This vacation business is hard work.

Not just for the parents, but apparently for the kids, too!

Obviously, part of the exhaustion was due to being in the sun and running around like wild maniacs all day...but part of it was due to illness.  Yes, you read right...illness.  Because that's just what this family does!  We plan exciting things, then we all get sick either just before or during said exciting thing.  Lets review the illnesses of the week:

Emmy: cold/sinus problems the week leading up to vacation, fortunately, I was better by the time we left.

Melissa: cold/throat problems a few days before leaving, then had no voice whatsoever on Saturday.

Jake: Strep Throat.  The first time ever that the poor kid has had strep, and of course it's just in time for vacation.  Fortunately, he did come down with it prior to us leaving, so we started him on antibiotics on Thursday, and he was doing much better by the end of the day on Sunday. 

Liam: Ear Infection and major teething.  First ear infection since he had his tubes put in, go figure!  He woke up with it on Saturday, so we had to call the doctor in Pittsburgh, who had to call the drops into a pharmacy in NJ.  That cleared up within a few days.  He has been teething for what seems like an eternity at this point, but when vacation first started I saw 5 brand new white buds in his mouth, and over the week of our trip 3 of those totally cut through.

Ben: Started running a fever at the beginning of the week, had a cough and runny nose.  His lasted the entire time we were there.

Brian: Started feeling sick around Wednesday of our trip, was running a fever, had chills, body aches, cough, runny nose, etc... super fun times.  He felt a bit better by the end of the week, but is actually back to feeling kinda blah now. 

So if you're keeping track, there were 8 of us on this vacation, SIX of the eight were man down at some point.  Brutal.  Dennis came out unscathed, although even baby Parker ran a fever once we were all at home. 

Next year, I'm putting everyone in a quarantine bubble for a few weeks leading up to our trip.