Road Trip: Day 1 and 2

Late spring/early summer Andy and I made the decision to go out to Washington to see his brother and sister-in-law (who happens to be one of my besties since sixth grade!).  We had been talking about it for a while and just decided that would be our trip this summer.  We are hoping they will come home soon and we won't have the opportunity to go visit them again. Wink, Wink.

 

The way it worked with Andy's work schedule and the boys' summer activities was to plan for the last couple of weeks before I go back to school.  Our plans changed here and there but one thing was for sure.  We were driving! 

You could say I was very nervous.  I was very nervous because Andy wanted to drive right through and get there early.  I wanted to stop at night, get some good sleep and continue on in the morning.  Oh! And I was nervous because we were bringing a 2 and 4 year old with us.

We decided to play it by ear.  I planned to be at Andy's work about 4:00 on a Tuesday to pick him up and go from there.  I actually arrived at 3:30, which meant I was early, which also never happens.  On his way to work that morning, my Dad had dropped Andy off at work so he wouldn't have a car to worry about.  Everything seemed to be falling into place. Although I had not wanted to drive through the night, after a 5.5 hour nap, my husband convinced me he would be fine driving through the night.  He took over at about midnight after I had killed about every mosquito in North Dakota.  Although I didn't sleep much through the night, Andy and I had great talks and some intense moments of me grasping the side handle and saying "Let's just find a hotel for the rest of the night". Regardless, we made it.

Aiden fell asleep when we were still in the cities and slept for a good couple of hours.  He woke up about 5:30. My parents and the sweet family I tutor for each made little travel bags for the boys.  So, they each got two bags of goodies that I spaced out for our trip.  When they woke up, I gave them each a bag of goodies that kept them entertained until bed time. They watched a movie and were out for the entire night not to wake up until 6 am the next morning.  The usual time.    

We spent a lot of time planning the actual trip out to Washington and back.  We packed a big Thirty-One tote full of snacks and a cooler with lunch meat, cheese, bread, yogurt, and cheese sticks.  We didn't stop for one meal.  Only some coffee.  We had destinations we could stop at along the way if we needed a break.  We had the route all figured out. 

We made it all the way to Seattle before a melt down arose.  Keep in mind that my 2 and 4 year old boys had been in the car for about 29 hours straight after picking up Andy from work and heading out.  The boys were maybe out of the car for a total of a half an hour when all was said and done.  They did great!  I am looking forward to many more road trips in the years ahead.