Vacation

We've been home from vacation for a week and a half now, but I'm just getting around to blogging. Our trip to the Outer Banks was great. Mr. Mister loved the ocean and once we got him to stop eating the sand, we had fun playing at the beach. There were more than thirty people there from my mother-in-law's family, most of whom had not yet met Mr. Mister. He was entertaining as always and Grandma and Grandpa loved having a whole week with him.

The only downside to the trip was that it took almost 22 hours to get there (it's supposed to take 12 1/2). We tried leaving at 2am, thinking that we would drive a lot while Mr. Mister slept since he has a limited tolerance for the car seat while he's awake. That backfired when Daddy started falling asleep after driving for 45 minutes. I took over but felt like it took every ounce of energy I had (which wasn't much) to keep the car going straight. So after making it a whole hour and a half from home, we had to stop and get a hotel room! Thankfully we found a cheapo room for $35. We slept for 4 hours until Mr. Mister woke us up. By the time we got on the road at 9am, we had been away from home for 7 hours but had only driven an hour and a half. What a start to the trip. It continued with hour long stops for Mr. Mister to have a break from the car seat, bumper to bumper traffic through Richmond, VA, and hunting down a Wendy's that was 2 miles off the exit, as all restaurants seem to be along the Virginia highways. Thankfully we had our trusty GPS this whole time and we arrived safely, albeit exhausted, at 11:30pm that night, exactly 21 1/2 hours after leaving home.

We didn't go anywhere the rest of the trip besides walking to the beach. On the way home, we stopped overnight halfway at a Young Life camp in Virginia called Rockbridge, where a lot of our friends are volunteering for this month. It was so fun to see them and so refreshing to be in that environment that we ended up staying the whole weekend. We drove home Monday morning, refreshed and thankful to only have half the drive ahead of us.

One more funny story from the ride home....I had to go to the bathroom very badly but we were only 45 minutes from home and Mr. Mister and Daddy were both sound asleep, so I was trying to avoid stopping. But I couldn't make it any longer so I pulled off the highway at the next exit. I quickly noticed that none of the cars on the exit ramp were moving. Out of all the exits I could have chosen, I picked one where there had just been an accident at the end of the ramp and no one could go anywhere! In desperation, I put the car in park, ran up the grassy hill off the exit, and into a LaRosa's restaurant. The employees had all been gathered at the window watching the accident and saw me sprinting up the hill with a pained look on my face. They laughed when I asked for the restroom and kindly pointed me to the back of the store.

Needless to say, we were glad to get home and have no plans for a road trip anytime soon!