Sorry...

It has been a rough couple of weeks.

James did not end up having pneumonia, just a really awful respiratory infection and a virus on top of that! He finally stopped running a fever after about 4 or 5 days and went back to work after a week. It is so unlike him to miss work unless he is really ill especially a week at a time! He went back to work last Tuesday and then on Thursday we were hit by another wave!

The stomach flu hit my house. It started with Gavin in the early evening of Valentine's Day. We were on the way to drop off flowers and a card to Gramma and he started throwing up in the car. He had a look of bewilderment on his face! He didn't know what to do, what was going on and knew that he DIDN'T like it. So we pulled over, cleaned him up and changed his clothes. Hoping this was just a one time thing, we kept going on our journey; after all, we were almost there! Well, so that I don't go into too many details for all of you I will give you the short and sweet version. We ended up trading Gramma the flowers for a Sierra Mist and oyster crackers and headed back home. After 2 more vomiting episodes (one actually happening as we were parking the car in our driveway), he was done! It was like he was saying well we are home now, I need to play so I guess I won't get sick anymore!

I made the kids pancakes for dinner for something bland on their bellies and off to bed they went about 8:00. Then James and I had our dinner. It was pan seared Salmon over a bed of steamed spinach on top of garlic mashed potatoes with a beurre blanc sauce on top! Killer meal, if I do say so myself! Dinner was great, James even wanted seconds and since it only takes 6 minutes to totally pan sear a salmon fillet, it was really easy!

We then started on the cherry pie. I am not a big pie fan at all and definitely not cherry, but I found this GREAT recipe for James a tart cherry pie. He loves sour things, so I was very excited about this. I have never made a pie before either, so this was very new territory, but the recipe seemed easy enough...right?! Anyway, they didn't have fresh tart cherries in Indiana in Feb, they didn't have canned tart cherries (or at least not in the pie section) and they didn't have frozen tart cherries either; so I settled for 2 cans of cherry pie filling, thinking I would just cut out some of the sugar from the recipe. I bought the almond extract, had all the rest of the ingredients at home including already made, roll out pie crusts. I was set...so I thought. I made this "tart" cherry pie according to the recipe and only put in 2/3 cup of sugar when it called for 1 1/4 cups. I thought I was doing great! Then I cut it to serve James a piece, all while telling him what I had done since they didn't have tart cherries. You pie connoisseurs out there already know what I did wrong and are doing now what he was doing as I explained all of it! I learned that night that cherry pie filling is just that...cherry pie filling. No need to add ANYTHING to it, just add to the crust, roll out the top crust and bake! Simple right?! Well, I did add it to the crust...after I had added the almond extract, sugar (that was supposed to be less than called for!), cornstarch, and lemon juice! So I made a cherry pie that was twice as sweet as normal and needless to say after we ate one slice each that evening, the rest of the pie has been sitting in my fridge ever since! OOOPPS! See, this is why I don't bake!

Anyway, back to the stomach flu. 4 o'clock in the morning comes and I wake up to James getting sick in the bathroom. This man has an iron stomach and has only thrown up twice in the last 6 1/2 years that we have been together! I am glad that Gavin started it all though, because I would have thought it was my cooking! Ha. James felt better when he got up Friday morning and headed to work. I was doing okay at the time, still hoping that it would pass Peyton and me up and find another place to go, but had no such luck. So, with 2 toddlers running around the house on Friday and James at work, I started and it hit me hard! The mixture of an already weak stomach from pregnancy and the flu was not a good combination for me! I laid around most of the day, only getting up to change a DVD or get my kids something to eat/drink. Surprisingly though, they were pretty mellow that day which allowed me to be a watchful eye from the couch instead of a participating mommy!

So, we are all well now, but it has seemed like an incredibly long 2 weeks! I rec'd phone calls from Kelly and Tangie wondering where I was and if I was alive since they hadn't seen us at church! Hahahaha It felt good that people missed us!Hopefully, I will be better at posting updates this week.

Peyton's birthday is tomorrow, so there will be a special one celebrating her, so make sure and come back!