We started off this beautiful Thursday with breakfast at home. I whipped up a batch of brownies so we could have a sweet snack when we got back to the house. After we ate, we packed up and headed for the beach! I’m once again SO thankful that we can just open our front door and be on the beach in less than 4 minutes! The girls are just loving the ocean. Jamey and I keep hoping they find snow just as exciting :/

Abby loved building volcanoes in the sand.

This is looking down both sides of the beach… while there were a couple condos and the Beach Club… 95% of the beach had  houses. So when you looked around you really just noticed trees – zero hotels. So so beautiful.

Once again, bicycles everywhere. The sand is really REALLY packed tight. You would often see a couple bikes stroll by or a runner. Speaking of packed sand… We took a pack of sand toys that I picked up at TJ Max. Those plastic shovels didn’t stand a chance. The surf shop had wooden handle, metal shovels for sale. We will know next time to just wait and spend our money there. They didn’t seem over priced – and they were much more practical for the type of sand.

The mighty ocean claimed Hannah’s blue goggles. I took a few extra pair – but the extras were pretty cheap. Although they work in a calm pool,  they just didn’t have the suction needed to keep Hannah happy in the ocean. We purchased these lovely purple ones at the surf shop. They said 7+, but they worked great for Hannah!

I can’t say enough great things about Sea Pines! So so so family oriented. Craft Cove is just another great area Sea Pines had set up for the kids. Each day they offered a different craft the kids could make for a small fee. Today they were painting sanddollars. The fee was $5 per sanddollar. We thought this was a great price. The girls got to sit down and make something on vacation that could come home with them as a souvenir! Craft Cove is located right on the beach. Since our house was right there – we ran home and rinsed off real quick. But we noticed several kids that just came up and took a break from the ocean for a bit. The craft leaders labeled the projects when they were finished and the kids went back to the ocean with their families. They picked up their projects as they were leaving the beach for the day.

The girls wrapped up their crafts and we decided to head to South Beach to The Salty Dog. It was at least 125 degrees out Well, I mean, it was over 100 and with the nice humidity even the staff was complaining about the heat. At the time I didn’t think it was unbearable. Thank you St. Louis for preparing me for this type of living. I think I may have gills before this summer is over

We could be seated outside right away – but inside had a long wait. We noticed they had misters in the tents outside – and you were in the shade… Live a little! Outside we went!

Hey! Guess where we are??

Hannah loved the misters.

Abby thought they were pretty cool too!

Our waiter was kind enough to take our picture. I didn’t even have to ask!

We had a pretty good meal. We had heard that we just HAD to go to The Salty Dog — but not all of the food was that great. Someone told me to get the shrimp. They said that they had excellent shrimp. I’m not really a fried shrimp kind of person – but I ordered it — and it ROCKED! So yummy! We had the crab dip for an appetizer. The girls had pjb and a corn dog. Jamey went for the special of the day, BBQ. Really J? We are at the OCEAN

Our friend Michelle used to come to HHI every year with her family when she was younger. They still visit – but no longer own a house. She mentioned that she had stained her Salty Dog shirt and asked if I could pick her up a new one. Of course! So to wrap up our time in South Beach, we visited The Salty Dog Shop.

Whew! What a long hot day! We headed back to the house to enjoy those brownies I made earlier.  J and I took turns with a little nap. I don’t think the girls napped — but they had a little lazy time on the couch. I put together some baked mostaciolli and salad. We had a quick supper and then headed out the door. We wanted to get to Greg Russell tonight before everyone else did. Once again we decided to drive since we would be there well after dark.

Woo Hoo! Front Row!!! Here we are sitting under the Liberty Tree!

The girls enjoyed dancing on the stage before all of the other kids arrived.

Lotsa twirling going on!

Moss in the treesHarbour Town Lighthouse as the sun was setting.

The girls asked Jamey if they could get their faces painted. Of course Daddy said Yes

Jamey also grabbed the girls some slushies! 

