but seemed to straighten out, so we didn't take it in to get looked at. When I first heard about the meeting, I asked my mom if she could watch the older boys for 2 days. She agreed to do that. I'm so thankful she did. Wednesday afternoon, I worked a half day and we packed up and left to go on the trip. It was the first relatively warm day that we took the van out for a spin. Once we got on the highway, anytime I revved the van over 2500 rpm, It would make horrible noises and the output of power would go way down. We got to Clarksburg to look things over and it wasn't anything we could see that was wrong. So I came up with the idea of renting a car to finish the drive. Unfortunately, none the Enterprise stores in the area had anything for us. They said, "Well, we might have something after 5pm. So we left. I called around and there was a Toyota car dealer that did rentals. All they had available was a Camry or full sized SUVs which were twice as much to rent. Since we only had the Milk Drinker with us, it was JUST possible for us to squeeze all our stuff and his car seat into the vehicle. We were able to leave our van at the dealership. We made decent time all things considered and made it there by 8pm. The drive is 4 and a half hours nonstop, so we only used up 2.5 hours on food stops and getting the rental. Not bad all things considered. The hotel was right next to the new building, which was awesome. It took me 5 min from stepping out the hotel room door, to the hot desk I reserved. It was really nice. If DH had somewhere he wanted to go, he could have bundled the Milk Drinker in the car and gone while I worked. As it was, it was nice to be able to walk back to the hotel for a half hour lunch/nurse the baby stop. All things considered, the Milk Drinker handled things well, he didn't get really fussy until about 30 min before I got back from the meeting. DH said that about an hour before I got back, the Milk Drinker went to the hotel room door, started jiggling the handle, banging on the door, and started saying "Mama" over and over. Poor dude. Once I got back from work, I got connected to my phone hotspot (the work computer didn't like the hotel internet) and we left to visit with some friends for a couple hours. It was really nice to see them as well. They came to visit us last summer and that was the last time we saw them. When we drove home on Friday the weather was a mess. After we got onto I-68 in MD, we were dealing with snow squalls until we got to Morgantown to return the car. There were times we couldn't see the car in front of us. We managed to get back safely and we have an appointment to get the van looked at tomorrow.
