10 States in 4 Days

*This post was supposed to start where the end of these pictures are (where I start talking about what I was going to title this post) but I didn't want to fix these pictures and put them exactly where they are supposed to go. So I didn't. It will bug me, so I know I'll have to fix it someday, but for now, it's out of order. Boo to that- I hate getting out of order :) Anyway, I hope you enjoy this incredibly loooong post of mine! It's pretty boring, so proceed with caution...

Somewhere along our journey.... flat flat lands ( I think it was Illinois?)

Our incredibly DIRTY car after we arrived from our 4 day drive. It rained since then and it at least looks black again instead of some sort of dingy gray... I really need to get it washed I guess

We crossed a bunch of rivers, but most of the time it was too dark, so this is the only picture I got, and I don't even remember what river this is. It was in Missouri. The rivers were all beautiful.

The Arch in Missouri (my parents have been up inside that.... it is much bigger than it looks)

Kiddos being SO good in the car

Stuff... everywhere

I think this was somewhere in Nebraska

There goes Andy! Haulin' our stuff- how he fit everything we own into that van and trailer, I will never know.... he amazes me with the strange talents he has :)

The boys in the girls jammies (You'll know why later.... I know, I know... the suspense is killing you)

The(goofy) man I love

Taking a quick break from the car.... yes kids, have fun playing with those rocks and sticks.

The kids travel bags, full of everything you can imagine, made with love by Grandma Collette (these saved my sanity)

I had a hard time coming up with a title post for our journey across our lovely (although very ugly in the winter-at least the states we drove through) nation. The Trek? No- that would be like comparing ourselves to pioneers, which I most certainly am not with a nice hotel bed every night and shower and hot meal every morning-not to mention a vehicle that moved 80 MPH the majority of the trip. Our Journey? No-too boring. Our Week in the Car? Ummm, that one's just dumb. So, I decided on the title that it is. Pretty self explanatory, but something that makes you want to read more. "What? Who drives through 10 states in 4 days?" We do folks, we do :) And it actually would have only been 3 had we not encountered some trouble along the way....

We of course started in Utah.... but there is no "Leaving Utah" sign, so I posted the "Welcome to Utah" sign.... I will miss living in you Utah, you are the best :)

We didn't end up leaving on Monday until about 6 PM due to some car problems. We took it to get the oil changed and they found something wrong with it, so we told them to fix it.... they called a couple hours later and found something else wrong, so we told them to fix that. I wasn't taking any chances here-I wanted my (13 year old!) vehicle in tip top shape! A total of 8 hours and $800 later, we were officially ready to take off. Our car,van, and trailer were all packed to the absolute brim. Our goal was to make it to Cheyanne (about 450 miles) before stopping. That would have been possible if not for the TERRIFYING weather. There was no falling snow, but it was SO dang cold that the roads were just covered in ice. I am convinced that Wyoming is the worst state in the U.S. SO ugly, miserable and frigid. They also had the worst fog I have ever driven through. I felt like I almost slid off the road maybe 20 times. Seriously, scary. And then I just kept worrying about Andy with the giant trailer full of everything we own and in a van with no 4-wheel drive. It was the worst day of them all. And I kept thinking "WHY are we doing this? What have we done? Can we still go back? Is it too late? And if we had to go, why did we choose February?" It was just a bad evening all around. But let me tell you.... we were so carefully watched over and nothing happened- even though we saw several accidents and slide-offs. I am so grateful we were blessed. Anyway, Andy pulled over to sleep, but we (my mom, me and the kids) continued on until 1 AM where we finally found a hotel in some podunk tiny town. We didn't quite make it to Cheyanne, but we got close. Our hotel didn't allow dogs, but I was too tired to find another one, so we snuck Sadie in, took off her tags so she didn't jingle, dressed the boys in the girls' spare pair of pajammas (their suitcase was in Andy's car... along with my toiletries :) and fell into bed exhausted (except Bear who was SO wired for some reason.... he giggled in his port-a-crib for 1/2 hour) Andy finally made it to the hotel the next morning at 7 AM and he went back to bed while we got breakfast and took the kids swimming. Funny story: Sadie stayed with Andy obviously while we went to breakfast. After we ate I ran a quick errand to the local K-mart (the biggest building in the town... hahaha) to get swim diapers. My mom had gotten the kids ready to swim and I was going to meet them in the pool. When I got back, I went into our room and I noticed right away that Sadie didn't greet me.... uh-oh. I called quietly for her (Andy was still sleeping) and then I heard someone in the hall whistleing and talking quietly to.... something. I didn't here the guy for a minute, so I peeked out into the hall and saw Sadie sitting several doors down looking in the opposite direction. I called to her quietly and she turned and ran to me. I shut the door and just then heard the same guy saying "I saw her in this hall.... maybe someone let her outside? She is a little black dog" And I looked out the peephole and saw hotel workers walking down to the door and looking around for her. They gave up quickly and I breathed a huge sigh of relief. A $100 fine on the company credit card would be hard to explain to Andy's boss... :)

