Ohio recap, 2011: The west side

(Yes, I realize at this point we're several months out and an entire trip to Ohio removed from this second installment, but for scrapbooking/memory keeping purposes, I'm publishing this anyway!)

So. Over. This. Car.

On Tuesday, we packed up the car and drove four hours west to Tim's parents' house. Elle did great but was more than ready to be out of her car seat. We enjoyed a nice, quiet night catching up with Tim's parents. Tim discovered that he couldn't use his work laptop at his parents' house because of a firewall issue, so we made a late-night run to a local McDonald's to use their free Wi-Fi. We live on the edge, I tell ya.

On Wednesday, Tim's mom had arranged for the extended family to come over for dinner. Many of Tim's aunts hadn't met Elle yet, and all of the family wanted to come celebrate her first birthday. Tim's brother owns a pizza place (in addition to practicing law, among other things - he's a busy dude), so he supplied the yummy food, and Elle enjoyed a piece of ice cream cake after everyone sang to her.

Happy birthday to YOU!

"You didn't tell me there would be ice cream cake."

She was a bit overwhelmed by everything at first but loved playing with her presents, exploring everyone's cell phones and hanging out with her cousins, Cal and Sam.   

Playing with Daddy, Cal, Sam and Aunt Angie.

On Thursday, Tim and I took advantage of Grandma's offer to babysit Elle, and we headed to Lima, the "big city" in the area. (Tim and I met there, and I love it dearly and will treasure fond memories of it forever, but it's not exactly a bustling metropolis.) We did some shopping at the mall, ate lunch at Tim's favorite Mexican restaurant and then hung out at Panera (which was not there when either of us lived in Lima) to ... use the Wi-Fi! I spent the time reading, Tim spent the time working, and Elle spent the time crafting an epic diaper for Grandma. Oops!

Lunch at Bandido's:)

That evening, we had dinner with a friend of Tim's and his family. They have three little girls (approximate ages 2, 4 and 6), so there were plenty of toys for Elle to play with, and she laughed so much with the girls. It was hilarious, and it was nice for Tim and I to hang out with the adults :)

On Friday, we packed up and hung out until Elle woke up from her morning nap.

Photo ops with Grandpa's dog, Lucy, before we headed out.

We made a quick stop in town to visit another friend of Tim's, and then we hit McDonald's (Wi-Fi, again). We hit the road and Elle promptly fell asleep, and less than two hours later we were at Tim's cousin's house in Cincinnati. Tim and cousins Jeff and Ryan headed out to the Reds game, and Jeff's wife, Allison, and 18-month-old daughter, Syd, settled in with Elle and I for dinner and a quiet, relaxing night ... until it wasn't :)

Future engineers Elle and Syd.

We had finished dinner and were slowly getting the girls ready for bed when Allison walked out of the living room to throw away a poopy diaper. Allison tripped on the baby gate (further proof that child proofing is the devil), though, and fell, hard. At first, she was shocked and sore, but soon, she realized something was seriously wrong with her arm. We tried to reach the boys and figure out what to do, and in the end it was decided that I would stay home and put the girls to bed, a friend of Allison's would drive her to the ER, and Jeff would leave the game and meet her there.

Hours later, Allison came home ... with a broken elbow. She has since had surgery and is healing well, but I can't even begin to tell you how much baby gates freak me out right now! Jeff went back to the stadium to pick up Ryan and Tim, and we all pretty much crashed that night.

On Saturday, we met up with Ryan's wife and another cousin, Travis, for breakfast. Allison had to explain why her arm was in a sling, everyone ate way too many pancakes, and a good time was had by all.

No bones were broken in the making of this breakfast.

After breakfast, we headed for our final Ohio destination: the Columbus airport. We had a bit of time to kill, but Elle enjoyed crawling up and down deserted areas of the airport. The flight back was nice because it wasn't full, so we had a full row to ourselves. Unfortunately, Elle didn't feel like taking a long nap, and then there were storms in Tampa that kept us circling Orlando for half an hour before we could land.

By the time we got our luggage, Tim got our car and we loaded everything up, it was about an hour later than previously planned, which meant we were screwed on any chance of getting home before Elle's normal bed time. Luckily, Elle fell asleep in the car and went back down easily when we got home - I guess vacation will do that to you :)

It was a great, exhausting trip - we're fortunate that we can make one (plane) trip and see both sides of our families. We had a blast seeing everyone and were blessed with an excellent traveler :)