Have you ever seen "State and Main"?  If you haven't, you should.  It's a wonderful little movie about a studio making a movie in a small town, and worlds collide, etc.  Anyway, there's this amazing scene in which Alec Baldwin, playing a spoiled movie star, gets into a spectacular car crash in the middle of Main St. at night.  As he crawls from the burning wreckage, he looks over at the people watching him, pushes his hair out of his eyes, and says, "So...that happened."

It's been one of our favorite movie quotes from the moment we saw it.  More times than I can count over the years, Nate and I have looked at each other in some bizarre circumstance and said, "So...that happened."  But I can't think of anytime more bizarre or appropriate than right now.  And that is saying a lot.  We lead a pretty weird life.

We're home from our "vacation."  You remember the one that was supposed to last two weeks?  At the beach?  Well, five days later, we're home.  In La Plata.  I don't really want to get into it all right now.  Let's just say that it involved the landlord of our rental house yelling vile curse words at Nate (this was about him having Toby on a leash in the fenced in yard of the place that allowed pets), forbidding our dog to be outside anywhere but on the tiny back porch, and our dog literally clawing a hole in the back door, big enough for him to crawl through into the house, while we were gone to lunch for two hours.  (Just so you know, our dog is not abnormally savage.  The door was completely rotted, so that it was more like sponge than wood.)  Believe it or not, that is not getting into it.  There are so many bizarre and unrelated details that all led up to our having to come home that it's kind of unimaginable.  If any little thing had been different, we wouldn't be here now.  But it was as if some invisible hand was at work.  It's a good thing I believe in God and know He's good.  Otherwise I would be pretty sure that someone was out to get us. 

But that's probably being a bit dramatic. 

I hope someday to be able to recount the full detailed story for you all and make you laugh.  There's nothing I enjoy more than turning the weird, crappy things that happen to me into funny stories.  But I just don't have the perspective for that yet.

I have no idea what comes next.  I've been through all the stages of grieving:  denial, anger, depression, and now I'm just left with I-can't-believe-that-really-happened-but-let's-just-get-past-it.  We're fine.  The kids enjoyed the beach and didn't feel overly sad about coming home early.  After all, they don't have any idea how long two weeks is supposed to be.  We still have Thanksgiving and Christmas to look forward to here soon.  (We're putting off T-day until next week so we can celebrate it as a team.  Em came home from vacation with bronchitis and can't be around other kids for a while.  I'll let Jil tell you that story.)  I am thankful that I don't have any real tragedies to be grieving.  My kids are healthy and happy.  My home is worth coming home to.  My husband and I still get to be together, and we really like that.  We have great friends, and for the first time in I don't know when, some of them live close enough to hang out with and spend holidays with.  That makes me very happy. 

Plus, after a month of being confined to home, we have our car again!  A veritable world of possibilities is before us. 

Real life completely not exaggerated scene from my morning:

Me, sitting on the couch, Ellie on my lap, combing her considerable tangles and preparing to try a new hairstyle with braids. 

Nate, standing outside, front door open, watching Toby run around for a few minutes before we leave him to be gone for most of the day.

Scott playing with toys.  Lucy sleeping.

It is approximately 20 minutes before we are supposed to leave the house to have lunch with our boss.  Who is also a friend, so not really as scary as it sounds.

1.  Toby suddenly makes a bee line for something that no one without a beagle nose can possibly imagine.  All I know is it must have been several blocks away.  Nate grabs shoes and runs after him to drag him home, leaving the front door open.

2.  Scott announces that he has wet his pants.  I reprimand him for this and tell him I will deal with it in five minutes when I have finished Ellie's hair.  Scott immediately begins stripping off his wet pants and underwear.

3.  Lucy wakes up and begins to cry.  I continue combing, knowing that if I let Ellie go now, we'll never get her head to look like anything but the mat of thistles it currently resembles.  Lucy will be fine for five minutes.

4.  I suddenly realize that Scott, completely naked from the waist down, has now wandered out the open front door.  Nate is no where in sight.

5.  Before I can in any way respond to this, my neighbor, who is walking by with arms full of groceries, sees Scott, stops and comes over to shoe him back inside.

6.  Said neighbor is very friendly and speaks English and therefore loves to talk to us.  He comes on inside and begins to chat about this and that.  While I braid Ellie's hair.  While a baby screams in the back room.  While a three-year-old runs around with his butt in the wind. 

Really?  Is this my life?  Or am I just stuck in a bad Ben Stiller movie?

Today Lucy ate her first solid food: delicious rice cereal.  She loved licking the spoon and ate more than I expected for a first attempt. 




In other news, she turned 5 months old last week.


And moved out of Mommy and Papi's room and into the pack 'n play in her own little room on Sunday. 



She'll be going to college before we know it.