Large yachts in the marina.

And just like that KIDS EVERYWHERE!! Abby had no problem jumping right in. Hannah was okay as long as she was near Abby.

He’s Here! And we can see him MUCH better than the other night!

Hannah ended up coming back to sit with us. This is the point where she nearly donkey kicked a woman in the stomach

Abby  made some friends

Hannah had a blast once the singing started!

The benches were in the sand. This was a very good thing! Hannah was entertained by the sand when she wasn’t by the music

Sometimes a girls gotta dance!

It seemed a majority of these families have been coming here for years! The kids are holding up posters asking Greg if they can sing with him. Some of the posters said, “My mom sang with you when she was a girl. Please pick me to sing with you tonight.” Others talked about how far they had traveled to see him. A couple kids were from Ethiopia!! For the record both of those signs got picked and they got to sing. Another family sang the ABCs backwards. And one cute tiny “free” year old sang Twinkle Twinkle. It was a great evening. The girls had a much better time up close! My recommendation is to get there plenty early and get a good seat!

Hannah sang and danced as long as she could… And then she was out!

We packed the girls up and walked back to our car after the show. Jamey had parked between two Palmetto trees. It was so tight we had to fold the mirrors in so he could get out safely. Nice!

We were beat when we got home. Baths and right to bed!

Monday night we decided that on Tuesday (today) we would wake up and have a very quick breakfast and then head to the beach. We wanted to see if there was anything fantastic waiting for us in the sand. So we did just that. We had some Nutrigrain Bars and headed out the door.

Good morning little friend!

We got to the beach and after quite a long walk all we came up with was a few dead jellyfish, a big turtle shell, a few small crab shells and one starfish missing a leg.

We went back home and changed our clothes and headed up the to Lawton Stables.

We started off looking at the horses and ponies in the pasture. They had one Clydesdale, Harley. She is in the blood line of the AB Clydesdales. A lady at the stables told us she was rejected because she had too much white in her fur.

Time to leave the horses and go check out the petting area.

Here we are!

No one was really running up to this poor girl

Here piggy piggy…

Pretty wrap around porch!

Jamey went in to sign them up for pony rides. The girls took turns on the old horse outside.

Hannah met a friend walking over to the ponies. She asked me if/where she could pet it. I said, “nose”. Um, I guess I need to remember that she is three… because she tried the best she could to stick her entire hand in the poor horses nostril. Sigh. She finally got it right and everyone was happy.

Time to ride! The girls took a minute to meet some of the ponies while they waited their turn.

Looks like Abby is going first!

She hopped up on pretty white Romeo like a champ!

This is one of those pics you save for future boyfriends or the newspaper when she’s 16. LOL makes me laugh every time!!

Hannah’s horse was named Dixie. She wasn’t scared at all! Good girl!

Time to wash up and head on to our next adventure! I find it a bit comical that J chose the women’s room

Two tired cowgirls.

Hannah wanted one more ‘ride’. I have the best video from this moment. I’ll be sure to post all of the videos in a separate post at the end.

We left the stables in search of some refreshments. Can you believe that there is a Starbucks less than one mile from here?? After a coffee break we headed home for some lunch. We made some yummy turkey sandwiches and had a few Sun Chips. After lunch we got in a couple rounds of Hullabaloo. Jamey spent some time on the computer trying to re-rout our trip home around Atlanta (too much construction). Then we decided it might be time to hit the beach.

We made lots of holes and castles and turtles and volcanoes in the sand! Jamey grabbed some cheap sunglasses at the surf shop. He still believes there is a piece of sand in the hinge on one arm of his good sunglasses We were in and out of the water for a while. Then, back to our house.

I took this pic of this palm type thing. Mom knows the name. I think she and the Jones’ both have one. Except they have the tiny version and this one is more the size of a large gorilla. This was in our courtyard. You can see Jamey standing behind it by our front door. So pretty!

