Home at last. (And the tale of the wine explosion at 40,000 feet!)

Sweet readers, have you ever been away from home (with your baby!) for five and a half weeks? I can tell you, that upon arriving home yesterday afternoon, it felt positively weird. It reminded me of walking in the door after having given birth and stayed in the hospital for nearly a full week. Following the transformative, life changing event of giving birth and the hospital stay avec bébé, our apartment felt surreal; like a mirage somehow, as if I weren't actually there. Yesterday afternoon it was the same way. I marveled at how familiar everything was, touched things to be sure they were real, admired the furniture and coziness of it all. It's difficult to describe. It felt like I was somehow in a home of mine that had disappeared, or gone to the moon, and then suddenly come back again. Thankfully that limbo feeling went away after a few hours. Then it was perfectly comfortable to be back in my own space with my own routines: J made me a delicious dinner, Coco went to bed at 8:30 (perfect) and then I went upstairs to see the neighbors and went to bed at 10:30 (perfect again ;).

This morning Coco and I woke up at 8:15 to sun streaming in the windows!

She let me know she was ready for her nap at 10:30 on the dot - no jet lag?! Fingers crossed on that one. ;)


Then I set about rescuing my new J.Crew shirt that suffered a wine explosion on the plane! Yes, that's right. A wine explosion. It turns out that those plastic cups on the plane are quite brittle. So a little squeeze meant that my cup broke apart and wine went everywhere. Everywhere! All over my shirt, drenched my tray and completely sprayed the face of the man sitting next to me. Horror! Thank goodness Coco and I were seated next to the two most wonderful, fathers themselves, sweet as can be Irishmen of all time, Alan and Simon. They held Coco throughout the flight, bounced her, walked around the plane with her while I ate my dinner (that was Simon - no joke!) and were sympathetic and helpful the entire time. Swoon! I've always loved the Irish, but those two strengthened my love, admiration and devotion to that culture even more. Alan wasn't the least bit ruffled by the wine explosion. He just wiped his face with his napkin and said, "Well it happens, you know?" Yes, Alan, I do know. And I can't thank you enough for knowing. Bless him! Bless them both!

Here is my shirt pre-Vanish soak. Uh-oh! Can I just say that I'm so glad I had extra clothes for myself and Coco? We used them all!


Immediately after dunking the shirt in the Vanish, the wine stains turned blue and very quickly started to fade to a greenish hue.


Fifteen minutes later, nothing! 


I heart Vanish. Not to be completely dramatic, but honestly, it's a miracle! Do you remember the days before oxygen bleach? You had to salt the red wine stain immediately, soak it for days, wash it in cold, hope and pray, dance for the stain gods and it still always stained for good. Not anymore. So totally rad if you ask me. :)

This afternoon we are having chicken wraps with N upstairs, heading down to the lakeside for a walk with the kiddos and bringing a blanket so we can all soak up some sun on the grass. Then when J gets home, it will be another walk outside. I'm so grateful that spring has sprung! At the same time, I'm filled with dread seeing all this sun and praying that my allergies won't be half as miserable as they were last year. Oof!

What are your favorite spring activities? Or if you have them, drug-free, breastfeeding-friendly allergy survival tips? ;) Happy spring!

{top photos taken with Instagram}

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