Oh, to be home...

...and to come home to this little happy face.



Quickly followed by this face...which coincidentally, is the same face Jonathan gives me when I'm interrupting him and he tells me to "zip it". Like father, like son.


Had my first night away from the Wee Ski...for a quick one day trip to Reno for the last planning meeting for this fall's Leadership Summit for the Relay For Life. We have such a fantastic team - with budget cuts, we fit 2 1/2 days worth of training and prep into 27 hours - and not only did we get everything done, but we finished early.

This has been such a perfect fit to chair the Training Task Force for our division just after Thomas was born...very little travel, conference calls instead of face-to-face meetings (where I'd need to find a babysitter each month), and amazing volunteers and staff from across a 12 state area. I can't ask for much more than that.

Was SO blessed to catch up with Michelle...it's been a year since we were able to have face-to-face time together. Last year, on this same weekend, she and I had some major 'life discussions' about marriage, babies, work and Relay. Little did I know as we rounded the track at the University of Nevada's Relay that I was pregnant at the time (baby Angus was just 10 days in the womb) and how timely our discussion would end up being.

We missed each other in September at Summit, because she was almost due with baby Samuel in Arizona...and missed each other in January just after Thomas was born.

We stayed up late into the night, talking, laughing and sharing stories about the wee ones and our fabulous husbands who were at home with them. She is such a gift to me.

That's one thing I truly love about Relay...the amazing people who end up crossing your path.

Got home last night and was on I-5 15 minutes after our flight touched down. It was good to get away, but great to be home!

Thomas had a great time with Grandma, though he may have missed a nap (or two or three). He kept Papa up all night long, so we all crashed as a family around 8 pm last night, and slept for another several hours this afternoon. Naps rock. Seriously.

Lots of random stuff crossing my mind right now...

• My 1000th post on this blog. Happening sometime this week. I believe this is post #995. Never imagined in January 2005 that this blog would hit 1000 posts, let alone hundreds of visitors a day.
• A Relay Mom shirt. A Relay shirt that I actually don't have already, and really want. How cute is this?!?
  
• As a nursing mom, had very amusing experiences both down to Reno and back. On the way down, my bags were held back to discuss the "machine" that was inside...lots of hushed voices and stares over to me while pointing at the screen. Those who were behind me in line, no doubt, were thinking the "machine" was more obscene than it actually was: a breast pump. On the way home, with my 36 oz of pumped milk, Linda and I were almost passed through by a very nice TSA serviceman who only wanted to whisper to us about what was inside the bags. Just before he gave us the 'go on through' motion, another TSA agent stopped us to very loudly explain to us that I couldn't go through with the milk because I didn't also have a baby with me. After a few attempts of trying to explain that if there is a baby present - there is no need to save the milk in a bag - we were finally waved through. Learned lots of good lessons here. This post is a great resource.
• And a few random YouTube videos...the first from ACS:
  
  
• ...and the second, which cracked me up after reading to Thomas tonight. Especially for all my LOST buddies...how creepy is Ben here? (Updated to the NBC version)