We were heading back to Harbour Town for some dinner. Remember, Harbor Town is still inside of the Sea Pines resort. We could safely and easily bike there — but we were planning on being there late, so this time we drove. Since we were getting down there pretty early, parking wasn’t bad at all.

We walked past the Liberty Oak Tree in Harbour Town. There is a stage under this tree. There are performances here most every night.

We decided to eat at The Quarterdeck. We had a great view, delicious food and spectacular live entertainment! Jamey had a surf and turf sandwich and I had the crab cake sandwich. We had an awesome waitress! She was so good with the girls! The girls asked if they could have a coaster with the lighthouse on it – not only did she bring them a handfull of coasters, she wrote their names on one in bubble letters. The girls were so happy!

Abby colored a beautiful “rainbow fish”.

You can see that Hannah LOVED the kids pasta…

…and the live entertainment!

After dinner the girls wanted to go in one of the gift shops. They found some jellyfish that they really wanted to get. I decided that I had enough to carry on this trip and knew we would be back. They were okay with waiting until another day. We left the gift shop and took a quick walk down to see the shells. Jamey noticed that the fishing poles on the boats had several strings on them. He stopped and spoke to one of the captains. He was so kind to take the time and tell Jamey all about the gear.

I think these pics turned out so cute. You can look at them and think, “Oh how nice. The girls look so cute strolling on the bank picking up shells.” But we will remember the stench stuck to their feet — like sewage… YUCKO!!!

The final thing we were doing today was a Sunset Dolphin Cruise on the Vagabond. This was a little bit special since we were going on a Tuesday. On Tuesdays Sea Pines has fireworks in a couple locations. This particular cruise allowed you to see them from the water. So beautiful!

We saw the Black Dagger docked again!

And here we go!

This is Daufuskie Island. Interesting fact: If you are older than 5th grade and still in school — you ride the school boat! No roads to this one! There were some gigantic houses out here!

Dolphins!! I didn’t get the greatest pics – because I really just wanted to watch them. They seemed to be having so much fun! If you look closely you can see they had babies with them!

Looking back at Harbour Town.

Some of the houses…

This was ruins from a plantation.

Here comes the sunset! Wow! It was just like a painting! We didn’t think we were going to get to see it actually set because of that thick band of clouds – but this view was still quite amazing!

Wait!! Maybe it will pop through the bottom?!

Yay!

And it was gone…

Now we were heading to our final stop to watch the fireworks. We noticed some more fantastic houses and went under a bridge. The girls (especially Hannah) were starting to get pretty antsy. Abby made friends with a pediatrician that was sitting right in front of us.

Grrr, I had my strap or something in front of my flash…

And finally! Firework time! Once again, I just wanted to watch. They were pretty. Seeing the reflection off of the water was quite beautiful! I didn’t have a tripod with me… but I still think a few of the pics turned out nice.

I seem to have forgotten now, but the girl were quite frustrating on this specific trip. It was close to 10:30 PM when this cruise wrapped up – and they had been dealing with very full and sleep deprived days. This might have been pushing Hannah just a little too late (for me to expect her to able to hold it together). Sigh. Lesson learned.

Hannah fell asleep on the long, slow ride back to the marina. Then I carried her the 14 miles to the car. Okay, well, it wasn’t 14… but it sure seemed like it! When did she get so heavy? This was one of those times I wish I had a pouch with me. Sure, her whole self wouldn’t fit in it anymore – but her bottom would have – and I could have dispersed her weight a bit better rather than ALL in my arms.

We loaded them in the car. They both were out by the time we drove the 2 miles back to our house. We changed their clothes while they slept – and they continued to sleep right until the next morning.

It was a fun filled FULL day! But what memories!!

