How to Survive a 30 hour (one way) Road Trip with 3 Kids

I really have nothing to say to this.  The title of the post that is.  A 30-hour road trip is pretty miserable.  And then to have to do it again to get home?  And then to have to repeat the next summer?

It's like having a baby.  The first time you're really excited and have no idea what's in store.  Then labor starts and keeps going for 30 hours.  You survive and claim "It wasn't that bad!"  But then the next one comes around.  And you know it's not that bad because you've done it before without dying, but you also know that it is bad.  So you try not think about it or plan anything for a long time because you know no matter how much planning you do, it's 30 hours.  It's not fun.  And then your sister invites you to Yellowstone for next summer and your oldest child insists that you have to go to Utah every summer because that's what you've done since he can remember.  But I just don't think I can handle another road trip next summer.

In all seriousness, I did prepare a bit.  You can go a head and Pin this if you want.

First, I borrowed a bunch of DVDs of movies that I like.  If I'm going to be in the car and listening to this stuff, I might as well enjoy it too.  I recommend most Pixar movies.  Except Up.  That is the saddest movie in the world.  I can't watch it.  Also, let's be honest, my kids were sitting on the butts for 30 hours, just let them watch movies.

Next, I downloaded a few audio books for myself (I typed books on tape the first time.  Haha).  Nothing like a man droning on about who-knows-what you lull you to sleep despite the baby shrieking next to you.

My kids do get bored of movies after the third or fourth of the day.  I bought them each a new toy they could play with in the car.  Rex got maze balls and Alice got a latch board.  I also loaded up a box with crayons, dry erase boards, coloring books, regular books, cars, clippy girls, My Little Ponies, and any other toy that didn't have a ton of small pieces.  Rex and Alice didn't touch any of them.  I take that back: Rex played with his maze balls a bit and Alice got the clippy girls out one day, but mostly we watched movies or looked out the window.  Driving, even if it is through Kansas, just makes you feel weird and it' hard to play while feeling wierd.

For Henry, I tried cut up pipe cleaners in an old spice jar, an electronic tooth brush, crayons, finger puppets, cars, animals, books.  All of which entertained him for a bit.  But let's face it, we drove to Utah and then to Idaho and then home again.  With toddlers, it's just best to pray that they sleep a lot.  We also sang silly songs and Greg let Henry play with the Go-Pro for a while.  And then we just fed him lots and lots of M&Ms one at a time.

#3: Break the trip up.  My kids can handle 9 hours of driving time a day, which takes about 11 hours to complete between gas/pee/food stops.  I also like to leave around 6 am so we arrive around 3 and have time to play and don't feel like we've been in the car all day.  This becomes difficult as the days progress and we get sick of waking up at 5 and like to chat with the family we're staying with past 6 am, but it's nice when it happens.

Lastly, eat breakfast before leaving.  I used to try to sneak the kids in the car in the morning to get a few mores hours of sleep out of them.  Yeah right.  Just wake them up, get them dressed, and feed them.  That's one less meal at McDonald's (barf).

Now really lastly, pack one "driving" bag for the family.  This way you only have to unpack one bag each night as you drive.

Here's how we did it:

We left Friday, July 31st at 6am and arrived in Princeton, Kentucky around 2:30.  Then we hung out with Nana for a while and put the kids to bed early (another plus of waking them up at 5:30).

Day 2 was my birthday and started with a birthday cake from Greg's aunt and grandma.  We left around 7:30, made a wrong turn at some point and arrived to cheesecake in Wichita, Kansas sometime around 6pm.

Ahh, a screaming baby.  Henry last half way through the first day rear-facing like a good little 17-month old should be.  We turned him around at lunch to keep from killing him.

With cousin Randall in Kansas

We went to 9am Sacrament on the Sunday the 2nd, then left for the 12-hour drive to Vernal, Utah.  We arrived in at our hotel around 2 am, got the kids settled, then I walked Henry up and down the hallway of the hotel while reading Conference talks for an hour.  He finally fell asleep only to wake up when I tried to put him in his crib, so we walked some more.  He didn't fall back to sleep.  Eventually, I decided hotel rooms are pretty baby proof so I went to sleep while he walked around a pitch dark hotel room.  I found him asleep on the floor with Greg's phone in his hand around 5 am.  He woke up at 7 am.

Coloring for about 15 minutes.

Never such a beautiful site as this.

Somewhere in Kansas--our entire country is really beautiful.  Even Kansas.

But mostly those glorious mountains we are about to enter.