Anyway, everything worked out and we were on our way by 11. The rest of our trip was much smoother and much less eventful. We drove and drove across some more ugly, flat landscape until we came to:

Another crappy state! Yay! We stopped for a bit and let the kids out to play for awhile. That evening we crossed through the corner of:
and then made it into:
where we finally stopped for the night at about 1 AM again. I think I sang "Baby Bumble Bee" to Baron about 100 times this day. He loves that song, and now he sings it almost perfectly. It's dang cute :) We stayed in a tiny town again at a Super8 that.... wasn't quite so Super (as my mom put it). It was horrid and gross. But we couldn't go on any further and it was the ONLY hotel in the town. Bleh. The next morning we were up and outta there by 10. We drove for awhile and then came to:

and then:
and finally (after many stops throughout the day) we came to:

Kentucky was by far my favorite state we drove through because my mom lived here for several years when she was growing up (her family moved a lot and lived in a LOT of different states) and this was one of her favorite places she lived. I got to here story after story, some I had heard before, but loved to hear again, about everything there. She pointed out places we drove by and things she rememebred about it. It was very fun and sweet to here all of her stories. I loved it. We spent the night in Kentucky at a great hotel. By now I had started noticing accents of different people we had talked to and a funny thought struck me- "My KIDS are going to get this accent!! Oh no!!" I told Andy and we laughed about it. Later that day we arrived in: Seriously-this was the most countryish, thickest accents, hickish place I've ever been! I actually had a girl at the gas station ask me "What can I do ya fer darlin'?" HA! I had to hold my laugh in. I am just not used to it I guess. We finally arrived in:around 4 and then we made it to our new home around 7. That last hour was B-R-U-T-A-L!! Even thought the kids did amazingly the entire trip (thanks to several wonderful travel bags and care packages, dvds, and Leapster games) and I can't complain about them at all (like really-I was shocked at how wonderful they were-like I said, we are so blessed and someone loves us very much and was watching out for us the entire trip), that last hour they were just ready to be done. And so was I. And so was my mom. And so was Sadie. I even called Andy and whined like a little kid and said "How much looooongeeeeer?" to which he replied "click" (as in, he hung up the phone ;) When we finally pulled up to our new house, the kids jumped out and ran in to explore and ran around like screaming crazies for the next 1/2 hour. It was hilarious. We got enough unloaded that night that we were all able to have a mattress to sleep on along with clean sheets and from there it has just been busy busy busy and unpack like crazy. My mom went home last Wednesday and I cried. I just love her so much. She is amazing and I want to be just like her when I grow up. She helped me SO much (unpacking, playing with kids, grocery shopping, cooking, cleaning... just to name a few things she did) and I know I couldn't have done it without her. And I am also incredibly thankful for my sissy Rach, my mom-in-law Diane, my grandma Darlene, and my friends Mindy and Cris who all gave us incredible travel bags/stuff to do on the looong drive. We have felt so blessed these past few weeks with out-pourings of love, kindness, and generosity. I will miss my (yes, it is mine ;) Utah and everyone in it, but we really are excited for everything Virginia has to offer us. If you made it through this entire post, I am impressed! Stay tuned for a ton of catch-up posts from February because I was too busy to blog, and also for our new life here in the east! Thanks again everybody. Loves and hugs and kisses to all!