cross country.

it's time to document our summer cross country road trip.  yes--all 11 of us in 

our big ol' van [maybe she needs a name?] traveling west for 3 weeks.

this is the only way that i pack.  each child's clothes laid out with what they will need.
i like the idea of putting an outfit together for each day and putting it in a ziploc
or tying it together with a string, but i've found that it doesn't work well with weather and big

family unpredictability.  so, each of the children have a little suitcase to keep their 

things separate. it's nice that they can be in charge of wheeling or carrying it, too--even 

the 4 year olds did this.  they each also have a zippered toiletry bag for ease of keeping it 

together and grabbing it to take into bathrooms.  this worked really well for us

the whole trip.

 we had been talking about this trip for almost a full year.  i'll share in the days to

come why we chose this route--for now, here's some of our excited crew as we took

off.  the essentials are handy--quilts, fresh fruit & veggies, cherry pepsi, 

slings, cheerios & a bag of extra shoes.  

okay, i know i caught ellie singing here, but i love it all.  chloe's working

on her clipboard--one of them is pictured below.  each of the 7 big kids had one.

it included plain paper, a little notebook, pen, pencil, baggie of crayons, worksheets

and age appropriate print out activities.  this and ONE toy or stuffed animal was 

all they took with them--no DS, ipods, iPads in sight.  we do have a movie in

our van and would watch one every now and then.  it was a treat and welcome

break for everyone to check out for a bit.  the 3 big kids rotated sitting between

the twins and it worked wonderfully so they could entertain & help when needed.  

i became a really big fan of rest stops on this trip.  i remember having a [valid]

fear of rest stops when i was young because of an experience a relative had while

working there, but i'm a their new biggest fan.  they are clean, usually have a lot

of stalls, have picnic tables, some have play sets and plenty of room to run. 

i wasn't sure how everyone would do in the van for so long, but really they were

champs.  [i think there were only 2 times--that only really last 15 minutes or so--that

i questioned our sanity.]  stopping for small spurts regularly was a big part of that.

our first stop was in Iowa at matt's parents!  we stayed overnight and had

a nice visit before heading out at dinner time.

we love to stop at local places instead of chain restaurants.  that's pretty funny to 

do in the middle of iowa.  this was a tiny, hole-in-the-wall, cash only restaurant filled 

with cute, old people.  we got quite the stares as our big ol', colorful family kept coming

in the doors.  :)  you have the have the fresh homemade desserts at places like that--

bianca got to try them all!  

and with that we were off to travel through the night.....