Take A Drive on the Wild Side

For those of you who might have noticed, I took a brief hiatus from my blogs. Why? Well, my family and I were busy driving back to mine and my husband’s home state of Minnesota. It took us three days to get there. Three days in a minivan with three boys, three adults and a little dog, plus all our stuff (which tripled on the way home). Somehow we managed to make it there and back safely…

Without anyone having to be put to death.

Several people asked us if we had a DVD player for the kids. I said no and they looked at me like I’d just told them I liked eating brains. I was telling the truth, however. We went on a family vacaction the old-fashioned way. We played games (how many different states can we find - we did pretty awesome on that one), sang songs ("Kookaburra sits in the old gum tree. Merry, merry king of the bush is he. Laugh, Kookaburra, laugh, Kookaburra. Gay your life must be…" over and over), the kids drew a lot of pictures and studied the landscape. My youngest slept a lot. They entertained themselves for the most part, which made life a lot easier on us adults.

Really, they were just great. I couldn’t believe how well-behaved they were, both on the way there and back. I am feeling quite proud of my boys. In fact, they seemed to just enjoy the trip, the driving, the time with Grandma playing games. Of course, now that we’re home, they’re making up for all that lost time arguing by putting extra energy and effort into their fighting. But that’s a price I’m willing to pay not to have to deal with their bickering while my husband is navigating Chicago traffic or I’m trying to find the way in to Niagara Falls without accidentally crossing the border.

Anyhoo, we did a lot of stuff that I’ll blog about over the next few weeks…things involving black powder guns, hunting for artifacts and caves (yes, caves!).

So stay tuned!