Family vacation: Day one...

We headed out nice and early (yeah, right) Monday morning.  We ran a couple of errands and were on the road by 11:30 or so.  I was thankful to plug the hotel address into the GPS and find it was only 4 hours, not the 5 that I thought.  Funny how important just that one hour seems when travelling with small children!  This was the view from the front seat - a car full of kiddos and stuff.

We decided to give the boys a small gift everyday to keep them entertained.  Monday's gift was a couple of new movies.  My favorite store recently had some good $5 deals so I grabbed a couple of those.  We pulled out the headphones and bought ourselves a couple hours of nearly quiet driving.  Max threw a huge fit the first half hour or so, but with a little reassuring he ended up taking a nice little nap.  We let them eat McDonald's on the trip there, but that was the only visit with Ronald!  It was by far the dirtiest, ickiest McDonald's I've seen in a loooonnnnngggg time. 

NO idea why this child thought that he needed a blanket as miserably hot as it was outside, but he seemed quite content and, really, who am I to argue with content?  Guess the air conditioning in the van was doing its job that day!  Unfortunately, on the way there, I discovered that the same could not be said for my point and shoot camera.  I also have my bigger, nicer camera, but I'm not too excited about lugging it around everywhere so I'll be asking for a new little camera for my birthday in the fall.

I took this picture while Dave was checking us into the hotel.  Yikes!  Maybe we won't go to the zoo tomorrow.  Perhaps an indoor activity? The hotel turned out to be manageable.  Not the wonderful homes we've stayed in in Florida, but we did have two bedrooms and a fridge - the essentials when traveling with kiddos - the adults didn't have to go to sleep at 8:30 and cold milk was ready at the boys' request.

We got settled in, hung up some some clothes, separated out the boys' clothes (all packed in big ziplocs by outfit) into three drawers to make life easier, set up the pack and play, and tried to get the boys to rest a little.  I figured out then that most of my time in the hotel would be me begging someone to quiet down.  Thankfully we didn't spend THAT much time there! 

That first night we headed to the local mall and had dinner at the food court - easy to please everyone that way.  Plus, the mall had a sporting goods store that Dave wanted to take the boys to see.  They have LOTS of taxidermied (made up word?) animals, a big aquarium, some turtles, etc.  Yes, that is a catfish.  Yes, it is bigger than Luke.  Yes, family vacation with small children means a trip to the mall for fun. 

And because no one really slept on the way there, this is what happened on the way back to the hotel.  Poor Seth.  That cannot be comfortable!

And sweet Max, he looks plenty comfy.  I was pretty jealous at this point.  Ready for a good night's sleep. 

Unfortunately, Max had other plans.  The older boys' room was too small for the pack and play, so we set it up in the corner of our tiny room.  We got everyone ready for bed.  Seth and Luke did quite well.  While they are used to sharing a room, on vacation they actually had to share a bed.  I was surprised that it didn't seem to bother either of them too much.  Max did not think the pack and play was a good plan.  I put him down and he started crying (remember we're in a hotel and I'm already begging people to quiet down).  I figured he would fuss for a few minutes and then fall asleep.  After about a half hour I got him up and calmed him down.  I decided I would just go to bed and maybe if I was in the room with him he'd be more content in his own bed.  We moved his bed to the side of our bed and I laid down.  He stood in the pack and play with his little face resting on the side and held my hand.  I tried to transition my hand down further into the pack and play, hoping he would lay down and fall asleep.  I closed my eyes trying not to cater to his every whil but while still staying close by.  I opened one eye and found him still standing there in the corner of the pack and play, staring back at me.  Poor baby!  I finally ended up laying on the floor next to the pack and play.  I only had to stay a few minutes and when he was out I got back into my bed!  Night night...