After the longest day in the world…left the house at 9:30, stopped in Niagara Falls to finish up all of Isabella’s American-izing paperwork, stopped in Buffalo for lunch and some shopping, our flight landed in Atlanta at 9:00pm and the kids finally were all asleep by 11:15. i was asleep by 11:17.

Isabella decided that yesterday was the day she was going to be fully toilet-trained. good choice, Isabella. We weren’t 20 miles out of Toronto when she started with her “i needa make a pee! i needa make a pee!” so we found out first Tim Hortons. and then we found our second, and then our third. She and I visited at least 12 bathrooms – successfully - yesterday, some of them nice (hello cheesecake factory! i love you and your gorgeous family bathroom!alas, now i love you even more…)

and some were vomit-inducing. I’m very happy that she’s decided to do this…but she’s very small, and still needs lots of help balancing on the seat…which for a person who is germy in general….is enough to cause panic attacks and heart palpitations. At first i thought it was just a game to her…and reason for us to stop the car. for her to get some attentions. but then i realized that she was actually doing her business every time i took her. also…how could i say no?? “sorry, Isabella, i WANT you to use your pull-up” doesn’t exactly seem right…

the kids were actually really well behaved on the flight. i got the two-seater (SCORE!) that i shared with Emily for the first half of the flight and i shared with Josh the second half of the flight. They were both angels. i DID have to play my fair share of

but it was well worth it. and josh even told me my Princess Leia skills were “totally cool”

BUT…i have this thing about personal space. i like mine. perhaps more than most people like theirs. but somehow, on our over-full flight, they put all the families at the back. there were about 7 families with kids and it was all back of the bus for us. somewhere along the line, a mother allowed her three-year-old daughter (who speaks NO English, mind you) to roam free on the plane. and just where did she roam??? ALL. OVER. ME. i felt a little Jerry Seinfeld meets the close-talker…

i swear. she kept coming over and talking to me in complete gibberish and then touching my glasses and my arms and then she tried to sit in my lap. i so wish i was kidding. and her mom was all, “oh, hahahaha” yeah – i’m not laughing. i’m praying. praying that this child has no communicable diseases to speak of…because if she did, i’m surely going to be acquiring them. but how do you get a child off of you? i didn’t really want to physically remove this strange child from my space…but what to do? she was all smiley and giggly and obviously in love with me.

(note #1: my stepmom has agreed to share her Reese Cups Recipe with y’all. i promise to post it at some point today. They are actually relatively easy to make…and also heavenly. she also makes homemade almond joys…and they are quite good too. just not the same peanut-buttery goodness of the reese cups.

note #2: also…yes, her kitchen is to die for. and she’s completely redone the ENTIRE thing since the last time i was here (in August) and it’s even more beautiful. I’ll post pictures of that too.)

for now, i have to run. my daughter needs to pee. once again.

come on over to Juice today. It’s Thursday….and i’ll be making some weekly recommendations 😉