There's no place like home

I called my mom this morning to give her a recap of our trip to China and my grandma was with her. When I told her it was good to be home my grandma busted out singing "there's no place like home, humble though it may be, there's no place like home." It's so true. After traveling to the other side of the world - no matter how incredible the trip was -it sure is nice to be home. When we got home last night, I gave Luke a bath, put him in his jammys and put him in his very OWN bed. Ahhhh. He was a happy kiddo. He has been such a good sport with all this nutty traveling. We went to bed at 5:30 pm and got up around 7:00 am. We too were happy kiddos.

Our trip was awesome. Thanks for the tips on traveling. We used a lot of them and they saved the day. He did great but he did have a crying episode on the way there and on the way back. But I feel like he is entitled to at least one 10 minute episode for every 24 hours of traveling his parents force him to endure. :-) Those 10 minutes, however, seem like an eternity when you are in a crowded plane with a screaming baby.

We loved, loved, loved this China trip and after discussing it on the way home - we decided the big factor in making it a great trip was FAMILY. (Especially family who spoke Chinese). I know, I know - we were in China for heavens sake - and it was great to see everything but the frosting on the cake was good times with the fam. We went with Joey's sister Victoria and her husband Mike. And of course stayed with Joey's brother Michael and his family Lisa, Bronwen, Mason, Manon, Griffin and Willa. Bonding and laughing with family certainly adds to a vacation.

I have over 500 pictures and will be sorting through them and posting a few very soon. So stay tuned for tales of hiking the Great Wall, staying in 500 year old hostel in Pingyao, using scary sqatty potties, Luke's throngs of Chinese fans and eating duck, cat ear pasta and cool beans.