the beverly hillbillies

hey, we're home. in la that is. got back just yesterday, and i gotta tell ya there's not much i'm missing about the car or I-40 right now. even though we had room in the driveway, tayloe and i parked the wagon across the street and out of sight and both made 'ew' sounds when we realized one of us had to get in it this morning to go fetch some milk.
not it.
our car will probably forever smell like french fries, moldy apple juice, dog and rotten raisins. we were so loaded down from top to bottom we caught other travelers actually laughing at us.
i just plugged in my camera and downloaded photos from the last 30 days (which, mind you, includes christmas) and i have exactly 12 photographs. um, was i asleep?
tayloe did take some photos of christmas morning and amazingly got all 20-something of us tearing through presents at mt.airy, but they're on his camera. there's also a great one of t2 with aunt mary and his amazing, enormous stuffed fish she gifted him. those are coming soon, but in the meantime did any one else get any good ones?
speaking of aunt mary, she's gettin hitched!! engaged on christmas day - isn't that romantic??!!
our trip back was as wham-bam as it gets. we literally drove 9 hours for 5 straight days. i felt sorry for us for a while, because let's face it - singing the itsy-bitsy spider 5,000 times a day isn't unlike ramming bamboo shoots under your nails.
then one bitter cold morning (it was still dark) near topeka, kansas we were pulling away from the motel 6 when i saw a portly, streaky-haired gal hunched over a cup of 7-11 coffee shuffling across the icy parking lot. she was headed for the front office, no doubt just beginning a long day of motel 6 desk duty.
i thought, you know, life's pretty good.
we talked about everything under the sun and when we were done, we moved on to answering life's most troubling questions. like who makes better snackfoods, nabisco or kraft. and counting the number of rock songs with drug references. or quizzing each other on the nickname of every state. somehow new jersey got 'the land of enchantment.' that one really stumps me.
my favorite pass time with t2 became singing whatever song i wanted, but using the hand motions he loves and copies. so i'd do my best rendition of me & bobby mcgee (tayloe on backup) while hand motioning twinkle twinkle little star, little bunny foo-foo, the itsy-bitsy spider or all three.
when we finally reached los angeles city limits, i thought we were both going to cry. you'd of thought we'd just placed first in the boston marathon with all the high fiving and back patting and woo-hooing we did. it was so green and lush and at least yesterday was very warm. best of all we were home.
it was a lovely 2 months and we are beyond blessed to have a beautiful, if not a little eccentric, family and even more blessed to have been so warmly and lovingly welcomed and taken care of.
warm fuzzies and big love, ya'll.