The next morning, we ate a leisurely yet mostly disgusting hotel breakfast followed by a dip in the freezing pool.  Then we got dressed and headed to Dinosaur National Monument.  That was #15 on our bucket list.  It wasn't as great as Greg remembered it being when he was 8.  It was about the same as I remembered from when I was 14.  So I'm sure the kids thought it was amazing.  We stopped by the Vernal temple on our way out and arrived in American Fork around 5.

Vernal Temple

We then spent two weeks (ish) all over Utah and Idaho

We were going to leave on Monday, August 17th and drive straight through to Kansas, but that's 14 hours, and when it came down to it, we just couldn't do it.  While at church on the 16th, we decided to leave that day.  So I left my kids with my parents in Primary and went home to pack.  We left around 2 and arrived in Cheyenne, Wyoming around 10 that night.

Monday we drove to Kansas, leaving and arriving late again, just to repeat the next day in Kentucky to finally arrive home to Charlotte on Wednesday the 19th around 8pm, 3 weeks to the day after we left.

People often comment on how  lucky we are to take such a long vacation.  Really the vacation only 2 weeks.  We spent 8 days driving!  And while I'd really like to go to Yellowstone with my sister next summer, I think a National Park a little closer to home might win.  It's just so much driving.

But we had a blast.  Those posts next.

29

And so we've arrived at the last year of the my 20s.  It was pretty good.  I used to think 24 was the perfect age, but after reviewing the last decade of my life through this blog, I'm thinking 29 was pretty awesome.  I spent the first half of my 20s getting rid of my remaining teenage angst, then my mid-20s feeling sorry for myself, but by 29, I think had things pretty figured out.

For example, when our Provo house sat on the market for nearly a year.  In my early and mid-twenties, I would have freaked out.  Mini panic attacks while vacuuming--what if it never sells and it explodes while every one is inside and we have to rebuild and and and?  But I didn't really worry too much about the house, I mean I worried a bit, but as I told my Young Women, by the time I was 29, I had had enough experiences with Heavenly Father his perfect timing, that I was ok with leaving it up to him.

Even Greg and my marriage got better.  It was never bad, but I heard something about a 7 year hump once long ago.  I think that was in reference to affairs, but that's not how I mean it.  But after our 7th anniversary, things just...got better.  Like magic.  Nothing tangible really, but it's like after 7 years of being married I've finally figured out how to ask Greg to do something for me without insulting him (I have a sarcasm problem).  Maybe it's like my previous paragraph: I've finally had enough experience with Greg that I can better understand what he's doing and why.  Either way, that 7-year-hump (minus the affair, of course) is really and now things are better than ever.

Just after my 29th birthday, we made a 5-day road to Utah by way of Kentucky, Kansas and Wyoming.  We stayed in American Fork with my grandparents for about a week (noticing a theme here--we stay at the Hotel Robins a lot) and took Greg around to most things Provo with us this year.  Greg did take a few days to go to Boise to meet with some business people--remember he started his own company about 3 weeks before we left.  Then we drove to Denver for the Brian Robins Family Reunion and to welcome my sister home from her mission.  Again amazing.  Then we took 3 days to drive home.

I mean really--how could I not be obsessed with this?  It's Provo Canyon at Bridal Veil Falls in case you were wondering.

Super Nintendo with cousins--that's Laney (I think--she's my cousin's daughter.  There are 4 of them and they all look alike! Leave me alone!)

In Denver--Rex, Alice and Autumn

Greg loves spending 3 weeks each summer in Utah

We got home on Monday; Rex started school on Thursday.  I had to beg him to let me drive him to school on the first day (he wanted to take the bus) and then turned back about 3 times as I was leaving his classroom--I just wanted to make sure he knew I was leaving so he wouldn't be surprised that I was gone.  He didn't care.  And so continued the school year.  And aside from homework and waking up early, I really like school.  I like the structure it gives to my day--I have to have certain things done before Rex gets off the bus.

1st day of school

I wanted to do Joy School with Alice but couldn't find enough people so a friend of mine and I switched weeks taking the little girls on adventures.  It was stressful thinking of new things to do each week, but the girls enjoyed it and, again, it was something to do.

At the end of September we went to Florida with Greg's family for a week, and aside from the sand (I really hate sand), it was fun.  In December my parents, younger brother, and youngest sister came for a few weeks.  I loved having them around doing all my chores and to play cards with at night.  In February we had a snow storm that shut school and the rest of the city down for a few days, which meant a few days of just our family (and the Wheatley's, but they're  basically family).

