Home for the Holidays

So now that it is February, I am finally getting around to posting an account of our trip home for the holidays. Amelia and I started the journey with just the two of us, and I was rather nervous making the trip from Portugal to Oregon on my own with a 16 month old, but there was no need to be. She was such a great traveller on the starting leg, that I told her I wouldn't care if she screamed the whole way to Vermont the next week (in hindsight probably not the best thing to have told her, and I am really glad she didn't take me up on it). We arrived in Portland tired, but relatively on time and with all of our luggage, so a good start to the trip. We spent the next week visiting with friends and relatives, Amelia loved seeing everyone, as did I of course, and she took quite well to the very social routine that is so different from our fairly quiet life here in Portugal.

Dan joined us after a week, a day late thanks to the snow storm in Newark stranding him there for an extra night. We celebrated Christmas eve with my family and got up early on Christmas morning for the cross-country flight to Vermont. We made it in time to join in Christmas dinner, and it was great to have all of the little cousins together (Isabel 10, Calvin 8, Jasper 2.5, Nathan 2, Coco 19 months, Amelia 15 months, and Oliver 3 months) and to distribute and recieve the news of the two newest cousins scheduled to arrive at the end of July (that's us!) and in August (Julie and Jim).

We spent the rest of the week with more catching up with friends and family, sledding, lots of appointments, and topped it off with the big New Year's party at Mary and Pierre's. Amelia didn't quite make it to New Year, as she finally went to sleep at 11:40 pm, maybe next year.

After all the festivities we had to say our good-byes and get on the plane for home. Amelia treated us to another hassle-free trip, she slept the entire flight from Newark to Lisbon! We loved seeing everyone, and since we don't know when Amelia and I will be able to make it back to the US, we will have to be satisfied with all of the great memories we have from this one. For a few photos of our trip and some more Amelia shots, click here.