Saturday, August 15, 2009

The Unexpected Roadtrip

One of Adilyn's little tantrums on the way home. :)
Swimming in Lake Placid

We had been looking forward to our lake trip all summer. A bunch of Cory's friends from high had all rented a lake house, and we were going to have a fun family vacation. Unfortunately as we pulled up to the house, Cory got a phone call from his stepmom telling us that his father had passed away. He had been sick with cancer, but he had been doing much better recently. We didn't really think that he was going to pass away so quickly. In some ways it is for the best, since he didn't have to suffer very long.
With all our friends' help, we packed up the family and drove home. His father lived in Georgia, a 14 hour drive. We originally thought that we would fly, but the tickets were very expensive. Also, as we thought about carrying the car seats, pack 'n plays, etc it seemed in our best interest to drive. I thought that I would rather have our kids screaming in our ears than a whole plane full of people's ears! The first thing we did was buy a DVD player for the car for Adilyn to watch some movies. I was always against those, just because I thought that you should have fun with your kids when you roadtrip...now that I have kids, I have realized that movies can be a lifesaver at certain times! This was just one of those times. We had enough time to get home, unpack our lake clothes, repack other clothes, and head out. We left around 9pm. Our plan was to drive until we couldn't drive anymore. Adilyn started out watching Nemo, but got bored with it pretty quickly. We realized that although the DVD player kept her entertained and quiet, it also kept her from sleeping. Once we decided she had had enough movies, we turned it off and had to listen to her scream, "I wanna watch movie! I wanna watch movie!" for a while. She finally dozed off. We had to stop a few times to feed Kacy, and unfortunately Adilyn would wake up anytime we stopped. Around 5am, we stopped and Adilyn woke up super scared. She was throwing a fit and wouldn't stop screaming and crying, poor girl...We finally got her calmed down, and we brought back the DVD. :) My mom flew in to Atlanta to help us out, so we picked her up at the airport around 2pm, and got to our hotel in enough time to change and go to the visitation. Cory's stepmom got us a great hotel! It had two seperate rooms, so it was perfect set-up for Adilyn to go to sleep a little earlier than us. We made it through all the funeral events, with my mom's help, of course. Then, we began our journey home. We stopped at Cory's cousin's house and let Adilyn play with her girls. We had a great time visiting with them. Around 4pm, we headed out. Again, we were planning on driving until we got too tired or the girls had had enough. The girls did amazing once again! Adilyn had a few little fits about getting into her seat or not being able to do what she wanted to do, but overall everyone did great. We stopped about four times to feed Kacy, go to the bathroom, and get gas. We pulled in the driveway at 4am. Of course, we were all exhausted, but we had made it! Two 12 hour+ car trips, lots of different situations and new people, and a whole lot of snacks...but we made it!

Funerals always make you think about the things that you want to do before you die, things that you want to say to people, and the life that you want to live. I hope that when it is my time to go, I leave on good terms with the people that I love and that I have accomplished things that have made a difference in this world.

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