March 16th: After spending a couple of days in Buffalo (always nice to see Tim's family, and an added bonus: it knocked 4 hours off the start of our trip :) ) we left at 10:30 AM for our first destination city of Cincinnati. Took us over 9 1/2 hours to get there... Ryan screamed most of the way, poor baby... and kept throwing his leg over the top of his car seat. We made 6 stops (though only got out of the car once, at a gas station) to nurse him and let the kids pee... several more stops than we would usually make for a trip that length, but Ryan in particular was desperate. Thankfully, the kids are expert at going in cups, LOL... obviously have spent a lot of time on road trips. ;) Taking two cars has been a challenge, but it will be good once we get down to San Antonio so that I won't have to get the kids up at 4am every day just to get Tim onto post. I had a terrible headache (mostly from listening to my poor baby scream, no matter how often I tried to nurse or feed him, etc.) so I was grateful for the last 2 hours to switch with Tim and drive his car, while he drove mine with all the kiddos.
The kids were entertained for awhile listening to the theme music from "Unbreakable." Timmy calls it the "bouncy song" because they were all bouncing in their seats to the beat, and I told Timmy that it used to be one of his favorite songs to be bounced to when Daddy was deployed. Then I realized that it was exactly 6 years ago today that Tim left us... even just telling Timmy about how we used to dance to the song, I got all choked up and had to start again. Therese asked why Timmy missed Daddy so much "when Daddy was in Iraq." Timmy said, "Because I liked him!" I don't know if he really has any memory of Tim being gone, but he does remember things from within weeks of Daddy's return... so I suppose it is possible. Anyway, we are grateful that this March 16th, we are all together as a family - and doing what it takes, even this crazy road trip, to keep it that way!
March 17th: Left Cincinnati just after 9am, after a relatively comfortable night, but Ryan was still really restless for much of it. The kids were excited to make it into KY within a short time, and were on the lookout for "bluegrass," which they did see here and there. They were also pleasantly surprised to see how red the dirt became once we neared Bowling Green, and for about 2 hours all I heard (besides Ryan crying) was "Red dirt! Red dirt! RED DIRT!!!" LOL We discussed different types of grass, the iron content of the dirt (the kids call it i-ron), the reasons why the weather down here is warmer than up north, how KY and TN are so much more hilly than most of OH, etc. Ryan did pretty well the first couple of hours, and we only had to stop every 90-120 min or so the whole day... think we made 4 stops... again, only getting out of the cars once to use bathrooms. (Thankfully we have a cooler in the car, so we haven't had to buy any fast food or anything at all.) Right before hitting the TN border, Tim and I switched again - the kids told me Ryan didn't cry the whole time Daddy was driving. What the heck. He did do better today, but cried for the last several hours I was driving him. Maybe it's because he sees me and the babas. ;)
Got lucky with some rocks that were knocked loose by a pick-up truck in front of me that dropped its load... sparks were flying and rocks were shooting up everywhere... still, they cracked and dented the windshield. I am just grateful that there was no real accident, and that nothing actually went flying right through the windshield. That was pretty much the only real adventure of the day... the 45 min it took us to go 1 1/2 miles at one point was frustrating, but again, it could have been worse. Only 9 hours in the car today, too, so that was also better than yesterday.
It's sort of weird driving this route again... it's been over three years since I last drove it, but still, this is my 8th time driving these highways... I know the route from NY to TX like the back of my hand. When it's this familiar, both big and little landmarks mean a great deal... let you know you're getting there, despite all the crying and whining and chaos.... the National Corvette Museum... Louisville... the Red River... Nashville... Natchez Trace State Park... and even the classic southern, "backwoods" town names that make us crack up everytime we drive through. :) (I think Bucksnort TN takes the cake on that one! :) )
The most exciting thing for the kids today, though, was seeing bright red buds on the trees, and purple and yellow flowers growing along the side of the road! Once we hit the Nashville area, you could really see that spring was starting to make its presence known. No snow, greener grass, and flowers here and there. It's actually such a climate shock for me that I had the A/C on for awhile because it got into the high 50's! If that's not a "You know you're from the North Country when....." I don't know what is. :) (But if the car windows didn't make such a loud noise while opened, yes, I would have opened them instead. :P )
Hoping for a good night's sleep tonight, and a continued safe journey tomorrow.
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