Summer Road Trip

Vacation was vacation.  It was relaxing, and fun, full of play, naps, good food, and a measure of hard and stressful too because real life happens even on vacation.  We had our share of misadventures and unexpected hiccups, like having to replace the steering on Todd's new truck the day we were supposed to make the drive back home.  Let's hear it for warranties!

I was unsure about the road trip idea from the beginning.  It was Todd who thought we could do it, even with two young boys.  And to my surprise, it was great.  Fun even.  The boys stayed occupied with sticker books and Disney Pixar movies on repeat in the backseat for hours on end.  Apparently, junk food and movies will make any long trip bearable.

We traveled first to North Dakota to spend a little bit of time with Todd's extended family and Todd's parents who were also vacationing there.   We stopped for a day in Minnesota to see the Mall of America and spent the rest of our time in Michigan to catch up with our dear friends who moved there a few years ago.  We got to do life and have dinners and share adventures with Darin and Bethany and their boys Wyatt and Sawyer.

As I get older, and my boys keep growing, I feel a deep sense of gratitude for the memories we are getting to make with them.  The stories we make together as a family and how experiences and times away together will shape their hearts and minds.  There were some days I had nothing better to do than read a book or take a nap.  One afternoon, I laid down with Jacob and watched him sleep and felt myself enter into a kind of rest I have not known in a long, long time.  As all vacations go, it had to come to an end but we made so many fun family memories and were so grateful for the time we had with our friends.

Below are the highlights of our trip, and in no particular order whatsoever.