Day three! Our first full day on the island. I thought I should start out letting you see our villa. I already told you how great our location was — but the villa itself was pretty nifty! All of the space and conveniences you could ask for from a rental house on vacation! Great views, nice sized rooms. Plenty of space in the kitchen, a washer and dryer. The list goes on and on. I will say, it had that “you’re at the beach” smell. Kinda humid and closed up maybe? I thought maybe it was just this house – but when we went to check out the other two places yesterday, they had the exact same smell. I guess it has to do with the humidity and being closed up? Heh! Anyway, wasn’t so bad after we were in it and moving around for a couple days.

So here is the house. This is the outside. You can see our gate and our outdoor shower. This was SUPER!! We walked from the beach to our house in a couple of minutes. We were able to completely shower off before heading inside! Remind me, if I ever live by the beach, I want this!

As soon as you walked through the gate the “adjacent, separate guest house” was on your left. We’ll get back to that in a bit. There was a small courtyard that always had fun little lizards (Hannah is chasing one below). It was gated all the way around tho. I made myself believe that the gate would keep out the alligators We had a couple lounge chairs, a table and chairs and a grill in the courtyard.

Oh look! Another one! I loved these little guys!

How about a look inside! So you walk in the gate and pass the guest house on your left. And walk to the front door. I guess I didn’t get a picture of this?? How odd?? When you open the front door you are standing in the dining room. Hannah thought she was being so funny jumping in every picture. You can see here where we placed the girls bedroom. So if you are doing your math – yes, we had one entire house with two bedrooms and two bathrooms that were not being used :/

On the right. 

On your left as you walked in. This is where we usually kept the sunblock and our keys.
Straight ahead

A little to the left. You can see the master bedroom on the far left.

Standing at the windows looking back towards the front door.
Standing by the windows looking back towards the master bedroom.

In the master bedroom. You can see we had sliding doors out to the alligators –er… I mean backyard.

Stepping out on the deck.

Back inside you can see we had a tv too. This was the one we watched in the evenings since the girls slept in the family room :/

Our master closet.

Continuing through the master closet into the laundry room.

Through the laundry room you can also get to the kitchen. This was nice! After the girls went to bed we didn’t have to walk through the family room to get to the fridge. The girls also loved the nice “race track” that was provided You can see the courtyard and the other house in this view as well.

Continuing around the kitchen.

Here you can see through the doorway that goes back to the dining room.

backwards look.

Now, standing in the doorway out of the kitchen (towards the dining room). If you walk straight you are in a washroom for the bathroom. If you go right you are back in the dining room.

When you are in this washroom. There is a door to the left that goes into the toilet/shower.

And this toilet/shower leads to the master washroom area — right off of the master bedroom.

Whew! That wraps up the main house. Want to see the house we didn’t use?

This is the first room off of the courtyard. It is the one we took the mattresses from.

It had a sliding door to the main house. OH!! There it is! The front door You can also see our bikes here. We parked them inside our gate.

The other bedroom.

It has a sliding door to the courtyard as well. Through this door you can see the kitchen from the other house.

And now the bathrooms for this house.

And a shared big closet. This closet also had a couple beach chairs in it for us to use. We were using them – so they weren’t in the pic

Okay! I think that wraps up the house! Want to see what we did today?

We started off with some breakfast at home. Jamey grabbed some milk last night. I brought cereal, fruit, nutrigrain bars, poptarts and bagels. We had a nice selection and actually ate breakfast at home every day of our trip!

We decided to try out our bikes. The bike shop delivered Abby’s tag-a-long as promised! Well, what they really did was deliver two entirely new bikes! At some point Jamey had rode his bike up to the bike shop and he traded his for a bit bigger frame. So what we ended up doing was keeping my bike with Hannah’s seat. Jamey kept his new bike and we transferred the tag-a-long to his new bike. Theeeeeeen we called the bike shop to come and pick up the “new” bikes they had left us, minus Abby’s tag-a-long. Whew! Got that?

