I tried to document a little bit of our time on the road, though most of it won't be very interesting to you readers. It will, however, be a fond memory to recall as our little family made our own sort of pioneer trek from the Pacific Northwest all the way down South to Texas.
We mapped out our travel plans and travel time for each of our five days of driving averaged about 8 hours (a couple of days a bit less, and a couple days a bit more). That means, 8 hours if you didn't stop at all. 8 hours a day with a 4, 2 and 2 month old meant more like 11 hours a day, as we had to stop for lunch, dinner, potty breaks, and nursing breaks. And every now and then Jacob and I did a Chinese fire drill to switch drivers. We were in a hurry, but we tried to enjoy and make the most of the times we stopped to stretch our legs. I have to say I was shocked and amazed at how well all three kiddos did considering it sucks to be stuck in a car for that long...for five days in a row. They were rockstar road trippers, for sure!
I am going to backtrack a moment. So, we packed everything up and cleaned our townhouse and were out by Friday evening. We met up with some friends for Menchies Frozen Yogurt in Lynnwood (a suburb just north of Seattle) and checked into our hotel that evening. The next day, I hopped on the ferry and went to spend the day on Whidbey Island, where I photographed a gorgeous wedding. It was a perfect day - until I suddenly got sick! Luckily, the ceremony was over, but right when they were reading speeches and toasting at dinner, I got sick, like stomach sick UGH! I ran off and tossed some "cookies" in the outhouse of the private beach (and it was hot that day, so it was a bad combo). I went back and caught them doing the cake (well, actually, they did pie, but you know what I mean) and I got sick AGAIN! This time, I ran off and tossed some more cookies - behind someone's horse trailer. YUCK. It was the worst! And I felt so bad - bad because I felt so sick and bad for getting sick during their wedding as the photographer! I had to leave early. Luckily, they are way awesome and were totally understanding and really, we got most the pics we needed by then anyway, but still! So I booked it back to the ferry - and tossed even more cookies at a stop sign along the way (who knew I had so many cookies in me?) It was horrible! I got back to our hotel about 10pm and told Jacob I was sick so the next day, though we planned to get an early start, I told him to just let me rest until I felt better to travel. Luckily, I did feel better after a good night's rest and we headed out about 11am. Destination: Idaho
We drove through Washington, Oregon, and then into Idaho. When we finally were hungry for dinner, we found this tiny little cafe in the middle of NO-WHERE. You know, where maybe a trucker stops by - it looks something like the photo below?
Aren't those the BEST places? I just love the down-home food and how everyone knows each other (I guess when there aren't many people around it's easy to learn everyone's name). Anyway, the kids were ecstatic to get out of the car and we were all hungry. I let them play around in the parking lot for a bit (since there was only our car and one big semi truck :) No toys needed: isn't it amazing the little things that can entertain kids? They had a blast just tossing rocks around and running around being silly until we went in to get some grub.
I had to laugh when Aspen kind of got all giddy and started pointing to an old picture of John Wayne and said "look! there's Grandpa!" I think she was remembering when she saw my dad in his pioneer trek outfit and Indiana Jones hat. Silly girly!
The kids had the biggest pancakes of their life (and they were SO good I had to try some, too!)
Hazel was such a trooper, as well, considering she was stuck in the middle of her two crazy siblings in the back of a very small Honda Civic the entire way. We are blessed with great little travelers and didn't have to go to great lengths to entertain them (although I am definitely going to admit that the iPad came in very handy on occasion).
We stayed in a hotel just north of Boise that night, a town called Meridian. It was a nice little hotel and the kids were really excited about all of our hotels. We got in around midnight (we lost an hour so it was 11pm our time) The staff was so nice they offered to keep the pool open later for us if we wanted to take a little swim. I really wanted to! It was so nice of them! But, to be responsible parents we decided we should just get everyone into bed. It's surprising how tired you can feel after a day of sitting down in a car for so long, isn't it?
We slept like logs.
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