We had an amazing family vacation (our first) during a road trip to Texas for Uncle Will & Aunt Anita's wedding. We spent 3 days on the road each way, driving roughly 6 hours a day, with hotel stops in Eureka, Missouri and Broken Arrow, Oklahoma. We stayed 6 days as guests in Uncle Will & Aunt Anita's beautiful home (it's everything we hope to have one day, as you'll see in the photos below) once we arrived in Texas. We spent most of each day outdoors since the weather was phenomenal while we were there (upper 50s to low 80s). I spent 2 months over-thinking and preparing for this trip, and in the end, we had everything we needed in addition to a lot of extra food.
Charlotte & Ruby did amazingly well in the car, and made the most of the quick rest area stops by immediately finding sticks & dirt to play with. The trip had many classically cute kid moments. When we were about 30 minutes into our 1st day of driving, Charlotte stated, "I can't see Texas yet." During the 2nd day of driving towards Texas, Ruby exclaimed, "Stop the car STOP THE CAR STOPTHECAR!" in a panicked voice. She then continued with a calm explanation, "I need to draw a square."
It was a magnificent trip, we loved being able to see family that we have not seen in years. Sadly, the vacation had to come to an end and we needed to head home. As we pulled out of the driveway, Ruby quietly commented, "That was a lovely visit." It was indeed. Enjoy the many, many photos!
At the first rest area in Missouri:
The play set had a bell to ring, but only if you were tall or daring enough to lean out from the platform, of which Charlotte was the latter:
Our first hotel had a large entertainment section that included an indoor pool area with a small children's pool (18" deep):
Our first night in a hotel was a little rough getting them to calm down and sleep but every night after went quite well:
In Broken Arrow, OK, we found a small park near the hotel to burn some energy at before going to bed that night. They found a questionable creek and happily played in it:
It took Charlotte less than 30 seconds to scale this leftover foundation conveniently located next to the playground (Bob was nervously standing next to it, though I cropped him out for the photo's sake):
Ruby thought about climbing it, but decided against it almost immediately, much to Bob's relief:
Once we arrived at Uncle Will & Anita's home, they ran into the magnificent backyard and began exploring right away:
Once our cousins arrived, Charlotte & Ruby had a ridiculous amount of fun playing with them. They played follow the leader with Kaitlynn (Jamie's daughter):
Which turned into chasing Kaitlynn all around the yard:
They took turns fighting the terrible dragon (a tree stump) to make it nice and fed it bird seed with peanut butter (their imaginations are brilliant):
Bob spent many hours playing with them. We went through 5 large bottles of bubbles in 3 days:
Reading a story at the end of the day with Grandma Sueli:
"Painting" the deck with water lasted an entire morning, and turned into squirting each other with the hose later on:
Charlotte & Ruby beamed with happiness while we were there:
At a nearby park Jamie (Bob's cousin) and her daughter Maura indulged Charlotte on the seesaw:
Charlotte loves the seesaw:
Maura read to Ruby:
Grandma Sueli blew bubbles for Kaitlynn and Ruby to pop:
They had the honor of being flower girls in the wedding, which left us wondering how that would go as they are 3 and not entirely great at following directions all the time right now. At the rehearsal, they gathered up dead leaves to use as practice petals:
Before the wedding began, we arrived early to take some photos with Aunt Anita & Uncle Will:
They smiled brightly in hopes of earning their reward of kid-sized garden tools (rakes, shovels, and hoes):
Sitting on rooster statues as though they were part of a carousel seemed like a good idea:
Until Ruby's failed:
At the ceremony, with very little practice and a whole lot of coaching earlier, they performed perfectly as flower girls (photos by Aunt Jen):
Ruby had to be gently nudged out of the way as she continued to drop petals in front of Aunt Anita when the judge began:
In case anyone is curious, they got the garden tools.
With the ring bearers:
A Nelson family photo after the ceremony:
With more Nelsons:
And even more Nelsons:
We found the most wonderful rest area possible in Oklahoma on the way home from Texas:
They gathered handfuls of dirt to pour on this tree stump so it could grow again:
Running through the leaves:
We had no idea that a rest area could be so much fun:
It would not be a true road trip without a delightful roadside attraction visit. We found this one to commemorate our first (of many) family road trips:
The moral of this post is: Make sure you introduce your child to houseplants before visiting someone else's home. They just might take a bite out of one without knowing the proper technique of behavior around such plants, as Charlotte demonstrated in Texas. Special thanks to Jamie for the photo:
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