We got our helmets on and loaded up the girls and headed to Harbor Town. Harbor Town was about 2 miles from our house to the bike racks. Nearly everyone rents or brings bikes. The Sea Pines Resort area (from our house) is roughly a 2-3 mile bike ride in any direction. Parking isn’t always easy – so riding bikes is a great option. I usually don’t have any issues riding a bike so I wasn’t too concerned. Until I realized that I had never carried a kid on the back of my bike… Um… And, remember when you were 6 and your bike brakes worked by pedaling backwards – yeah, well… that is how “beach bikes” work. Sigh. Can I tell you how difficult this was for me? Cars have the right of way. But TONS of people biked. So when you came to a crosswalk or bike crossing area – you usually had to stop. And so did the 17 bikes behind you. Then, the car would usually wave you through and you had to get your bike (with your kid on back) going again. Quickly!! Because you didn’t want to hold up the car or the other 17 bikers. I often use my foot ON MY BIKE to rotate my pedals so I have the best leverage to get it going again. But you can’t do that on beach bikes. When you try to turn the pedals backwards all it does is throw on the brakes. You can see where this is going right? Sigh. Hannah and I never actually fell to the ground… but we had some close calls. Bikes are very VERY convient there. But when we do this again – I think I’ll take my own. I’m just not a fast learner on this type of bike I guess Jamey didn’t have the trouble I had. He had parking issues since his bike was more like a bicycle built for two… but that was his only issue. I think I coast with my left leg up – but I really feel more comfortable taking off with my right leg up. I dunno. It wasn’t too bad. 90% of the bike trails are tree covered. There was usually a fantastic breeze. We often noticed birds and alligators and turtles while we rode. All of the paths were asphalt, lit and well maintained. But be warned!! Just because they are lit doesn’t really mean you can see too well… I’ll get back to this

Once we made it to Harbor Town, we parked our bikes at the playground and headed to the pier to get information on some of the excursions we wanted to do. There are many shops and restaurants at Harbor Town to visit.

I also had to keep baby wipes handy to get the drool off of Jamey’s face. He was surrounded by boats. Well, I suppose a better term would be yachts. They were amazing.

After walking all around Harbor Town we went to find some lunch. We chose Harbourside Burgers & Brews. You can guess what we had to eat… Burgers and drinks! The fries had sea salt on them and were delicious!

Abby was super excited about the information we got on the Pirate Cruise!

We were all pretty beat and ready to head back to the house. We hopped on our bikes and rode home. Because I am super talented, I was able to get the camera out of the bag and snap a pic of my view on the bike ride.

We made it back home and everyone lounged on the couch. Hannah passed out and we put her in her bed. The rest of us watched The Kona Ironman competition on TV.

After naps and Ironman we headed to the beach.

Can you believe it is already super time?? We decided to hit  The Crazy Crab back in Harbor Town. So we got our bikes together and took off!

These are our bikes.

This is one of the smaller bike racks right in front of the Harbourtown Burgers & Brew. The Crazy Crab is just out of the picture to the right.

We put our names in and decided to walk around a bit more. Abby spotted a bride!! And a “real cowboy”! Her day was complete

More yachts in the harbor.

Walking down towards the Lighthouse.

The Black Dagger was docked!

This is the Vagabond! They were heading out for a sunset cruise!

The girls were getting tired of waiting – but were still being really really good!

They finally called our name! You know how most restaurants give you rolls or chips and salsa — this one gave us hushpuppies!!! And not just any hushpuppy — these were perfect!! So so yummy!!!

We had fried calamari for an appetizer. It was so good! The breading was super light. Then I had the broiled seafood platter and Jamey had the stuffed flounder.

It was getting dark out. We didn’t have lights for our bikes. They highly encourage you to have lights if you are riding at night. We still noticed bikes out. We couldn’t decide if we should ride/walk or take the trolly and pick our bikes up tomorrow. In the end we decided to ride. We had a bike path. We weren’t competing with cars — but we were competing with trees and wildlife and other lightless bikers. While it was an adventure — I DO NOT ADVISE EVER DOING THIS. Once was enough for us. We always took daylight into consideration when we left on our bikes in the future.

