1. ROAD TRIP!
Things I love about road trips:
arriving at the destination and visiting with family
Things I hate:
everything else about sitting in a van with six other people for 16 hours
Highlights have included:
2. Doing the drive in one day because damnit, Tony and I are beasts behind the wheel. Beasts who have to reassure the children we still love each other, and them, even though we yelled the whole way through Indiana. (Seriously Indiana, WTH is up with your road construction this summer???)
3. The Milwaukee Art Museum, although there were several times I was afraid Fulton and Teddy were going to destroy some modern art with their chairs simply because they didn’t realize that thing right there was something important to be avoided.
4. Brewers baseball game. A major league game we can all afford to attend, AND they sell buffalo chicken fries and hard soda???? Also, three home runs. I was in heaven. Meanwhile, the kids made it to the eighth inning only because of Pokemon Go!.
5. Lake Michigan beaches and the tons of smooth rocks Teddy made me collect and schlep across hot sand in my bag. He’s already forgotten them I’m sure.
6. Instagram Stories; thank goodness – a proper substitute for Snapchat. I’ve been recording all the details, a.k.a. all the ways I’m disappointing my kids this week, with Stories and just when I think, hmmm, maybe that wasn’t that funny or necessary, it’s gone.
7. Cheese curds and friendly people with Wisconsin accents. I wanted to hug a couple at the beach and tell them how cute they sounded dontchaknow!?! No one shows up in NJ and thinks anything remotely similar. I’ll try to buy curds in bulk for the drive home, but chances are I will eat them all in line at the checkout.
(Oh, and robbers and miscellaneous felons; we have people at our house + no valuables so, don’t bother.)
Next week I’ll be back with (hopefully) a couple more posts about special needs parenting. Thanks to everyone who stopped by to say hi and listen to me prattle on at the IHM Conference in Dobbs Ferry, NY last weekend. I have a couple small events coming up but I’d love to speak at your event too. Shoot me an email and let’s plan something!
Are you still in summer mode or starting back at school? Be sure to write it down then link it up below! I look forward to reading your posts!
We do the 15+hr trip from Midwest to NJ in one day, too. What saves us from falling apart in the middle of the turnpikes are: 1) screens – DVD, tablets, DS – you name it. If it plugs in and distracts a kid for a little while, we’re all for it. 2) Occasional stops to run off the pent up energy. At a McDonalds playplace, highway rest stop, or a Walmart. We’re not picky. 3) Dramamine as needed – sedate the little ones for less mess and fewer whines. 4) Caravaning in two cars – it breaks up the crowd, you can rotate kids between cars. We use walkie talkies to communicate between vehicles. It’s not easy (and sometimes horrible) but it gets the job done. I hope you have an easy ride back home!
I love the art museum photo! We took our kids to the Andy Warhol Museum last month. Lots of curious looks from the kids. Until we got to the room with giant metallic helium balloons floating around. Then they went wild and we got looks from the staff. Half the family totally missed one exhibit. It was behind a black curtain and the furniture was covered in sheets. I thought it wasn’t open yet. Apparently that WAS the exhibit.
So, um, you’re totally sending some of those cheese curds to me in Washington, right? 😀
hahaha! We went through Indiana two summers ago and there was crappy road construction then too! Our ONLY slow down of the entire day and it was crawling! Ugh!