Funk-a-licious

That describes the smell of my van after driving ~2,000 miles in it with 4 kids and Nana, not that Nana contributed to the smell. This could be linked back to the Alfredo disaster of '05. Many of the travel days were quite warm and humid, which probably released some odors that had been dormant for awhile. At any rate, I thoroughly cleaned, scrubbed and vacuumed the van on Monday and it has lost most of the funkiness from the trip.

Spring Break was great. Nana braved the trip with me and the kids, for the most part, were somewhat well behaved. They didn't kill each other. I was going to say they didn't hurt each other, but they did at some point. Owen was the super star of the trip. His toes kept him entertained for the majority of the car time. I only stopped once for Lydi to have a time out on a rock at some rest stop in Ohio. The DVD player only worked for one movie, so there was plenty of time for good old fashion road trip games, like "Don't touch me!" and "Get your feet off me!" I must cut them a little slack as it was 4 days of traveling in the car, and I know for a fact that I was much worse when we made the cross country treks to Iowa in my youth. Why I didn't travel with the cargo is beyond me.

Highlights of the trip include:

Seeing Chaser (my 18 mo old nephew)! He is so much fun. He loves his daddy, even though he calls him mommy, and follows him everywhere. He loves his mommy, too, but started calling her daddy while we were there. He LOVES shoes, especially Gaby's Crocs. And most of all he loves himself! Lots of belly laughs and hand clapping when he does something right.

Seeing Mason (my 6 yr old nephew and almost twin of Lydia)! He got to introduce my little girls to weapons (See Deb's fall blog relating to weapons). There were Star Wars battles every day in the backyard. It was warm enough for water gun fights one day and the kids tried to convince us that it was time to fill up the pool. He got to teach Lydi and Taylor how to play video games AND he let us all play Guitar Hero, a gift for his birthday from his dad, that really is one of those gifts to yourself that you just say is for your kid. Right, Matt? I stink at GH, but Matt is really good, and we all had a lot of fun be Rock Stars.

Seeing Matt and Deb (my brother and his wife)! We only wish we could see them more, but I'm so glad that I decided to get out there since we won't see them this summer. We ate lots, but not even close to nearly enough DQ. Only one trip the whole week. That's just wrong. Where's Monka when you need him? The one DQ run happened to be the same day as our traditionally Red Robin farewell dinner/send off. So, my chocolate peanut butter cup blizzard was a chaser to my chocolate RR milkshake. I need all those calories for my training, right?

Seeing Alyssa and Mike and their new house and seeing Grandpa Kilgore (but we sure missed seeing Grandma who is still in AZ). Ta-May-May got the royal treatment with her very own Alyssa-for-a-day. Actually, it was a sleepover and girls' day out. The sleepover was complete with Eragon (says Taylor, "this is the best movie ever!") and The Pink Panther (says Taylor, "this is the best movie ever!"). I will be sending Alyssa Taylor's next dental bill for the cavities that she now has from eating her weight in candy at the sleepover. Uncle Karl would be shocked and appalled, I'm sure.

Spending time with my mom! We started a silly game with Lydi on trip home. She didn't quite understand highway alphabet, so we tried thinking up as many words that started with a letter, each taking a turn and going until Lydia decided to change the letter. Well, after being stuck on the letter P for awhile, I realized that my mom and I were still playing, but the kids had stopped. And stuck we were. From Columbus to Indianapolis, nothing but P words. It got pretty funny. It all started with Lydi saying "Pee" for the letter P. Then she said, "I have another inappropriate P word, poop!" Which sent her into fits of giggles.

There weren't many lowlights. But here they are:

The car smell, for sure!

Zanesville, OH. No offense to anyone who may be from there, or live there, or have relatives there. Our experience(s) at the hotel and local Wendy's left much to be desired. A rowdy and raunchy pool party had me quickly exiting the pool area with hands over Lydi's eyes. And my mom was verbally accosted at the Wendy's ("Hey, Lady!") for ordering a "Happy" meal, when Wendy's only sells "Kid's" meals.

Gaby and her new found love of talking and SINGING about toots and other bodily functions. The girl is obsessed.

Tornadoes. Great weather until we arrived in Iowa City. The last time I made the trip to PA with my mom (June '04) we arrived home in the middle of a torrential downpour. I had to unload all her luggage from the Thule (car-top carrier). I was drenched. So we were joking about how funny that was on the way into town, when all of the sudden the sky is black and it starts raining horizontally. We pulled in to the driveway to find a tornado warning/watch for the area. So, I unloaded the kids and got completely soaked in the process. And we had to wait out the storm for an hour or so until we finally returned home to daddy.

That's a wrap on our cross country adventure.