We made it home and crashed immediately. We were all so tired. What a fun day!!

We booked our vacation at Sea Pines Resort on Hilton Head Island. Check-in is on Saturday. Since it is over 800 miles to get there – we knew this would be a two day trip. I spent all afternoon and evening on thursday packing and shopping. We had everything ready to go friday morning as soon as we all woke up. (Some people put the kids in the car late at night or early in the morning — but we’ve noticed that our girls do better in the car when they are well rested and wide awake. Hannah doesn’t sleep too well in her seat.) We had everything in order and left the house around 10 AM.

About 2 miles down the road I realized that I didn’t pack the girls toothbrushes. Our very first stop on our trip was Walgreens Then we filled up at the gas station and off we went! For those of you keeping track – I did not get Starbucks before we left… I thought I’d grab one later on the road ;)

Another thing we chose to do was turn the outside world off. We told most everyone that called or texted us regularly that we really needed some time alone. To focus on just us. We would not be answering our phones. If they really needed us be sure to text URGENT or something exciting like that Our friends and family were so kind to understand!! I turned my ringer off while we were in the car. Every few hours I would glance to make sure there wasn’t an urgent message. I never logged into Facebook. Not once. Both of our moms asked that we let them know when we were traveling and at our destinations. So we did text our closest friends and family when we reached checkpoints and stops durring our 4 days of driving (2 there and 2 back).

We don’t currently own a gps. So our maps and directions were printed before we left the house. We did use technology to help us on our trip though! The iPad provided hours of movies and tv programs for the girls. Jamey hooked it up so it would feed the shows to their over the seat dvd players. The dvd players weren’t too dependable anymore and right as the girls would get into a movie – they would quit spinning the disk :/ The iPad worked like a dream! Super easy for me to control from the front seat! I also didn’t have to skip previews or deal with menu screens. It was awesome.  We used our phones to look up information as we drove. We googled almost every brown road sign we passed. It was so fun and entertaining (and educational). We pass them so often and read them – and still have no clue who Mr. So and So was or why that park is so important.

One of the things I did to prepare for the many hours in the car with the girls was to make them binders. I filled it with maps and coloring pages as our trip progressed. I also included blank paper in the back.

I gave them one map that showed our route.

And a map that they could color as we entered each state. Abby thought she did a much better job than Hannah. I had to explain to her that Hannah’s was just as beautiful You will notice that Abby colored NC as well – we came home through NC to avoid construction in Atlanta.

I also gave them a new coloring page (from Crayola)every time we entered a state. Sometimes Abby would color them in her favorite colors and other times she would ask me what the flag/bird looked like. She did Missouri right away. Hannah wasn’t really all that interested in coloring the states. Barbie was more her speed

Once we entered Illinois she did that one too!

I know it was only Illinois – but this was the first time we heard, “I need to pee.” Sooo, we stopped. Abby was very excited when she spotted the exact same flag from her coloring page!

One of the tips I read reminded us that we were on vacation. Relax. No need to rush. If you get to your destination an hour later than planned – who cares?? They recommended taking time to let the kids run and burn off some energy each time you stopped. So run we did!

The first movie the girls wanted to watch was Polar Express. Of course we had an audio issue with it :/ But Dad came prepared. He had every piece of equipment with him that he needed to reroute the audio through the car. Worked perfectly!

And, because I was there too – Hello!

Back in the car and heading to Kentucky!

Once we were there we found a lovely Dairy Queen – and we found out that Hannah completely peed her pants. Sooo, she was wet, the car seat was wet – good times! I packed ziplocks and plastic bags in the front seat with me. Another suggestion I found online. Perfect tips! Dirty pants in the ziplock and plastic bag on her seat. We had full bellies (and empty bladders) and were off again!

