Holiday Fun

So today is my 40th bday, and we're celebrating the holidays with hubby's family.

Let me summarize the past few days:

Day we left:

• while washing dishes, shattered the carafe from the coffee maker in the sink
• our sewer stopped draining properly as we were all trying to "empty" before hitting the road... We called our water/sewer company to report the issue, and decided to go ahead and leave anyway. Will deal with whatever when we get home.
• since I was unable to go to the restroom at home, we stopped at a gas station on the way out of town.  A woman bustled by A and I as we walked in, and turned out there was only a single restroom.  We waited a bit, but we were hearing noises and finally decided it wasn't worth waiting any more so just hit the road.
• got about two hours north of home and I ended up getting my.first.speeding.ticket.EVER. I could understand if I was actually wrong, but the cop shot me doing 56 in a 55 and then tried to say I was in a 40 (he was sitting right behind the sign designating the new speed limit - sure, like I'm going to blow by him like that?!)  Anyway, life goes on.
• our GPS redirected us around jammed traffic, and then proceeded to freeze. Ended up shutting the car off while mostly stopped on I-10 and thankfully it restarted OK.
• my sunglasses broke (these are the kind that slip over my regular glasses, and I only use them when driving.)
• hit major cold front/rain just as we were pulling in for the night

Day 2:

• drove in the rain for about an hour, but thankfully it was warming up at that point. 
• MAJOR wind through west TX. Hardly shocking, but annoying nevertheless.  Thankfully New Mexico was fairly uneventful.
• hit some ice coming out of the mountains in Arizona.
• tried to pull off at a rest stop in a small town in AZ - there was a sign telling us it was coming in 1 mile, but nothing actually designating the turnoff, so we ended up pulling into the wrong place.  D had to go pretty badly, so decided he was going to walk to the right place... well, ended up that we couldn't take the easy walk-through, but had to walk back out to the road.  Hubby had already moved the car around and we were running along... I love walking along highway in the darkness, wearing flip flops in 40 degree weather. Oh, and did I mention crossing the cattle guard?  Good times, good times.
• arrived, but kids having serious coughing fits.  Thankfully no congestion, fever or other symptoms, but we still ended up staying home from church on Sunday.

There's all sorts of side family drama as well, which makes for a turbulent head & heart, but I'm trying really hard to just focus on the amazing gift that we were ALL given thousands of years ago.

Merry Christmas to all!