We are in Florida at Phil & Leah's! After 2 days of long car rides, we made it safe and sound here around 4:45pm yesterday. Here's a brief synopsis of the trip...
We left Pittsburgh at 12:30pm on Thursday headed for Nashville, TN to get some nighttime sleep before finishing the trip on Friday.
This was Tavin's first long car trip in his forward-facing car seat, so he looked a little perplexed as we took off on the journey, "seriously, we are going to have to sit here for how long?"
Big Brother Koen of course knows the ropes and how to work the situation to his advantage = lots of DVD's. Since DVD's are a special treat back at home, Koen loves long car rides because he knows it means almost unlimited DVD watching. I had bought a few new ones and requested a bunch from the library, so we were stocked and ready to appease his insatiable DVD appetite for Thomas, Chuggington, Handy Manny, Bob the Builder and Curious George.
It took 10 hours to get to Nashville since we stopped for dinner and a few quick gas/bathroom stops along the way. The ride went very smoothly. Tavin took awhile to figure out his afternoon nap, but eventually he did and it was great that he was able to sleep and get a second wind for the evening portion of the journey. After the sun went down around 8pm or so, he slept most of the rest of the way to Chris & Molly's, so that was great too (at this point, Koen had basically given up sleeping in the car, so it was encouraging to see that Tav can still make it happen).So, now on to Day 2 in the car. Our friends were so nice to literally just let us crash at their place for the night. We didn't even stay for breakfast, we got right on the road after the boys woke up and we showered. It was about 7:40am (this is now Central time) when we left.
We timed things quite well on the way down with our stops and things went very smoothly. Tavin seemed to have figured out the sleeping in the car because he took his morning nap and afternoon nap very well-timed to his normal day. Here's the cute little good traveler!
Koen hung in there very well too. His new car seat is very comfortable and roomy for him and he was pretty easy to please between reading books (storytime with Mommy from the front seat), watching DVD's, snacks and playing on Daddy's iPad (these gadgets are seriously very cool with great educational free downloads from Chuggington, Thomas and Handy Manny). He seemed to be getting a little squirmy at the end of the trip and I asked him, "you OK, buddy?" and he replied, "yes, it's just my bum's a little sticky." So funny! Kids will just tell you how it is. Doug and I could relate though because we were sitting straight in the sun for two-thirds of the trip and it was hot!
We had no traffic issues except for about a 40 minute delay in slow, slow traffic for about 3 miles in Alabama South of Montgomery due to an accident. So we were really blessed with safety, easy going driving and we actually really enjoyed the scenery. Neither Doug nor I had ever driven this far South before and at this time of year it was beautiful. The grass was neon green in spots where it was coming up fresh, dogwoods and so many other trees and bushes were blossoming. We also had no idea that this ride would have some rolling hills and quite a bit of rock, so that kept the scenes interseting too. Doug did an awesome job driving the whole time (and I have to say I rocked it as a prepared Mommy and completely sacrificing my comfort to reach to the kids about 200 times each of the days). Here's Doug with his taped up fire truck Koen made for him the day before we left. Koen was so impressed he liked it enough to bring it on the trip.
Koen hung in there very well too. His new car seat is very comfortable and roomy for him and he was pretty easy to please between reading books (storytime with Mommy from the front seat), watching DVD's, snacks and playing on Daddy's iPad (these gadgets are seriously very cool with great educational free downloads from Chuggington, Thomas and Handy Manny). He seemed to be getting a little squirmy at the end of the trip and I asked him, "you OK, buddy?" and he replied, "yes, it's just my bum's a little sticky." So funny! Kids will just tell you how it is. Doug and I could relate though because we were sitting straight in the sun for two-thirds of the trip and it was hot!
We had no traffic issues except for about a 40 minute delay in slow, slow traffic for about 3 miles in Alabama South of Montgomery due to an accident. So we were really blessed with safety, easy going driving and we actually really enjoyed the scenery. Neither Doug nor I had ever driven this far South before and at this time of year it was beautiful. The grass was neon green in spots where it was coming up fresh, dogwoods and so many other trees and bushes were blossoming. We also had no idea that this ride would have some rolling hills and quite a bit of rock, so that kept the scenes interseting too. Doug did an awesome job driving the whole time (and I have to say I rocked it as a prepared Mommy and completely sacrificing my comfort to reach to the kids about 200 times each of the days). Here's Doug with his taped up fire truck Koen made for him the day before we left. Koen was so impressed he liked it enough to bring it on the trip.
So, anyways, we are here in beautiful sunny Florida. It's supposed to be near 80 today. We will probably be out on my brother's boat and heading to a beach for a lunch picnic around midday. Ahhh, this should be good! Thanks for the prayers as we drove here. We are so thankful that we were safe and the boys were such great riders, really, really impressive!
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