สวัสดี Sawadee-Ka!

We're back! We made it back from our two week trip to Thailand to visit my family for Christmas. It was a full two weeks and there is so much to document. I think it's going to be many, many posts with many, many pictures. But for this first post, I'm just going to address the list of fears from my previous post:

1. Losing passports - Fortunately, we didn't lose any passports on the trip. But that was only because I was checking and rechecking them the entire time we were traveling. Very stressful.

2. 16 hour plane rides with three children - The trip out there was better than expected. The stars aligned and everything went so smoothly. The seating arrangements, the long periods of sleep, an open seat for Jude to sit in, sitting in the front row, etc. Kobe and Luke were so great and my brothers helped with them a lot. The trip back was not so great. For the long flight, my brothers sat at the opposite end of the plane. And so that Jude could have his own seat (which was pretty important since he's not great at lap-sitting for 16 hours), Jake went and found an open seat three rows back. Result: Me sitting with the three boys alone the entire time. Jake would try and switch me spots, but then all I could hear was Jude crying for me non-stop and when he finally figured out where I was, he would constantly try to come back and see me. Not worth it. I think my tears started flowing at about hour 12.

During breakfast Kobe had fallen asleep and kept knocking off food that was sitting on his tray. I went over to go and pick it up when sleeping Jude rolled off of his seat and started crying. I rushed back over to him, sat down to try and get him back to sleep, when Luke accidentally knocked his full yogurt cup over on my pants. I didn't sleep the ENTIRE flight, so I'm a little hazy on the details, but I'm pretty sure I had a little breakdown on the plane involving some yelling, crying, and drama. I am still not recovered from that flight and don't foresee any plane trips ever again in our family's future. I don't know how Brad and Angelina do it.

3. 4 Hour Layovers - We had the long layovers on our trip out there, so they weren't that bad. My brothers helped entertain my boys a lot. Phew!

4. Watching my three children drown in the icy, winter ocean - Yay! No plane crashes! The plane travels so high on these long flights that there really was barely any turbulence. But when there was, I was scared. I am not a very relaxed flier. The only true scare was the crazy landing we had in L.A., but other than that I felt safe.

5. Jakob's strep-throat - Miraculously, Jake's second round of anti-biotics must have masked his strep-throat long enough for none of us to get sick. We were all very healthy on our trip, and it was so, so nice. I think the beautiful warm weather may have helped our sickly ways, because right when I saw the snow out of our plane window as we flew into Denver, my nose started to congest.

6. Child-trafficking - Some of you may have felt that some of my fears were a little irrational, but - I kid you not - we had a little scare on the first day of our trip. When we landed in Bangkok, my brothers, Jake, and I were a teensy bit distracted at baggage claim as we tried to round up all of our luggage and make sure we had everything. Jakob turned over to check on the boys, who were still very close to us, and saw an older Thai man in a suit walk over to Kobe, grab his hand, and say, "Hello. You are my new friend. Come with me and ride in my car." Kobe was very uncomfortable and Jake walked right over and grabbed Kobe away. The man only walked like 10 feet away and just stood there staring at my children. I don't know for sure if he wanted to take Kobe for child-trafficking, but it was enough to scare me to death.

But besides that, I felt very safe with my children while we were there. The Thai people loved my boys. I guess they really love children with light skin. Everywhere we went people were constantly touching my boys arms and faces. Everywhere. While we were just walking in the mall there would just be a constant stream of hands reaching out to touch them. And it was encouraged further when my boys learned to bow and say, "Sawadee-Krup", which means hello. When we got the Thai pictures taken, the "girls" that helped us get ready were even kissing their cheeks and constantly trying to hold Jude. And by "girls" I of course mean men dressed as women. There are a ton of them in Thailand. A little creepy, but I guess you had to be there because it was really cute.

While we were sight seeing, I was holding Jude and a Thai woman walked right up to us, pulled out her camera, and took a picture of Jude. All her friends behind her were reaching at his hands and giggling. Thailand really is the land of smiles. The people there were so kind and innocent and we really enjoyed spending time in that country.

7. The Tsunami - Miraculously, no tsunami this year. :) But we didn't even go to the beach anyway because it was three hours away and we were all too exhausted.

8. The box of Christmas gifts - Our huge box full of Christmas gifts made it in time for Christmas - BARELY. It came to the embassy the very last day it could have before Christmas. Another very stressful experience.

9. My children falling off an elephant - I'm not going to say that this was NOT a possibility. There are definitely no safety regulations concerning elephant riding in Thailand. I could not cross this off of my list until we were all safely on the ground. It was an extremely bumpy ride, and the guide on our elephant kept turning around and telling us to scoot different directions to even out the weight of our carriage. Why? Because if we didn't the carriage would topple to the ground? Probably so. Probably so.

So, now that I've addressed my fears, I'd like to add three things that should have been on my list of fears, knowing what I know now:

1. Extreme jet-lag. The time change was tough. Especially on three little boys' minds and bodies. But we got through it somehow and, after a few days, it felt normal. I think that coming home is going to be harder. My boys were up for good at 3am this morning, but then went back to sleep at 9am and are still asleep. It's 3pm. Our bodies are confused, and its going to be tough.

2. After sneaking a peak at Denae's blog at the end of our trip, I was updated about a fatal tiger attack at the San Francisco Zoo. It dawned on me then that maybe I should've been a little more afraid here:

The guide was telling us to walk very slowly up to the tiger and not to get too close or touch it. They were also feeding the tiger milk the entire time, to try and satisfy his thirst for blood, I guess. I probably should've been a little more fearful on our visit to 'Safari World' world, as well. You just drive around in your van through fields of wild animals. We were feet away from tigers. I guess now I know.

3. Biting Monkey's. Kobe got bit by a monkey while we were at a Monkey show. It didn't bleed, but it was a definite scratch on his thumb. After the Monkey show, they let us all come and shake the monkeys' hands. There were these two little ones and while we were all waiting to shake one of their hands, Kobe wandered over to the other one. When he extended his hand, the monkey took it to his mouth and bit his thumb. Kobe didn't tell us at first, but then when Luke went over to shake the biting monkey's hand, Kobe started screaming, "No! Stop! That monkey bites!" We didn't get the bite checked or anything, just cleaned it. I hope that this is the end of that story.

But my number one fear for the trip should've been dying......of happiness. I almost died of happiness here:

And here:

And here:

And here:

And here:
It was an amazing trip and I am so grateful to my parents for giving that to our family. More trip details to come!