The boys had their first official road trip to South Carolina for Thanksgiving! We looked at the price of plane tickets for the three of us (John could still ride in my lap) and decided that we'd be better off driving. This would save us money, give us the ability to pack whatever we needed in the car and give us the flexibility to set our own travel dates a little easier. Not to mention that we wouldn't be hauling carseats through the airport and then installing them into a rental car.
We set off late afternoon/early evening on Tuesday on our travels and planned to stop in Kentucky at a Holiday Inn Express to get a good night's rest and a head start on our day on Wednesday.
But you know what they say about best laid plans.
We hit a ridiculous amount of traffic in Chicago thanks to our bright idea of a start time. That mixed with a potty training kid who did not like being in pullups made for quite the adventure. We finally stopped for dinner at an Oasis and to let traffic clear out. To say it was brutal would be an understatement. Not only that, but our original plan of getting into our hotel between 10 & 11 that evening was completely blown and we rolled in somewhere closer to 2:00 am, complete with the boys both waking up and being pretty much wide awake when we were in the car waiting for Erik to get us checked in.
Original plan: cart 2 sleeping kids in from the car and have everyone sleep well in their own beds.
Actual outcome: We put Will to bed in his shoes and John was not having anything to do with his portable crib that the hotel provided us with. I slept an hour or 2 that night completely convinced that either John would somehow crawl over me and fall out of bed or that I'd fall into a deep sleep and roll on top of him.
Regardless of that, the boys were both in pretty good spirits when we resumed our travel the next morning after breakfast and LOTS of coffee at the hotel.
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| Will gives road trips 2 thumbs up! |
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| I used part of the trip to practice french side braiding... so exciting |
We thought the stop in Kentucky would get us into Rock Hill in a little over 6 hours.
Again, we were wrong.
We made a lot of stops that day with the boys. Food breaks. Potty breaks. Walk around Walmart and pick out race cars breaks. It felt like the trip down would never end. But thankfully, it did. We rolled in well after dinner time and closer to what is the boys normal bedtime. After so much time in the car, however, it was necessary to push them and let them stay up a bit later than usual.
We all needed a good night's sleep because the next day was Thanksgiving!
It was a beautiful day and the boys had a chance to run around and play outside in the afternoon before dinner.
John was a big fan of sitting in the yard and playing with his mini soccer ball.
We were all dressed nicely for the holiday so I thought we'd sneak in some family pictures while we were there.
This kid's smile is like no other :)
How many takes will it be until we get a good shot of all of us?
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| Success!! This one made the Christmas card |
Shenanigans with Uncle Kurt in the yard
Jeff & Moe wanted a nice picture taken too. Luckily we got exactly 1. Ha!
And then one of me with the handsome guy that I married :)
We had a Thanksgiving feast that night and enjoyed lots of great time with family!
The next day, Erik's sister and her family drove to meet us all so that we could all spend some time together (they had Thanksgiving celebrations with Scott's family this year). We also took the opportunity to celebrate sweet Sydney's 4th birthday!
Sydney wanted a lion cake. My crafty sister in law made pretty much the cutest lion cake I ever did see.
Everyone sang to Will & John as well since it was the only time this fall we'd all be together.
And we made sure to get some jammy pictures of all the cousins together. I'm pretty sure we hit the jackpot as far as adorable kids are concerned.
The next day (Saturday) we watched football, ate more food and had some good family time together. We decided that the trip back made more sense to try as an overnight drive so that the kids could just sleep the whole way home. It worked out really well... for the kids!
Erik drove almost the entire time all the way to the Lake Forest Oasis. He drank lots of coffee and relied on me to talk to him to keep him awake, which by 3 am I was failing miserably at. We arrived home that morning, just in time for John to take a nap, which he did luckily! Then we put on Christmas movies for Will and we both slept on the couch for a couple of hours. I even convinced Erik that we should head out and get our Christmas tree that afternoon. He was obviously still delirious from sleep deprivation because he agreed to the task.
All in all it was a great Thanksgiving spent with the people we love. And we learned some valuable lessons about road tripping with our kids. Like not to leave anywhere near to Chicago rush hour, give yourself way more time than you think you'll need and never, ever, ever try to drive overnight on only an hour nap. Until next year, South Carolina! May we be brave enough to try a road trip again!
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