Wednesday, June 1, 2011

Memorial Day Trip to Cleveland

Over Memorial Day weekend, we took Miles and Vivienne on their second road trip.  We went to Cleveland to visit Jason's family.  His parents, brother, nephews and niece drove in from Indiana and we all gathered at his sister's house. 

Our first road trip was to Georgia last Christmas to visit my family.  The babies were 6 months old at that time, and the trip went fairly smoothly.  They slept most of the way there.  But now the babies are 10 months old, and they are much more active.  They get antsy if they are sitting still for too long.  So, we decided that we would stop in West Virginia at my Aunt Barbara and Uncle Alan's house, spend the night, and then finish the drive to Cleveland.

"Oh, come on!  PLEEEEASE let me drive!!"
On the way up, we made the mistake of following the Chick-fil-a mirage.  This has happened to us before.  I will find a Chick-fil-a on my iPhone, and we'll start taking side streets, trying to find it.  In the end, we discover that it's in a mall food court.  Ugh.  So we ended up eating at a Wendy's in Bluefield, West Virginia.  I think it's safe to say that we will not be visiting that city again on future trips (no offense, Bluefield).

We made it to Barbara and Alan's house in about 6 hours, only stopping a couple times.  It was so fun to introduce Miles and Vivienne to their Great Aunt and Great Uncle.  They made us a delicious shrimp creole dinner, and it was wonderful to catch up with them.

That evening, Miles pushed himself from a tummy lying position up into a seated position.  This was the first time he had done that.  I am so thrilled at the idea of not having to set the babies up over and over.  Right now, they will be sitting on the floor and they fall over and start crying because they can't sit up.  At least now Miles should be able to get himself back up on his own.  =)

On Friday, we got up early, ate an amazing egg and bacon breakfast (probably ate way more bacon than we needed to!) and headed for Cleveland.  It was only about a 4.5 hour drive to Cleveland, and we arrived in the afternoon.  Miles and Vivienne got to meet their cousins, Drew, Gabe and Amber, and see their Aunt Michelle, Uncle Jason, Grandma and Grandpa.

"Check out these rings, Grandpa!"

Vivienne loved meeting her cousins for the first time.

Amber gets some snuggle time with Viv.
On Saturday, we all went to the Cleveland Zoo together.  I'm not sure that Vivienne and Miles really knew that they were actually at a zoo, but it was fun to have them there and to watch the cousins enjoying all the animals.

Daddy and Miles at the Cleveland Zoo


"Where, Aunt Michelle?  I don't see the bear."

Uncle Jason held Vivienne in the butterfly house.
After a couple of hours, the babies started getting tired, so we brought them back to Jason and Michelle's house early while the rest of the crew stayed behind to see the rest of the zoo.


"I'm SO close to figuring out this crawling thing, Mommy!"
Miles was tuckered out after a long day of fun.
On Sunday, we all went to church together.  Then Jason grilled burgers, hot dogs and chicken on the grill for everyone.  We just enjoyed a relaxing afternoon of Wii games and good food.

Tiger

The Grillmaster at Work

1 comment:

  1. Sounds like a fun trip! Yeah, we've had our hopes high for things like Starbucks on the road, only to be dashed upon arrival (or trying to find them). Good plan on the overnight stop.

    ReplyDelete