Swedish Food & Furniture

Well with all the excitement of finally getting out of the car, meeting new family members, and even getting some sweet gifts, this crazy Tater Tot didn’t go to sleep until 10:30pm last night! Which is definitely the latest she’s ever stayed up straight without sleeping, but she was still surprisingly happy and sweet. The adults all ended up staying up till 1am chatting, and just enjoying catching up!

And then first thing this morning, she was ready to open up her two other surprise gifts that we wouldn’t let her bust into late last night.

We started our day the Gergich way, when Tammy made us eggs, (turkey) bacon & toast for breakfast. So yummy!

Uncle Phil (Dave’s younger brother), and Aunt Tammy with Emmie! She really liked them, and they loved her, and we had a great time being with them for this short trip!

They got her these giant stuffed animals, a unicorn & a kangaroo with a baby in her pouch, and of course she loved them so much! She held them all the way on the 15-minute ride to IKEA.

Then we spent like three hours walking around, seeing all the things, eating lunch, testing couches, and shopping in the Marketplace.

Swedish Meatballs all around for lunch! (We even bought a bag of their frozen meatballs to bring home, plus a packet to make the gravy, and a jar of their lingonberry jam.) And the extra “side” of four meatballs was for us to share, in case any of us wanted more, and literally every meatball seen below eaten.

She did so great using a glass (which I don’t think she’s ever done before), and loved their sparkling pear drink. Then of course she just wanted to eat the ice out of the glass, as usual.

And we did find a couch we liked! We were going back & forth between two of them. We liked the mid-Century-modern style of one of them a lot, but in the end, it just wasn’t as comfy as the other one. So comfort won out in the end. (But can you believe I didn’t get a photo of the couch we bought?! And since as I’m writing this, it’s now 8:40pm, and we’re exhausted from a long, busy two days, it’s not getting put together in our living room until tomorrow…)

We of course also bought a whole buggy full of other things, like pillows & covers, crib sheets, twinkle lights, white bowls, salad tongs, a step stool for Emmie to “help” in the kitchen and a different step stool for Emmie for the bathroom sink, fake plants & pots, etc…

We started out only tying it all down with twine, but then quickly decided that wasn’t enough, and dug the ratchet straps out from underneath Emerson’s car seat. But a few miles down the road, we had to stop at Walmart to buy a second pair of ratchet straps, & packing tape, and Jeff tied down & taped down the whole deal three ways from Sunday…

Meanwhile, we wore out this sweet baby and she fell asleep in the car, only 15 minutes after we left IKEA. That was exactly what I wanted though, and scheduled the day hoping & praying she would sleep on the way home. And it worked! She ended up sleeping like 2.5 hours, and only woke up about 30 minutes from home. (We had to drive slow, with the stuff in the back, plus we made some stops for the tie-down straps & to check on stuff, so it took us a little longer to get home from Jax than usual.)

We got home right at 6pm. We backed the truck into the carport at a wonky angle, so we could unload the giant, super heavy boxes directly into the side door, onto the top step, as easily as possible. (This was my idea, and it worked like a charm.) Then we got all the rest of our stuff unloaded, and got Emerson’s car seat back in my car. Then we went back out to grab tacos for dinner.

By the time we did all that and got back home, it was after 8pm, and after Emmie’s usual bedtime. We got her in her Anna & Elsa nightgown, which she specifically asked for. The bunny she’s holding below is the one we let her pick out at IKEA today, and she decided on the way home, to name the bunny Anna! And you can see her new unicorn & kangaroo good in these photos as well.

She was super sweet and loving while we read books and sang lullabies, and we didn’t have much trouble getting her down for bedtime.

Jeff is gonna run back over to his parents house to switch the truck for his car, and I’m going to try to tidy up a little bit, if I can muster up two ounces of energy. The house is a cluttered mess though, so it needs at least a little work!

We had so much fun on our teeny little road trip, and I’m so glad we found a couch we both liked and agreed on! I’m also grateful for safe travels, Emmie’s nap in the truck, and no rain on our way back to Tally, since that storm was threatening us. Can’t wait to get the new couch put together tomorrow, and then figure out what to do with the old one!