A Hogwarts Halloween

Christmas outfits

Christmas day

Hannah thought my house was cold.  Haha.  Like she would know.  I had the heater all the way to 63!

All the while Greg worked on his product.  For the most part, it was like he had never quit his job.  We have missed a few "pay checks" here and there (by which I mean we've been able to pay ourselves 6 out of the last 12 months), but again, faith in the Lord's timing and faith in the blessings of tithing, and faith in Gregory as a provider, and we're just fine.

Then school got out for the summer.  We made our bucket list, took swimming lessons, bought a pool pass and soon it was over.  By which I mean it was time to pack for yet another epic trip to Utah.

Henry playing hide and seek in February--he feel on a glue stick at Church, hence the giant scar.

I was driving from Princeton, Kentucky to Wichita, Kansas on my 30th birthday.  Have no fear, Greg's grandma remembered my birthday and had a breakfast cake made and Greg commissioned his sister to buy a cheesecake for when we arrived in Kansas.  Add to that the birthday dinner Greg's parents had for me; the one Greg made for me; and the brownies and ice cream plus late night girl talk with my friends--I had an Amber for sure this year (one that just keeps going on and on and on).

Point is: 30 isn't so bad.  In fact, I think it might be the new 20.

28

28 was the year of the house.  As Greg put it, the house isn't a trial trial like cancer or loosing a job, it's just annoying.  Which is true.  Whenever I'd stress or whine about the house (the Provo one we were renting), I felt a little silly for whining about my first world problems.  Nevertheless, it was sufficiently annoying that the April of the year I was 28, we put the house on the market to sell it.  And it sat there.  And sat.  And sat some more for nearly a year.  I learned a lot about the Lord's timing on this one.  As usual, He knew exactly what he was doing.  We ended up selling it at just the perfect time, but the waiting and spending loads of money on a house we didn't want anymore was annoying.  Not to mention fearing my phone ringing because 98% of the time it was one tenet or another whining or something or it was the real estate agent with more bad news.  It was stressful.  And cured me of my desire to own another home anytime soon.  Besides, buying a house would mean moving away from Becky and I think I've pretty well established my complete obsession with her.

Most of my 28th year, I was also pregnant.  As a lady I met at the park said, new house, new baby.  True.  Pretty much as soon as we moved onto the Wheatley compound, I got pregnant.  Pregnancy was much less fun this time around.  While this was my first pregnancy where I didn't land myself in the ER for something stupid like falling on ice or running too much, but I'm getting older and being 28 and pregnant is not the same as being 23 and pregnant.  I also had two other kids I had to take care of so I couldn't nap as much as I liked.  I get SUPER tired when I'm pregnant.  The whole nine months I sleep like a newborn.

Then there was the stress of where Henry was going to be born.  Definitely not a hospital but the birth center where Alice was supposed to be born had been shut down by the state.  I spent a lot of time trying to finagle my way out of a hospital birth--if we rented an apartment in South Carolina for a month then we could have a home birth there, but that would be uncomfortable without any furniture.  But then what if we just move some of our furniture to South Carolina and we just lived there for a month until the baby is born.  But then what would we do with Rex and Alice during the birth?  We probably won't have any friends down there to watch them?  Well, what if we got a hotel room instead?  That'd be cheaper, but we'd have to sneak in the back door because they probably don't want the liability on their hands.  Or what if I just don't let Greg I'm in labor and just secretly have the baby at home; I did it once, I can do it again.  In January or so, the birth center re-opened so that solved all those problems.

Rex was in Joy School again but this time with 6 kids instead of 4, which meant I didn't have to teach as often.  We loved it again.  I didn't stress as much about teaching, was a better teacher, and also just enjoyed my mornings with Alice.

Joy School graduation/pool party

This was also the winter where I had the brilliant idea not to run our heater.  Becky said they paid $2000 to run the heater in this house for one winter and I was not about to pay that much.  So Greg and I did some reading and learned that zonal heating is really efficient.  We decided to try it.  We bought two space heaters then used some thermal backed curtains to close off the main part of the house from the bedrooms.  It did not work.  The house was usually about 40 degrees.  I could see my breath in the morning.  My mother-in-law often offered for us to come to her house just to hang out and be warm.  I didn't quite realize how cold I was at the time.  We were all just sort of frozen.  We went out most mornings to some place warm, then came home and read stories under a pile of blankets, watched TV and napped away the afternoons.  It wasn't until spring came and it started warming up outside that I realized how cold I had been all winter.  We did not repeat the experiment.

