Road Trip!

Ah, the Road Trip.  Notice the capital letters.  Because when I think of this trip I will always think of it with capital letters. 

We started with just the six of us.  We grabbed a quick bite of lunch after morning services at church on Sunday and then hit the road.  We were only going to my brother D's house, about 5 hours of drive time, so it was a pretty uneventful trip.  We make that drive enough that we finally got the bright idea to write which exits had good places to stop at along the way.  We didn't have any paper handy so did we pull out our nifty smartphones and put them in a note on our phone so we'd always have it?  No we did not.  We wrote it in pencil on the safety warning on the visor in the Suburban.  Of course, Hubby wrote them while he was driving, so we'll actually be lucky if we can ever read them again, but whatever!  It occupied some time.

We got to my brother's house about 7ish and got to spend time with Aunt A and K-bug.  It's nice being able to walk in to D and Aunt A's house and feel comfortable enough to just relax.  D was working, but got to come home for a little bit when our older brother M got there.  M was leaving in a couple of weeks to go overseas and wouldn't be home for about a year.  I actually didn't think we were going to be able to see him at all because of our trip, but he came down to D's earlier than he planned so we got to spend a couple of hours with him.  I appreciated him doing that and was really glad we got to see him before he left. 

After going to bed about 1 we got up and were pulling out around 7 Monday morning.  The last thing we saw as we pulled out of the driveway was M's dog, who had spent the last several weeks in an apartment in the DC area, take off running after a squirrel.  I felt bad for M since he had only gotten up to see us off, but he got her back OK.  I didn't have the guts to ask how long he had to search for her!

Monday we were on the road for about 10 hours total.  A few things to note.  Paris, TX is not a cool town.  You might think it will be based on the name, but you would be wrong.  There is a loop around it that has zero restaurants or gas stations.  I found this out the last time I went through there so I was smart this time and actually went through town.  There is nothing on the main road through town either.  I thought we were going to have to actually turn around, one of my biggest pet peeves on a trip, but we ended up stopping at a Braums.  Unfortunately, it was too early in the morning for ice cream! 

Also, I don't really care for Wichita Falls, TX either.  It seems like every time we go through there we end up stopping at a place that is in a bad part of town with a weird bathroom set up that makes me really uncomfortable.  But the way we were taking didn't have a ton of towns to stop in, so Wichita Falls it was. 

After Wichita Falls you can consider yourself in West Texas.  Anyone who has ever been in or driven though West Texas understands why it is in caps as well.  I have friends who love it there.  I also now have a sister and bro-in-law who live there.  It holds no appeal to me.  Out of respect for my loved one's chosen dwelling places, that is all I'll say about it.  Just note the capital letters! 

And this was the one day we actually got lost.  Well, not lost as much as we kept driving down a road instead of turning down another one.  How Hubby figured that out when we're on a road that stretches for miles without ever turning and there isn't so much as a scrub brush to distinguish this road from any other, I'll never know.  But he did.  We only went about 10 miles out of the way.  It could have been a lot worse!

So we rolled in to my Sis and BIL's (short for bro-in-law) around 5 Monday evening.  My Mom was waiting for us at their house because she actually joined us for the rest of the trip.  It's OK, you can ask yourselves why too.  Everyone else looked at her crazy when she told them she was coming with us.  I personally kept thinking she would wake up one day and realize how crazy it would be to come with and have to put up with all of us.  She didn't, so she must love me as much as I think she does!  Thankfully they had made us a home cooked meal which tasted amazing after eating the last 5 meals at fast food places.  We also got to spend time with our good friends who live in the same town.  They're actually BIL's parents who Hubby and I were friends with before BIL married my sister, but I don't want to confuse you anymore than I already have trying to keep track of who everyone is--so let's just say they're our friends.  Sis and BIL took the girls for a snow cone and gave them cameras for the trip and I think they went to the park as well.  I didn't care what they were doing, I honestly was just glad to not have to answer any questions for an hour!  And thankful for family who was willing to give us a break when we needed it!

We stayed up way too late talking again.  It was rough getting out of bed Tuesday morning.  But we did it.  I know you're dying to hear the rest of the story, but you'll just have to wait.  Who knew a day and a half of driving could be so eventful?

As a side note, Monday was also Hubby and I's 13th anniversary.  While it was a bummer to be traveling on our anniversary, we dealt with it by celebrating with each other before we left.  I also had the brilliant idea to write down my favorite memories from each year of our marriage.  The idea was that I would give him a year to read every hour and we would laugh about the memories and share some sweet moments in the car.  I failed to take in to account that he would be driving all day long and therefore be unable to read anything.  So what ended up happening was that I would give him three or four years every time we stopped and he would read them between trying to eat or gas up or whatever else we were trying to do.  The last three years didn't actually get read until Tuesday because we left them out in the car when we unpacked to spend the night.  Not exactly how I planned it going...