Our Vacation: London, Durham, and Edinburgh

Three Planes, Four Trains and Five Busses later and we are home!  Aila did amazing! She is such a happy traveler. There were some tears along the way and she only slept if she was touching either dad or mom but man is she a trooper.

We had a 10 hour flight to England. Our plane tickets had us sitting apart but praise the Lord, we were bumped up to economy plus and were both put in an aisle seat in the middle of the plain with a seat in between us. Aila slept for most of the flight and we watched movies.

We started our time by spending two days in London. We walked from Kensington Garden to London bridge and saw all kinds of fun things along the way. We had Aila in her stroller and she loved looking around at all of the people.

We then got on a train and headed to Durham where we spent 7 days with our dear friends the Warnes. Let me tell you, the absolute best way to see a place is with friends you love who know the area and have a child the same age as yours. We had so much fun! We took it easy so that our girls had plenty of time to rest (their daughter is only two weeks older then Aila). We visited the Durham Cathedral, took long beautiful walks, went to Newcastle, and I got to go to a fun play day with Charissa and our girls.

After day 7 we said our sad goodbyes and headed off to Scotland. We stayed at a wonderful bed and breakfast and on our first day took a nice walk along the waters of Leith. Our second day was rainy, it wasn't too bad but I couldn't bring my camera. We toured the Edinburgh Castle which was amazing then took a stroll through the city. The next day was gorgeous and we crammed in as many things as we could. We started our day with some haddock for breakfast and some porridge. The sweet older lady who ran the B&B recommended we pour some whisky on top so that is what Stuart had while I went sans whisky. Aila also went without whisky though that may have been recommended as well.  Our sweet Aila did so well, she was strapped on to daddy and stayed there pretty comfortable through out the whole day. Stuart and I absolutely loved Scotland and like any vacation, we wished we had just one more day to spend there.

Thank you to everyone who prayed for us during this trip. It was amazing in so many ways. We were nervous of how our flights would work out but God took care of it. We also weren't sure how Stuart's leg was going to do but everything was fine. He was definitely sore and could feel a little pain but overall everything went smoothly.

I am definitely more aware now that time is not something that is guaranteed and I am so grateful that we got to have such an amazing vacation. I constantly realize that Stuart makes me a more fun person. He pushes me to be who I want to be. It was Stuart that planned out our entire vacation. The Scott Monument was amazing and something I never would have done on my own. He also encourages me to bring my camera wherever I go and then carries my camera for me until I need it to take pictures. He also planned to do certain thing ahead of time so that I would get my perfect shot. For example, he planned to go up to Calton Hill during sunset which ended up being one of my favorite shots. I also learned a lot about Aila, which will be for another post.

9 months/Happy Halloween

Aila is now 9 months!

Everyone that meets her either compliments her on her eyes, comments on how smiley she is or how much energy she has.

She loves to pull things out of suitcases or drawers and empty book shelves of every last book.

She has two teeth!

She doesn't need much sleep and loves to smile at everyone and anyone.

She can crawl now, thanks to a little help for her friend Corrina.

She can pull herself up to a standing position and usually gets so excited that she bounces up and down, loses her balances and hits her face on whatever it is she pulled herself up on.

She is very determined and focused and has lots and lots and lots of energy.

She loves to dance! Her favorite songs are "Do you want to build a snowman" and "Say Hey (I love you)".

She is also a strawberry for halloween.

Pumpkin Patch

Today we celebrated the nice and cool 80 degree weather by going to a pumpkin patch. Thank you to all the ladies who recommended Irvine park, we had lots of fun!

 

8 months: Facts and Pictures

Aila is now 8 months old and has had a very busy month.

• She has learned to sit up from a lying down position
• Has gotten her first tooth
• Loves to Dance
• Will stop crying in the car momentarily if you play her some Flogging Molly
• Can get on all fours and is starting to crawl
• Army crawls pretty fast
• Still hates every food, but we can add strawberries, apples, and store bought baby food to the list
• Gets super excited when daddy comes home

Stuart has also had a very busy month. He is now finished with radiation and we are praising the Lord that his leg did not split open again! We learned that if any more treatments had been done there was a potential that Stuart could lose the function of his foot so we are grateful that we are all done and hope to not have to go through it again.  Stuart is looking forward to being able to strengthen his leg again, it has been eight months that he has not been able to do much with it.  We will continue to have scans to make sure the cancer is dead.

We are both very tired. Aila has a difficult time sleeping and still wakes up about every two hours (if we're lucky) so we have been adjusting to our new normal. I am very foggy and forgetful and I am starting to take after my mom in getting idioms mixed up (I believe this last week I said "she gets angry at the drop of a dime").  Most of my energy goes to taking care of Aila which can be a bit overwhelming since my independent sweet child has turned into a clingy screaming teether but we still have fun. There just doesn't seem to be too much time for anything else, though we do squeeze in an occasional photo shoot :)

All is well but life is short.

So I was going to title this, "Life is Short" but I didn't want to worry anyone, hence the "All is Well" part :)

I've always known that life is short, that anyone can go at any time. Every year I was in college, someone from my college passed away. Sometimes it was a student my age, another time it was a beloved professor, and one year it was an entire family. Every single time it was a tragedy and the entire school mourned. I know life is short but Stuart being diagnosed with cancer made me realize that HIS life is short and MY life is short and even my little baby girl's life is short.

As far as eternity goes, Stuart and I are ready to die but there are so many things we still want to do while there is still life in our bodies. Stuart just finished his radiation treatment and we are hoping we will no longer have to battle cancer but the truth is, we don't know. We have learned we really don't know anything as far as any of our healths go.

For three years we have been waiting for the perfect time to go visit our friends in Europe. We wanted to go earlier this year but because of Stuart's health we weren't able to so, here we go. Life is too short to wait for perfect timing so in a couple weeks we are taking our precious, teething little girl and a tub of earplugs for the rest of the passengers and getting on a 10 hour flight to Europe.

We don't take enough time to celebrate, so this trip will cover a multitude of celebrations! We bought our first place, yay! We had a baby, yay! We've been married for 10 years, yay! We were led to remove a lump that everyone told us was fine only to find out that if we had waited longer it may have been too late, yay!?! We have survived a long round of radiation....It's time to celebrate.

So it's definitely not the most perfect timing but I am learning to do things when I can. There is still so much I am worried about but I am learning that it is better to go forward in fear than to sit and never let anything happen.

PS. Thank you Heidi Weston for reminding me that life after cancer teaches you to say "yes" when the barista at Starbucks asks if you want whipped cream on your drink :)