It's good to be home, for sure, but we had a lovely time in Birch Bay, Washington. Mom, Wesley and Brynna came down to spend the week with Marian and take her to school for us. We were so appreciative!!

We went to Grandma Holland and Stan's wedding on Saturday and then made it to Seattle area that night. We stayed with Shane and Suzanne Kleppen which was a blast from our past. It was so great to hang out with them even for one evening and then go to their meeting the next morning. We said good-bye after lunch and headed up to our resort in Birch Bay. The weather was great that weekend and things with Cora went pretty smoothly too. She was a champion at eating baby food in the car and we only had to stop really for diaper changes. She was ready to get out and roll around at the resort, though. And that's about all we did our whole time there -- sit around watching Cora. Any schedule revolved around her and that was it. We went to the beach one afternoon (the only one that was sunny) and lasted just a few minutes considering the chilly wind.

We took a day to go visit my grandparents on Guemes Island. My Great Grandma Jo was in the hospital so we all visited her there and then had lunch with Grandma and Grandpa. After that we went over to the island and hung out for a few hours, allowing Cora to have a nice nap. It was so nice to see them and we found out later that we were there on Grandma's birthday and they never told us! So, a belated Happy Birthday to her!!

The ride home was not as easy as the ride there. We were supposed to leave on Saturday to make special meeting in Spokane, but the passes were bad enough that we thought it would be better to just wait to make the trip on Sunday. On Saturday night, Cora developed a funny rash everywhere that really got our attention, as well as a slight fever. She had a restless night and in the morning we took her to a doctor since the spots had become much larger and she was trying to scratch them. He figured it must be a food allergy (though we're really not sure what) and gave us something to reduce the rash. So by about 11 am we were still north of Seattle. To make the long and painful story short, we left Birch Bay around 8:30 am and arrived in Moscow around 8:30 pm. Snoqualmi Pass was slow going considering all the snow fall and it was pretty good until we were 40 miles or so west of Colfax -- then it got REALLY icy; we passed several vehicles in the ditch, including one that was upside down. For Cora we had to stop ALL the time, it seemed! She wasn't happy with food, since she was still running a fever and I finally gave in and gave her some tylenol to help her get comfortable. At that point she finally calmed down and slept almost all the way home (2+ hours).

Maybe next time we'll just spend a week in McCall. <:

Hope all is well with everyone!
Love,
Calysta, Mike & Cora