Our Ohio Visit

We headed off to Ohio to visit with my family since most of them had not met Megan yet. But more important was my desire to see my Grandma and introduce her to her 5th great grandchild.

The flights to Ohio were not too bad but we definitely will have to rethink about buying Megan a seat for our trip to Kauai later this year. Giving her some Benadryl helped but she was still extrememly squirmy until she finally conked out. We arrived into Columbus with no major hiccups and met up with my dad and finally were on our way to my uncle's house. Megan got to ride in a forward facing car seat this trip since the car rental company couldn't get the seat installed correctly in the rear facing position (yikes!!). Fortunately she meets the age and weight requirements to make the switch. I think we'll be switching around her seat in my truck soon because I found it fun to see what she was doing while driving. After 2 hours on the road we arrived in Tiffin and briefly said our hellos before heading off to the hotel to get some sleep. Traveling eastbound makes for a very long day!

Our first day was visiting with my Dad and my Uncle and Aunt - my cousin and his family came later that night. Megan did her usual routine with most everyone - shy at first, tease and then become the best of buds. Her favorite was my Aunt Judy who was graced with many hugs. We had two visits with my Grandma at her nursing home. The first one was not really good, with Grandma not remembering me and not showing any interest in Megan. Meanwhile Megan was charming the pants off of everyone in the lobby. Alan was a great Daddy and kept Megan from getting into too much trouble since she wanted to walk everywhere! But our second visit was wonderful but way too short because we were headed out for our 2 hour trip back to the airport. I am bummed that we had the camera already packed away for the trip home and only have pictures from the first visit but glad to at least have those. My Grandma remembered me this time and she was very much interested in watching Megan. She kept asking Megan's age and stating "she's one determined child" which is a very accurate assessment of Megan! For a woman who is going to be 96 later this year and suffering memory losses due to strokes, she is doing pretty good. She definitely has aged since my last visit but she still looks good. I am so thankful that we were able to make this trip happen - it meant so much to me to see my Grandma and to have her meet Megan.

I mentioned above that Megan was walking everywhere, well she "mastered" walking during this weekend in Ohio. It was so awesome!! She figured out how to stand up without the need of someone or something to hold onto, she even started doing u-turns when she'd reach someone and then just keep going to the next person. It was as if a switch was flipped for her and you could just see the excitement in her eyes. I can't tell you how thrilling it was for me that this happened while visiting with my family.

Head on over to Megan's Photo Gallery to see the pictures from our trip (starts at the picture of Megan in a lavendar winter coat).