Home again

Well, we made it home from our latest travels last night and now, we're not going anywhere for the rest of the year! Except maybe to exchange some gifts. And to the grocery store. And the library, probably. And maybe to the Madison Children's Museum, if the girls are especially squirrely. But nowhere else!

The weekend before Christmas, we traveled to central Illinois to visit Greg's family. It was a wonderful visit, marred only by the intense cold and horrific wind we experienced driving back home. It was one of those trips where you have to hold the steering wheel at an angle for the entire time to try to counteract the sideways action of the wind, only to weave a bit when you go under a highway underpass and the wind is blocked. On top of that, there was blowing snow across the highway for the entire portion of the trip that took us across prairie.

Trust me, you haven't lived until you've driven three hours straight through with snow blowing across the freeway that's been flying for ten miles or so, there being nothing to stop the snow out there in mid-America. That trip was only topped by our adventure last night.

This weekend, we traveled to visit my family and to attend the 50th wedding anniversary party of my Aunt Carol and Uncle Jim. I was insistent that we were going to my party, since I'm ashamed to note how long it's been since I've seen these relatives. Let's put it this way; Julia was almost a newborn. I very much wanted my girls to meet the kids of my first cousin Ken (their second cousins).

So despite truly dense fog, we traveled about 1/2 hour north of my parents' house for the party, then drove home in really, really dense fog and darkness for almost three hours. We took the interstate again (a different interstate) because it seemed safer to not have all of those intersections to deal with. But it was bad, really bad. So bad that I didn't feel very comfortable unless I had someone's tail lights to follow. So bad that Greg suggested stopping at a hotel and going the rest of the way home in the morning.

But I persevered, and we made it to Milwaukee, where the fog dissipated. We ate some dinner, then drove the rest of the way home, about another hour. When we stopped to eat, the temperature was an amazing 49 degrees. By the time we pulled into our driveway, it was 34 degrees. We were very glad to see the house still standing and to be welcomed home by the cats (and a pile of dirt from a tipped over plant--hey, you had your holiday and they had theirs).

And now, it's home sweet home for us. Ahhhhhhhhhh.