A Weekend Trip, An Adorable Niece and a Stomach Ulcer?!

So this past weekend my sister Beth and I took a quick trip out to California to visit my brother Mark, his wife Mindi and their new daughter Adalyn.

This was the first time that Beth and I have ever had the chance to get away together. A couple of things I realized on this trip...flying is WAY overrated. I don't love the waiting and the boarding and the concern about the luggage....or being squeezed between 2 strangers for 2+ hours...if you could fly anywhere in the US in under 2 hrs and no layovers....that would be ideal!

The other thing that I realized even more was just how awesome my sister is.  As kids we weren't really "friends". She always seemed so much younger than me. But now that we are both married and have kids...we do share some common ground and it was just so much fun getting to spend time talking about life together! She is just an awesome mom and we had such fun laughing together over our kids!

The main reason though that we went to CA was to see miss Adalyn.

Oh my goodness she is just a sweet ball of adorable!! She has such a nice personality. And while, like most babies, she had a few hours of "fussy" time in the evening....she was such a sweetie all day long that she is forgiven! ;)

Beth is giving her a little baby massage to calm her down one night and she was liking that! :) And Mark and Mindi are doing such a great job as parents...it is cool to see my little brother in that role - so very proud of them both!

The only down part to the trip was that I didn't sleep well...I woke up a couple of the nights with this bad pain in my stomach/rib cage.  I was worried that I was coming down with something or didn't know if it was nerves because of flying or what was going on.

The night I got home the symptoms got even worse and I was really hurting....turns out I have a stomach ulcer. Good times. Thankfully I have been feeling MUCH better today with the Prilosec I am on - but this is a reminder to me of how my health can suffer when I am trying to do too much and not taking good care of myself.

That is changing! And the how's and why's are details that are coming....but for now I will say that after this weekend I just feel so blessed. I have such a wonderful family, from my husband and kids that "let" me leave them for a weekend to a sister, brother and their families that make my life more full just having them in it! I am blessed!