Our "Vacation" to AZ

Here we are only one day to go before Darryl gets home. Could we been any more anxious or excited...I don't think so.
I wanted to post about our AZ trip before the big homecoming. My memory isn't what it used to be and I've learned if I don't write things down right away it's crazy how fast I'll forget it. Good thing for journaling.

The girls and I decided to take a trip to AZ to visit my sister and her family before they move back east to GA and it was a nice way to break up our wait time before Darryl gets home. Our good friends and neighbors the Hofers also just moved to AZ so we were excited to see their family again too. Trips are always fun to look forward to and I've had them spread out throughout this deployment which has helped us manage through.

The flying part by myself with the girls isn't my favorite thing to do, and this trip didn't help my attitude about flying solo w. them. A poor decision I made from the start was wearing white pants on the flight. What rational mom does this? I was setting myself up for something "really wrong" to happen. We are flying into the Tucson airport and I forget that it is surrounded by mountains, which means a lot of turbulence. Cora gets motion sickness and I forgot to go thru what to do if you experience this on the flight. Hmmm....good thing all she had to eat and drink all day was apple juice and pretzels. After she was finished I showed her the white baggie tucked in the seat pocket in front of us and told her what it was for. Just a little too late w/ that instruction. Oh well. At least we were renting a car at the airport and no one was going to be there to see us (and smell us) get off the air plane.

We ended up renting a Ford Edge. We definitely couldn't miss it in a parking lot because it was a nice burnt orange color. Fitting for AZ. Cora still talkes about that car and everytime she sees one that looks like it or even a car w/ the same burnt orange color she says there's our car. When Daddy gets home I want one of those. Sorry Cora we're getting another Van.
As we started our drive down to Sierra Vista Cora was so excited to see Cacuses. That is not a spelling error, she really called them that the whole time. I turned on the radio and to my surprise...Dust in the Wind came on the radio. Perfect timing as we're making the drive from Tucson to Sierra Vista...really just desert in between.


On this trip we also discovered Shay has alergies in the desert just like her Daddy. Her nose was running the whole time and the drainage would go down into her tummy and the poor little girl would have her tummy get upset almost everynight. Needless to say we were doing laundry everyday. Good thing my sister lives on post where they don't have to pay for water.

My cute little nephew van ended up getting a serious case of the hives when we were there as well. Poor little guy. They honestly covered his body from head to toe.

More and more this vacation was sounding like one out of the National Lampoons Vacation movies.

Aside from all this we did have a great trip and it was wonderful to see all the cousins play together. Lisa's husband JC watched the kiddos so we could have a sisters' night out. Thank you JC! We went and saw Baby's Mama but I think we were laughing more at the theater than the movie. We always have a great time together no matter what we do. We had a "Survivor Finale night" w. our dear friends the Hofers. So much fun to watch it w/ friends then by myself. We went to see these cool underground caves the "Colossal Cave" in fact and it reminded Lisa and I of one of our favorite movies Goonies.


I'm so glad we took this trip. I love to travel and see beauty in all places and landscapes. Coming from green WA it was amazing to see the desert and all of its beauty and especially the awesome sunsets. It was a great trip and I am happy to report after some dramamine and more instruction we didn't have any mishaps on the flight home. Until our friend picked us up from the airport and Shay started getting sick in their new van...shoot. All in all we loved our trip and would do it again for sure *especially because we'll be traveling w/ Darryl on our next trip!
Yay!