Don’t judge me — I finally caved and bought Chris an iPad for his birthday. It was a joint gift from me and both sets of parents, so at least the price was reasonable. He got it on Friday and I’m fairly certain he didn’t put it down for more than an hour the entire weekend. Here’s the best part: now that he has access to all these cool apps, he has finally taken an interest in where we’re going for our cruise. Apparently he didn’t even realize the Kiel Canal is an actual canal with locks and everything. He’s a clueless idiot, but I love him anyway.

This is the first night in over two weeks that I feel almost back to normal. I caught a cold the week before the BBQ that quickly turned into an unbearably painful sinus problem. I had the same problem when we flew back from Rome a couple years ago, and I remember how completely plugged up and utterly miserable I was on that flight, and I couldn’t bear the thought of going off to Sweden like that. So the morning of the relay, I finally went to a doctor and got some antibiotics, and at last I can breathe again.

Speaking of the relay…despite the fact that it poured almost the entire day and I was walking in the rain with a sinus infection, it was a fun experience. Everyone there was in good spirits (some people went right on playing volleyball or whatever despite the weather) and it was all for the kids, so that was a good motivator. I would totally do it again next year. (Never mind that it’s been three days and my shoes are STILL wet…)

We had Brayden’s kindergarten orientation this week — my baby is growing up. He reached a very cool milestone today: he read a word on a sign by sounding it out! He’s been able to sound out the individual letters for quite a while, but he never put it all together until today. Awesome.

And we are only four days away from our big trip! I don’t think it feels quite real yet. I’ve been planning for so long that it just seems like it’ll never actually happen. We’re off to Stockholm on Saturday — how cool is that?