Abby colored a bit more:

It was time to fill up the car and check out a little wobble that J had been noticing as we drove. Yup! He was right. We needed air. We had just had the car serviced before we left. I’m not sure why the tires were off… but they were. We found some FREE AIR! Can you believe it??

Grandma and Grandpa Mifflin gave the girls little pencil boxes with colored pencils at Christmas. I thought I was all super cool putting those in the car for the trip. So super cool – except I forgot a sharpener :/ And wouldn’t you know that Abby needed one within 2 minutes of using the blue! I ran into the gas station and they didn’t have one to purchase but gave us directions to a Dollar General that was right around the corner. It was super! They had the sharpener and a few other things that may have just jumped into my hands. I did pick up a couple hand towels for Hannah’s seat. I thought that might be more comfy.

Jamey’s eyes lit up when he noticed a hardware store right next door.

Side note: A while back I may have been backing out of the Feger’s drive and wrecked our bumper a bit. Although it was quite loud – it wasn’t too noticeable - but it also wasn’t really attached on the passenger side. This too was “fixed” at the dealership before we left. However, Jamey wasn’t 100% happy. To make him 100% happy we would have had to replace the entire bumper. Since it didn’t look bad we weren’t interested in paying the $2000+ to fix it. He thought he could just use some zip ties underneath the van to hold the one little part he was concerned about. The problem is, he brought a ton of tools, but he didn’t bring a drill. And, since we owned drills at home – he wasn’t interested in purchasing one at Shop-O-Rama. So, he went in anyway to see what he could find that might help. He came out with duct tape. Excellent! :/ He did a little fixing right there in the parking lot. I forgot to get a picture at the time. Don’t worry. I did get pics later. You’ll see them in a bit

On the road again! We passed the Kentucky Dam. Of course we Googled it! Such an interesting read! One cool fact: Kentucky Dam is 206 feet (63 m) high, although over half the dam is submerged by water.

In to Nashville we go!

Now this wouldn’t be a fun trip without a little rush hour! Right??

This is only funny to you geeky types

The girls enjoyed a movie (and some sticker art) as we creeped along…

Sigh.

Hey, job opportunities everywhere!

We finally made it through rush hour and continued on our way towards Chattanooga.

We stopped to get some gas and that is when I realized I didn’t have a pic of our classy bumper. Here ya go!

We went across the street to a Cracker Barrel for supper. This might have been when we realized that Cracker Barrels may have the cleanest bathrooms on the road. An excellent place to stop and stretch our legs and grab a treat (even when it wasn’t supper time). I think we were in Southern Tennessee by this time. It was difficult to find a Cracker Barrel that wasn’t packed on a Friday evening.

A little bit more driving and it was dark. Aaaaannnnddddd, we found some construction.

While we were moving painfully slow through construction I snapped a pic of this place. Looks fun right??!!

We finally made it to Atlanta a little after midnight. We located our hotel and carried our girls in. They didn’t fall asleep until after 11:30. But once they were out – they were OUT

And finally changed and tucked in!

We stayed at the Renaissance Waverly Hotel in Atlanta. It was quite nice and I’m sure the nicest place our girls have gotten to stay. Jamey travels quite a bit – but one of the perks is the reward points he gets to keep. We can usually get a pretty nice hotel or good air fare when we need it! He knows he’s pretty cool – there is no need for the hotel to use big bold letters reminding him…

I snapped a couple pics of our room in the dark. Sorry about the quality :/ I was too tired to remember my new super duper flash.

A toilet paper embosser — now I know what to get you all for Christmas!

So we’ve come to the end of day one. Other than some construction and a rush hour – it was a very uneventful trip. The girls did just super! I had small presents for them along the way. We had movies and snacks. We took lots of breaks. We were in and out of the car for 13.5 hours from St. Louis to Altanta. It was a good day!