Merry? Christmas Trip

(Jenn) Our Christmas vacation this year started out to be everything we were hoping it would be:
great snow to play in . . .

Henry's first alien encounter . . .

games . . .

girlfriends (Brady's and Tanner's) . . .

and late night stairwell conversations . . .

Then BOOM! We got hit by the vacation-destroyers! [This is where I stopped taking very many pictures.] Henry got sick with the flu, and Ellis was so stuffed up that he couldn't breathe well enough to sleep. As I was carrying the humidifier into Ellis' room to help him get some rest, I tripped over the cradle and smacked into the wall. CRACK. Ouch, that was my hand. Thinking it was a dislocated pinky, we rushed to the E.R., hoping they could pop it back into place and we could get on with our merriment. Oh, no. It couldn't be that easy. Instead, the X-rays showed a fractured metacarpal bone, a break that would require surgery and two screws. The next day was a blur of Lortab, a giant out-of-state insurance mess, fasting (for the anesthesia), pumping (for Ellis), starving, and much crying before finally having the surgery that night. Let's just say this was not exactly how we were planning for our vacation to go. And lots of our relatives were not planning on changing diapers, folding our laundry, carrying our boys, and lifting Ellis up to me to nurse for the next 2 weeks. Still, at this point, we were pretty optimistic about the rest of the trip turning out okay, and then BOOM! Ben got hit with the stomach flu on Christmas Eve and Christmas day. Merry Christmas, Ben. Henry also still had it and threw up several times all over everything, having not yet mastered the knack for using a bucket. I caught the bug on Christmas day and the day after. Lots of angels in our family got to clean up throw-up and change sheets.

We all started feeling better around the weekend. We had a nice family party, a great Sunday (including Ellis' baby blessing), and a fun ski/play day on Monday. Then on Monday night at a fabulous El Matador dinner, Henry got sick with Flu #2 and threw up right at our table, enough to fill two tortilla chip bowls. We endured the disgust and mockery of the tables around us, and Brady dutifully carried the bowls to the bathroom to be dumped. That night, I got this 2nd, much more violent case of the stomach flu and joined the vomiting brigade (I know -- too much information -- sorry!). We cancelled our plans for the next day and just sat around watching movies all day. By New Year's Eve, we were all starting to feel a bit better, only to receive the phone call that Ben's grandma had passed away the night before in her sleep. Her death came as a surprise to all of us, although really she couldn't have left this world at a better time or in a more peaceful way. I think mostly everyone felt calm about her passing, she being victim to a stroke 6 years previously, but I must admit that grieving and attending her funeral was not exactly how we had planned to spend the last weekend of our trip.

By this point, Ben and I had wondered several times if someone was trying to intentionally destroy our vacation! We also worried that our bad luck was spreading like a tornado to everyone we came in contact with. We certainly passed our illnesses to hundreds of others, and the extended Iverson family had pretty similar luck to ours. Between all of us that were staying at Ben's parents' home, we had 3 trips to the emergency room, several cases of stomach flu, a 9-1-1 phone call, and strep throat among the other things already mentioned.

So mostly I'm telling you all of this because I think our luck was so outrageous that it is almost comical. I don't want any pity or sympathy! Really, overall I felt like it was a great vacation. Because we were sick for over half of the trip, we spent a lot of time just sitting around with our families, relaxing and talking, which is really all I wanted to do anyway. I feel bad that we didn't get more pictures of the good times that we had. Here are a few I snapped to prove that it was a good Christmas after all:

Santa came, and we feel so blessed with all he brought us as well as all that our Savior has given us.

Christmas morning was nice and peaceful, and we had a lovely breakfast.

In spite of being sick, Henry and Ellis were adorable and everyone loved them! Many people shed tears as they parted with Ellis, knowing he will not be the same baby in 6 months.

The snow and the mountains were glorious, and several times I was thankful I got to stay house-bound and not go anywhere.

See? Whoever was out to ruin our trip failed. We did have a good time. We got to see LOTS of people that we love and miss, and for that, we will probably consider returning to Utah again next year. Okay, so it's pretty much a given that we'll be there. We love you people!