This does more than throw a wrench in things, it's sort of like putting sugar in the gas tank...

For the past few months we've been planning a trip to KS to visit John's parents. His parents plan to retire to KS in 2 years and they recently bought a house there. Their plan had been in the spring to go to KS, to the house, and spend a few weeks fixing it up. John and I decided we would meet them there and spend a week with them. We figured this was a lot easier than flying out plus it fit perfectly in with what has become seeing each other about every 6 months.

Anyway, a LOT of this trip depended on John's mom coming and watching Anne overnight for a few days so John and I could get away and celebrate our anniversary together, sans baby. We had planned to leave this afternoon as soon as John got home from work.

Here's what actually happened. John got home from work, took off his coat and said a few words to me. He ran upstairs to start bringing the bags down so we could leave. The phone rang while he was upstairs. It was his Aunt who also lives in KS. She called, asking us if we were leaving tomorrow. I said, no tonight. She said that John's mom was not there. I (hopefully) assumed she meant that John's mom was not there yet. I said "I know, we won't get there til tomorrow". She repeated that John's mom was not there and actually was not coming. WHAT??!!?? Like I said a HUGE part of this trip depended on John's mom going and watching Anne. We had said this to both his parents several times and were reminded there was a chance his mom wouldn't be able to make it. Still, I had just talked to her on Tuesday, confirming everything was a go. John and I talked to her over the weekend, again confirming her excitement about going. Now are you seriously telling me that 30 minutes before we are to leave you're saying you aren't coming??

Needless to say I don't handle change very well at all. I spent the next 30 minutes bawling my eyes out, close to hyperventilating at times. Poor Anne wandered up in the middle of it all scared out of her mind wonder what was wrong with Mommy.

So long story short, we are not going to KS anymore. No car ride with a toddler, no visiting relatives, no hiking in OK. Nothing. John and I both have the week of and we'll see what we can do to make the best of it. I don't want to leave this making you all think that we were somehow using his parents and the only reason we were going was so they would watch Anne. Nor do I want you to believe that we only wanted to see his mom and are ditching his dad (who is in KS right now.) The main problem is that we were told 30 minutes before we were to drive 600+ miles for 11 hours. John's dad has said all along this isn't a family trip/visit-he is and was going to KS to work. John's other relatives obviously all work and cannot spend time with us while we're there. We aren't going to go, spending close to $1000 to sit in a (literally) empty house for 7 days. Had we gotten some advanced notice (like Wednesday when the decision was made by his mom she wasn't going) we might have been able to make a rational decision and figured out what we could do to make the trip happen. Instead we had to make an emotional decision, split second, with virtually no time to think things through and come up with a solution.

Needless to say I'm still pretty drained from my good cry a few hours ago. I haven't cried like that in a while. Hopefully we can indeed salvage this week and have fun, here at home, as a family.