va.ca.tion - noun
1. a period of suspension of work, study, or other activity, usually used for rest, recreation, or travel; recess or holiday.
2. freedom or release from duty, business, or activity.
It all started Wednesday at the store. Kailyn was having a TERRIBLE day. I had so much I had to do. I was cleaning the store before we left, doing last minute training with a new girl, taking care of customers, getting deposits to the bank, and just the general day to day responsibilities. But of all the things I had to get done one of them was to talk to my case worker for Medicaid and give him an update from Daniel's employer that was especially important and time consuming. Medicaid is time sensitive. You turn in your application, are given a date to have all your paperwork turned in by (usually a week and a half), and then are given 10 days ONLY to get anything extra turned in whether it's something you missed or you are waiting for someone else to get something to you. Another thing to know about Medicaid is you aren't ever given your case worker's direct contact information. You have to get through to the representatives on their "800" number and leave a message with them to direct to your case worker and then the case worker is supposed to call you within 48 hours.
Well, as crappy as the day was, I had called the "800" number and got through to a representative with all the things Daniel's employer needed from my caseworker. I got home at it was time to pack and clean my house as we were leaving at 5:30 in the morning to head up to Utah. So I was multi tasking packing, laundry, cleaning, and Kailyn while Daniel ran some errands with a friend. Long story short: Daniel and I both pulled an all nighter and were on the road by 6 am. We made the drive to Provo by 1 pm without any accidents, although I did see Danny doze off a couple times when he was driving.
Here's where we started having issues. We got to Provo to see Daniel's sister who just started at BYU. After that quick stop I decided to drive the rest of the way to my parents house. While I was adjusting the settings I noticed a warning light. Neither of us knew what it meant, but Daniel assumed it was his regular maintenance check light since it was about time for him to go in. So we drove the 40 minutes to my parents house and didn't drive our car until the next afternoon when we went out to get lunch. Before we pulled out onto the busy road the car was making a funny sound in the back. But, instead of checking, we kept heading out and decided to just looked up the warning light symbol in the owner's manual. I couldn't find it so Daniel pulled over and found it: Low tire pressure. Fantastic! We don't know how long the light had been on except for sure in Provo. So Danny changed the tire to the spare and we headed back to the house. After a quick shower we loaded up, went and got lunch at one of our hot spots in Utah, and headed over to Costco to get the tire fixed. Well, the tire wasn't fixable. I new tire cost us roughly $180 and after talking to the Toyota dealership in Vegas we found out that the tire wasn't covered in our warranty so it was all coming out of pocket.
Note that this was all on Friday, the last day that my caseworker could call me to be within his 48 hour time limit. He never called so that added to the stress of the day, especially since Monday was a holiday and we wouldn't even be in town until Wednesday.
The next morning we picked up Michelle and headed up to Idaho for Daniel's family reunion (after making a couple stops for errands that had already put us all in a bad mood). On the way up Daniel was in another car's blind spot and they kicked up a piece of metal that hit the front of our car. We saw something fly up the front of our windshield and assumed it was whatever the van kicked up. When we stopped to get gas about 3-4 hours later Daniel showed me the front of his car and the Toyota emblem was missing. So that was what flew in front of our windshield. Our car is, by the way, 2010. Practically new. GRRRRR!
After another hour or so we finally got to Daniel's family property. It was beautiful. A river runs right next to it, pretty trees on most sides, and a TON of loose dirt everywhere. My allergies went nuts. That dirt was in everyone's eyes, nose, and throat. And it didn't help that the younger kids were all rolling around in it and throwing it at each other. I kept Kailyn away from it even though everyone told me she was going to get dirty. I still couldn't encourage her to go get dirt in her eyes. We got to spend a little bit of time with some of Daniel's favorite cousins but it was cut short since everyone was going to tubing down the river. We all had lunch together and that's when the worst part of the trip happened.
Kailyn starting acting like a wild child after lunch. She couldn't sit still. It's hard for Danny to get around because of his ankles and I can't get around because I'm pregnant. It got super frustrating when we asked Kailyn to do things (come here, don't touch, go see Grandpa) and she flat out ignored us. She's usually well behaved. So finally we set her in a camping chair while we helped clean up lunch. We were both, literally, within 3 feet of her. She tried to lean over the edge of the chair and I caught the chair before she could fall over and warned her to sit still of she was going to fall. We continued helping, still just as close as before and about 5 minutes later she leaned over the edge again and no one could catch her. I saw her hit her head on a cinder block but it didn't look like she hit it hard enough to have anything worse than a nasty scratch. Danny got to her first and when I asked if she was ok he said she was fine. But then he looked at her head and said she would need stitches. He told me afterwards that he could see her skull. She was bleeding everywhere.
After we got her bandaged up we headed to the closest emergency clinic in the area which was only about a half hour away. The staff was great but the actually facility made us a little nervous that things wouldn't get done right. But they glued her up (no stitches!!) and got her a tetanus shot and everything looked great. We don't have insurance currently so we are going to have to pay for that. Still no bill in the mail, but we're hoping we'll be able to get Medicaid by then.
The rest of the trip was great. Kailyn was right back to normal. We stayed in a motel room that night (no camping when I'm 7 months pregnant), headed back into town to spend the day with cousins, went to the Idaho State Fair, drove back to my parents house, Danny went shooting with the boys and I went window shopping with the girls... we were also able to spend time with Kenneth's family our first night in, which was a blast. Anyways, the trip all together was a bust financially and stressed us out beyond belief. Especially because we had seriously considered not making the trip at all. But spending quality time with my family and Daniel's family was great. But we are definitely taking a vacation from taking vacations.
The morning after.
On our way to the motel.
The bear the nurses gave her for being so brave.
There's more blood on Danny's shirt hiding in the folds.
Patched up and tuckered out.
