Hello Sweet Sweet Cyberspace

We are finally home from India. Isabelle, my mom, and I had a GREAT trip! Besides missing my husband, I can honestly say I missed my computer the most, and I have been happily passing jetlag time (as you might notice from my posting time) catching up on friends blogs. And can I just say that I have such a witty group of friends I have been laughing out loud! I guess I am also up because Isabelle caught her first cold...and I feel bad about calling the doctor at 0'dark thirty to get a medicine recommendation. So the little congested thing just fell back asleep in her swing. Of course, her being up may also have something to do with the fact that she slept for 8 hours straight this afternoon!! I think thats the longest she's ever slept! We wore her out on the trip home. The final leg of the trip from JFK to Coloumbus was delayed 3.5 hours...you know what hell that is when you've already been traveling for 30 hours!? We were delerious with lack of sleep!

By the way, I guess I will spend the next few posts giving you trip highlights. So for now, I'll start with an overview:

Isabelle is a natural traveler! She is easy going and flexible and smiles at everyone, so makes fast friends with strangers. And I am sooooo glad that my mom went with us because it would have been very difficult without her. I can just imagine asking the stranger next to me on the plane if he would kindly hold my baby why I went to the bathroom.

We arrived in India to the welcoming experience of what I like to call Indian buracracy. Our bag arrived before us, so was claimed by customs. The experience went something like this: Oh, it's here. Can I get it? Wait for 30 minutes. Let's go and look at it through a locked glass door. Is that it? Yep. Can I get it? No let's go back to the waiting area (with overly sleepy grandmother holding hungry and poopy baby). Wait for 20 minutes. Let's go look at the bag again. That it? Yep, Can I get it? Hold on, fill out two papers. Wait for 10 minutes. Can I get it. No, let's go look at your OTHER luggage just to confirm (confirm what? I dunno). Walk back to waiting family. Check out baggage. Go back to little glass room. Okay NOW you can get your luggage, go through security gate and meet axiously awaiting family members.

But when we went through those doors, we had almost 20 people waiting to see us, with flowers and cold water and smiling faces(all of which fit into one SUV and 2 motorcycles...it makes me rethink the saying, "how many people can you fit on a Guatemalan bus?"). It was soooo good to see all of Conrads family and to meet those I've only heard about or talked to on the phone. And they were very excited to meet Isabelle. My mother in law said, "Now that I have Isabelle here, I don't miss Conrad so much." I was wired with seeing and talking to everyone and was awake the rest of the day! Good for jetlag. But my mom went right to sleep as soon as we got home. So I will post some pictures, but let me prefence them with this: The first thing my Indian family told me was "Danielle, it's so good to see you, you've gotten very plumpy!" (Indians obviously don't have the same hang ups or filters for these things as americans do!) I know, I know, I just had a baby, cut me some slack. So I won't be posting many pictures of myself. I am going to need a few months back at the gym and some quality therapy, but I think I'll recover!! :)