At the same time, we were paying upward of $500 for our electric bill.  I couldn't figure it out.  We only ran the space heaters when we were actually home, turned them off when we went to bed at night; we stopped watching TV at night to save energy; turned the computer off whenever we weren't using it.  Finally, in August after my 29th birthday and still having huge bill even after being gone for 3 weeks, Greg figured out that we were being billed for our neighbor's huge house and swimming pool.  The energy company eventually reimbursed us.

In the spring, just as I started thawing out, Henry was born.  He birth was even faster than Alice's but because of Alice's, we knew not to doddle and to get straight to the birth center.  He was born an hour after we arrived.  The next few weeks were rough.  I have a hard time nursing.  Just doesn't come naturally to me.  And Henry was (still is) a hungry child.  He would nurse for HOURS every night just to scream for more when I put him down.  I was so tired I started describing sleep as delicious.  After multiple round trips to the birth center for weighing and counseling, my midwife told me to feed him for 15 minutes on each side then pump for another 15 then feed him what I had pumped.  Repeat two hours later.  I did that for about three weeks.  It doesn't sound like much now, but it was very time consuming then and those were long three weeks.

Luckily I had learned from Rex and Alice's baby blues and was prepared for number 3.  I put absolutely nothing on my to do list for about 6 weeks.  I laid in bed most of the 2 weeks my mom was in town.  No baby blues with Henry.  Just house blues, but we already talked about that.

Spring quickly turned to summer.  The kids took swimming lessons and I bought a pool pass.  We spent the rest of the summer swimming.  And no naps!  We stayed at the pool as long as we wanted with Henry tucked away in the shade of his car seat.

Rex played T-ball

Mommy and Me swim lessons with Alice

Mother's Day 2014

Then in July Greg came home and announced he was quitting his job to start his own company.  GULP!  Great!  I said.  Let's do that.  All the while thinking, aren't we supposed to have a year or two of income saved before starting a business, isn't that what Dave Ramsey would say?  But I'd been through enough job changes with Greg to trust him.  He's no Dave Ramsey for sure.  Greg loves risk and thrives when put to the test.  So with one investor on board, Greg quit his job.

A few weeks later, I turned 29.  And we got ready for our epic summer road trip to Utah.

 *I have lost A LOT of pictures...I really need to figure out what happened to that last few years worth of pictures.

Moving onto 27

Just before my 27th birthday, I left Greg (at home) and the kids and I went to Seattle and then to California for two weeks.  It was great.  I got out of the horrible humid Southern summer and hung out with my mom a bunch.  She helped me start some crafts to help beautify my home and make it feel more like my home.  And then when I got home, Greg got me two small home decorating magazines for my birthday, which silly as it seems, were amazing.  He is really good at giving gifts.  I drooled over those magazines for months, imagining and planning my perfect house that we would one day buy.  Then my friends lied to me a whole bunch and all showed up on my front door step for an amazing surprise party.  I may have lost Provo, but I really did get some amazing friends.  I'm tearing up just thinking about how awesome they are.

Soon after that I got a realtor and Greg and I started house hunting.   We had planned to live in Greg's parents' house for a year, and that year was fast ending.  We looked at some beautiful mid-century ranch homes that I just LOVED but none of them felt right.

In Septemeber, Rex started Joy School two days a week.  This was great for me.  I now had something to do two days a week.  Monday I spent cleaning, so that left only Thursday and Friday for me to fill.  One of my problems with moving to Charlotte was how bored I was.  I had spent 2 years finguring out stuff to do in Provo just to have to start over in Charlotte.   Add to that that I couldn't walk anywhere (not even to my mail box due to the giant and aggressive St. Bernard that lived next door without a fence) and everywhere was at least a 20 minute drive.  I digress.  I loved Joy School--I stressed over teaching but I secretly like being stressed about stuff like that and I loved having two mornings with just Alice, since Rex was a rather demanding toddler/preschooler.

The kids getting ready for a craft day

In December, one of my rich friends moved and mentioned that they would not be buying another house but would rent.  Rent, I thought, that's only for poor people and young married couples (see I have these crazy ideas sometimes).  But the more I thought about it...then my sister came to visit for Christmas, which was fun.  I really really really miss my family here, still do.  The day I get home from Utah every time I go is always the worst day of my life because my family is so far away.  My sister and I talked a lot about her moving to Wyoming and where they were going to live.  The more we talked about it, the more I thought about moving myself.  I knew that moving out of the Charlotte area wasn't an option (Greg had just started yet another new job), but maybe a fresh start in a different house that didn't have all the negative energy of the past year would be good.  I casually started looking for rentals near Greg's new job.

