We just got back last night from our long road trip to Illinois and back. Thirty plus hours in the car with two small children–without electronic entertainment, thanks to my rushed packing right before the trip–was a great adventure. We were surprised by how well both kids did in the car, especially since both were sick at various times.
Since I have innumerable pictures, I’m cutting straight to those:
On the way to Springfield, we stopped by Hannibal, the home of Mark Twain:
That night we arrived in Springfield in time to catch the tail end of a family pizza party. I don’t have any pictures, but the girls were soooooooo happy to see my mom.
We stayed at the Presidential Abraham Lincoln Hotel, which is where my grandma always took us swimming whenever we visited her. I got up three hours before Abe and the girls, and after eating breakfast, I swam in the pool. It felt exactly the same as it did when I was little–they haven’t changed the decor one bit! The only thing missing was the sauna. Maybe it wasn’t safe enough, but I did feel nostalgic when I noticed it was gone.
Abe and the girls woke up at 10:30am, just in time to get Maid-Rite and head to the picnic. Maid-Rite is the nation’s first drive-thru; it’s also one of my favorite Springfield spots because we used to go there every time we visited Grandma.
At the picnic:
Then we went back to the hotel so Abe and the girls could swim before dinner. At dinner, we took a lot of family pictures, all of which can be accessed here for the next couple weeks. After that, I’ll need to upload them from the CD which my mom is so kindly sending me. Thanks, mom!
Here are the pictures I did get:
Then Clark, Swathi, Abe, the girls and I took a walk to Abe’s Lincoln House. It was dark, so I didn’t take my camera. Too bad! The house was lit up and beautiful. It’s right downtown, so the walk wasn’t too demanding–which was great, considering we’d gorged ourselves at dinner.
But before our walk, I got a picture of Abe posing as Abe.
The next morning, we barely made it to church in time to hear my mom give a fantastic Relief Society lesson on love. (Well, I got to hear it. Abe and the girls can’t go to Relief Society.)
Then we headed to Grandma’s for lunch and some visiting. While there, Lydia suddenly came down with a 103 degree fever. As I cuddled her, Abe gave her medicine. Oops! She vomited that right up, all over me. Emma, pictured below, is my new favorite person. She was so great at helping me clean the vomit off in the bathroom. Seriously, whenever I have my next baby, I want her to be the nurse.
After saying hasty goodbyes, we headed off. Lydia slept until we arrived at a Dairy Queen, several hours later. She was feeling better, so we got her an ice cream cone.
That night, we stayed at Abe’s Aunt Bonnie’s lake house in rural Missouri. It was gorgeous.
The next day, we stopped in Independence, Missouri, to visit our church’s visitor center. The Independence temple lot is really important to Latter-Day Saints. The Community of Christ (formerly the Reformed Latter-Day Saint Church) owns most of the lot, and they’ve built their own temple on their portion. We visited that, too.
We spent the rest of the day driving. Kansas, in my opinion, is a little spooky. Since the land is flat and a lot of time there aren’t any trees in sight, it feels like you’re lost at sea. The sky is so big and oppressive. But, at the same time, it’s also pretty:
We got to Denver late that night, and in the morning, we completed our Grandparent Grand tour.
Then we drove home.
