1 Utah Adventures Series: An Introduction and the Drive

I've found that if I don't blog almost instantly, it just won't happen. My reasons for putting it off inevitably include: I want to edit my photos, I took so many photos that it overwhelms me to think of going through them all to find good ones to edit, I would rather sleep/eat/veg/watch TV than blog, my kids require my attention 24:7 leaving no time to blog, and I can't seem to gather my thoughts into cohesive sentences. Yup. That about sums it up. Today I am putting aside all of my reasons (which are still all true by the way) ~ and making this a priority ~ because Utah was filled with too many fun memories not to at least photo dump them on our blog.

So in lieu of a ridiculously long blog post spanning a week of Utah fun, I've decided to create our "Utah Adventures Series", breaking up our photos and short stories into events. This way you can pick and choose according to that which interests you most or according to the amount of time you wish to invest.

Road trips with children are always an adventure. Always. The preparation often gives me heartburn and anxiety in spite of how many trips I've taken, most by myself. Utah trips are a completely different creature though. What should be a 9 1/2 hour drive turns into 12 hours just by adding 2 little people into the mix. Olivia is an awesome traveler. She is content to read books, color, look out the window, sing along to the Frozen soundtrack, eat snacks, take naps, and play on one of our phones. We have to take occasional potty breaks, but thanks to our car potty those can be anywhere, and usually an ice cream stop at McDonald's. Will, on the other hand, is not an awesome traveler. Or so we learned this past month. I took a trip to Livermore - I drove up with my Mom and home by myself. The trip up was bearable only because I had help. The trip home was painful. He spent at least 2 of the 6 hour trip crying.

Will was excited to go, and would have preferred this method of travel to the car seat.

On our way!

This was at our stop in Barstow - the comparison of these 2 modes of transportation just made me laugh. The standard and elite models.

The trip to Utah was no different. Whoever wasn't driving sat squished between the car seats trying desperately to entertain one unhappy William. We tried everything we could think of: favorite toys, books, snacks, songs and games. And then it got worse; we hit stopped traffic just outside Vegas. STOPPED. Just picture 2 out of ideas and out of food parents trapped in a car on 2 lane stopped highway with a crying 1 year old who wants only to get out of the car into the 85 degree heat. Isn't it your idea of fun? After exhausting our resources yet again, we resorted to blasting Classic Rock and rolling his window up and down, up and down, and up and down. Yup, fully prepared to wear out the motor in the name of a semi-content child. I think we endured that for some 26 miles. And so did our neighboring cars.

Suffice it to say, after a ridiculously late start (11am due to a number of factors, one including the fact our vinyl floors were getting replaced so we had to empty and move our fridge and kitchen shelves and table) and several stops for sanity, we didn't make it to my grandparents in Provo until after 1am. We were exhausted. Olivia had been quite the trooper, and I was actually quite thankful to have been the one driving for the majority of the trip, leaving Aaron - the good sport - to battle it out with Will for most the trip. I will admit, never in my life have I been oh so tempted to give my son a dose of Benadryl to knock him out for the drive; but I didn't.

Though it wasn't exactly a restful night, we were relieved to have beds and help with our little ones, especially come morning.