Photos from Italia

Well, we're back. On Thursday, we woke up in Rome at 6 am and walked into our door in Minnesota at 11 pm. You'd already think that was a long day - but when accounting for the time change, that's a nice 24 hour day! Complete with three flights: Rome -> Frankfurt (1.5 hrs) -> Newark (8 hrs) -> Minneapolis (2.5 hrs) for a grand flight total of 12 hours (give or take). Plus, airport sitting (with a 2 hour delay out of Newark). Ella has now been on 18 flights. Whoa.

We were ready for bed upon returning home. Ella seemed especially happy to see her cat and her bed. She slept well. Loran awoke in the middle of the night to use the bathroom and ended up wandering around our bedroom, unable to find the door (can we say, disoriented?) and I had crazy Italian dreams all night and was weirded out, when upon waking, my feet hit wood floor and not cold tile. We all seemed to wake up, on our own, at 6 am.

Ella is suddenly eating like she hasn't had anything to eat in a week. Oh yeah...that's because she didn't! Everyday, she ate a little more, but not like she would at home. But in the comfort of her highchair, she was an eating machine. Nap came early, due to the early wake-up time. She's been cruising all over the house on her belly - quickly, if I turn my head, she's gone. She's also discovered the tupperware cupboard for the first time today (the only unlocked one) and she's been sampling all of the wares in there. Just another thing I get to clean up at the end of the day - but it means she's moving and exploring, so I'll take it!!

We're slowly unpacking and doing household chores. Ella's reacquainting herself with her toys - which all seem so great after a week away. I have no idea what day it is, my internal clock is off and I have a sore throat that I'm hoping is just from being tired and not swine flu... The lawn is like a mini jungle and the laundry is laundering away. It's back to reality.

I've created some slide shows of our trip - mostly Ella influenced (since it is her blog), but truth be told, most of the photos we took included Ella!