He caught this guy on his first night!
So I had to decide which was better - six days at home with the kids by myself, or two 10 hour car rides by myself with three kids. We chose the second, because the long trip is worth it to get some extra time with Papa Joe Grandma Ronni (who is also known as Papa Joe by Carsten). And lucky for us, my sister ended up deciding to go with us, so I had some help along the way.
The drive down was completely perfect. We got there with only three stops, and one was just a quick ten minute one because Aria couldn't quite make it twenty more minutes without food. It was pretty amazing.
The way home... well it was not as perfect. The drive is eight hours of actual driving time, but usually takes us about ten hours. Like I said, we got to Kansas in three stops. On the way home we made eleven. Eleven. Eleven stops in an eight hour drive. And one was an hour and twenty minutes long because we may or may not have run out of gas. I will tell you what. I love our mini van, but it seriously has the worst low fuel signal in the history of ever. As embarrassing as it is to admit, this is not the first time this has happened since we got the van in September. Anyway, the trip took almost 14 hours, even though we ate both lunch and dinner in the car.
But it was still worth it! We had a great time with my parents.
Breakfast on the deck.
Aria's new camping chair!
Carsten and "Auntie Em's Woof-woof."
We spent our last afternoon at Papa Joe and Grandma Ronni's zoo. Tyler talks about this zoo all the time so he was really excited to go again!
The peacocks just wander around everywhere.
Watching the kangaroos!
Carsten and his best friend.
When my parents were here a couple months ago Carsten started calling my mom Papa Joe. So on this trip we kept trying to get him to call her any version of Grandma. We tried to get him to say Nana, Nana Ronni, Grandma and lots of other things. But every time he just grinned and said, "I can't how." On the last morning he was praying for each person at the table. He listed every one of our names but when he got to my mom he just stopped and pointed at her and kept going. The rest of the morning he just looked or pointed at her. It was so cute. Since we've been home he's gone back to calling them "Papa Joe and Papa Joe." :-)
The boys had so much fun on this trip that they both melted down at different times because they missed everyone. In the car Tyler started saying he didn't want to go home and when I asked why he said he wanted to go back to Kansas because he missed Papa Joe and Grandma Ronni. As Carsten was getting ready for bed that night he burst into tears crying for Auntie Em's woof-woof... and then eventually the actual people. :-)
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