Road Trip Recap

Finally getting to sit down to recap our trip. A few weeks ago, Andrew told me that his company was having a building opening in Farmington, NM. His company had designed most of the buildings on the campus of the Navajo Prep High School, and this was the most recent one. Since neither of us had ever been there, we figured that it might be a nice little family trip over Thanksgiving weekend. As the day of leaving got closer, I got more and more stressed out. Let me tell you, it is not easy to pack up all the stuff you need for 3 days away with a toddler. I really started to appreciate what my mom did all those years when I was a kid and we would go on two week summer vacations in a car!


So, our plan was to leave around 9am on Saturday, about an hour before C would be ready for his nap, so that he'd have some time to get accustomed to the car before falling asleep. We also planned to stop about 3/4 of the way to our destination, stay overnight in Gallup, NM, and then continue on to Farmington in the morning. Come Saturday morning, we took a look at the weather report and found that snow was likely to be moving in earlier that expected along the route we were taking, so we threw things together, gassed up the car and were on the road by 7:30. After about 15 minutes in the car, I wasn't sure if we'd make it. Caleb was pretty much a mess (chalk it up to teething), so I made the decision to let him have a pacifier for the trip (he usually only gets these for naps and bedtime) since it seems to soothe his teething pains, and it worked like a charm! Caleb fought sleep until we were about an hour away from home. Our first stop of the trip wasin Flagstaff, about 2 hours from home. We stopped for some breakfast for A & I at McDonalds while we let C run around the PlayPlace. I was completely horrified that I was letting my child loose in that filthy place, but it was too cold to do anything outside, and he needed to let off some energy after sitting in the car. Next we headed to Target to pick up winter essentials that apparently aren't sold in our neck of the woods (windshield ice scrapers and gloves). And finally we were back on the road. We figured Caleb would still be tired, but darn if he didn't struggle with falling asleep until we were about 45 minutes from the next "big" town where we had planned to stop for lunch and a potty break. As soon as the car was in park, Caleb was awake.

We again stopped at McDonalds (sigh...this trip was filled with WAY too many Mc-y D's meals) where we had lunch and let Caleb run around. Here is Caleb sitting in a regular chair and eating McNuggets just like a big boy!

We again modified our orginal plan since we had gotten on the road so early in the day and because C was doing so well in the car. We had hotel reservations for a town about 3 hours away from our final destination, but decided to press all in one day. We arrived about 8.5 hours after we left home including three stops for a total of about 2.5 hours. We got checked into our hotel where Caleb promptly found the TV remote and fixated on the TV.

We ended up finding a really cute local brewery for dinner (which was pretty good) before heading back to the hotel for the evening where Caleb had a great time running around and exploring before bed. At one point, he went around the corner to where the closet, bathroom, and sink were located. We didn't think anything of it since the doors were closed and the trashcan was moved up high. After a minute or two of quiet, we decided to go check out what he was up to, and this is what we found...

...oops. I guess we forgot about the tissue dispenser!

Unfortunately, as I already mentioned in a previous post, C really struggled with falling asleep and ended up sleeping in bed with us. Thank goodness for the King sized bed!

The next day we got up and ate dinner with the locals at a little pancake joint. I've never felt so out of place in my life as I did when we walked through the doors and had all eyes on us. I just know they were all thinking, "Where did these people come from?" We managed to give Caleb some playtime before heading back to the hotel for a nap. I got him to fall asleep next to me on the bed and I was able to get up while he slept. However, A & I were stuck in the dark hotel room with nothing but my laptop and iTouch for the next 1.5 hours. Thank goodness for free WiFi!

Finally after nap we headed to Andrew's project site (the reason we had travelled all that distance) where we were given a tour of the new building and campus by A's bosses. Caleb had a great time running around outside and picking up stones from the newly landscaped buildings. I LOVED the campus and felt like I was back home on the east coast. All the buildings were brick, there were large grassy areas and big trees (albeit baren for winter, but big nonetheless). If it weren't so darn far away, I'd probably make another trip back there next fall to get my "fall colors fix."

We finally headed home around 2:30, and again had intended to spend the night about 2 hours from home to make the final part of the trip the next morning. However, I since we had left about an hour before we had planned, and since Caleb fell asleep once again about 30 minutes before we got to Flagstaff, we decided to try to keep him asleep and press on to home. He ended up waking about an hour later, but fortunately we were near another town with a McDonalds, so we stopped to change him, let him walk, and give him his nighttime milk, and he passed right out when we got back in the car. Good thing too, because by that point he REALLY hated being in the car. We made it home about 7 hours after we left thanks to shorter, less frequent stops, and we were able to get Caleb right to sleep.

Overall, I have to say that C did GREAT! I really couldn't have asked for anything more from him. Looks like he's a pretty good traveller afterall (I hope I'm not jinxing myself for our two upcoming trips). We'll definitely think about taking some shorter day/weekend trips when the weather warms a bit this spring.