Road Trip: Part 1

This past weekend I drove with the kids, without Ben, to Utah. Thankfully, his parents were with me and helped with the girls and everything actually turned out to be really great- albeit exhausting. We ended up having a fantastic time and were able to do quite a few things. I even think Ben felt a little bad he missed out (he has been avoiding this trip for 5 years, and was able to worm his way out of it because his boss demanded he work tons of overtime. In 7 years, Ben has never had to work overtime, and it just happened to be when we were planning our trip. Coincidence? Perhaps. But, in the end, I think Ben would have rather been on the road trip than working incredibly long hours).

Here the kids are- ready to head out. Audra was so excited for a road trip. She had never been on one before, and she thought it involved an airplane, so I am not sure that it ended up meeting her expectations.

 We stopped at Little America for ice-cream- how can you not? It took us 12 hours to get there, and 10 hours to get back. I was worried about the kids so we took lots of stops to let them run out some energy. Really, though, they did great- I was surprised and impressed.

 Lessons I learned from this trip:

-DVD players in cars are GENIUS for road trips- that seriously made the trip so much more bearable!
-I will never live in Wyoming. Ever. That wind is awful.
-Audra is an excellent sleeper.
-Claire is a horrible sleeper.
-There is reason God's plan calls for both a mom and a dad: having another one to share the burden saves Mommy from going insane.
- Ben's family is awesome! I loved being able to get to know them all better!!!
-Claire gets motion sickness. Poor girl- she gets it when looking down (coloring). She also doesn't like  having throw up on her.
-Ben owes me BIG time.
-As long as Claire has a cat to love/annoy, she is pretty happy- even in a new environment with all new surroundings (though some time alone to play by herself also helps).
-Even though it was a little rough at times, I am really glad we did it. But now I need to go get some sleep...


Stay tuned for what we actually DID on the trip as opposed to just a round-up of the trip itself.