Then one Sunday morning in January we woke up to no water.  I took it as a sign.  A sign to move.  While Greg worked on fixing the burst pipe, I started packing.  I packed up all of Rex's room, (I had never bothered to unpack Alice's room), and half the kitchen before Greg with the help of the Wheatley's fixed the pipe.  I didn't unpack.  We moved June 1.

That move was not a tender mercy of the Lord: it was a giant blessing of the Lord.  It was timed just perfectly to put Becky Wheatley in my backyard.   Becky is a soul mate (I can have more than one soul mate).  She too is from Utah, more so even than I am in that she actually grew up there, and stupidly married a boy from the South who dragged her unwillingly back.  She too fantasizes about moving back to the West Coast.  Only she's been here for 18 years.  She has become my mother/sister/cousin/friend all wrapped up into one.  She showed me how to be happy despite my physical location.  I have a giant crush on Becky and all things Wheatley, but I'm also pretty sure I've fangirled about the Wheatley's whole ton on this blog so I'll move on.

Within a month of moving onto the Wheatley compound, I finished my last class at USU and graduated from my Master's program, found out I was pregnant, and packed for an epic trip to Utah.

The kids and I were gone for 2 1/2 weeks, Greg joined us for about a week, but other wise, he had to slave away paying for my extravagant lifestyle.  The kids and I stayed at my grandparents at night, but spent our days in Provo.  I did all my old Provo favorites--the Rec Center (ok that was built after we moved but still), the library, J-Dawgs, Cafe Rio, Kneaders, Temple Square.  We also spent several afternoons working on our house in Provo trying to get it ready for the new tenets moving in.  Greg joined us for a few family reunions (one of my favorite things--nothing, I mean NOTHING is better than family, especially mine), then he flew home.

I spent my 28th birthday scrubbing my Provo house top to bottom trying to please a semi-picky new tenet. The rest of my 28th year was spent trying to please that same tenet while being super grateful for our own wonderful landlords, the Wheatley's.  Good thing we have the no other gods before me commandment or I might seriously build an alter to the Wheatleys.

*Apparently I've lost most of my pictures from this year.  I only have a few from the move and then lots of my epic Utah trip.

moving

j-Dawgs

playing Great-Grandma's closet

Racing with some first cousins-once removed.

more distant cousins

All the Robins cousins near my age

enjoying yet another perk of the Wheatley compound--Derick

26

26 was pretty bad.  We moved out of our lovely Provo house on August 20. Greg then drove back to North Carolina in my car while I stayed with my grandparents in American Fork using Greg's sister's car for a week, and then stayed at Greg's other sister's house in Greensboro, NC for a week.  And then we moved into Greg's parent's house and two weeks later Alice appeared on our bathroom floor.

I won't bore you with more details since I've gone through ad nauseum all the pros and cons of living in Charlotte.  We'll just say this, the year I was 26 was the first time I openly acknowledged to myself and any one who would listen that I was severely depressed.  Turns out not a lot of people were listening because when I mention it now, people are surprised, which is surprising to me because all I talked about for a year was how wonderful Provo is...maybe that's why no one remember's--they all just stopped listening to my word vomit.

I made it through the year with the help of lots of naps (2-3 hours a day), a few great friends (you know who you are), a cute baby who learned to give the best hugs at 3 months and is still the top hugger in our family, and a sensitive toddler who reassured me from the back seat, "It's ok Mom.  You don't have to cry; we'll find it" (I got lost on the nearly-impossible to navigate streets of Charlotte almost daily despite my brand-new GPS unit in the car), and a loving husband who let me do and buy whatever the hell I wanted because I followed him to the hell-hole that is Charlotte (that's what I thought then.  I've since changed my tune--about Charlotte, not Greg.  I still think Greg is pretty cool).

And that's all I have to say about 26.  27 gets better and by 28 I am fully functioning again.

Not all babies are cute, but Alice, she was beautiful.

See how sweet Rex was?

3 generations on blessing day

See how Greg humored me?  We were the cast of Peter Pan for Halloween.  Greg was Smee, nobody knew how he was.

We flew to California for my brother's wedding when Alice was 7 weeks old.

Great friends convinced me to do a mud run with them.  Best race ever.

See Greg again?  Chasing kids around a muddy obstacle course so they could cheer me on.