The weekend trip

Friday, June 29th, we hit the road around 4:50pm for Idaho Falls. I was impressed that we got the tent trailer and all our junk packed up for the weekend trip so quickly. We gassed up and were on the freeway at 5pm... an excellent start!

Tid bits from the 4-5 hour road trip TO Idaho Falls:

After finishing dinner at Cr@cker B@rrel, Liam had to rock each rocking chair on the veranda as we made our way to the car. Sometimes he would stop and check that the rest of the chairs were rocking before he went to the next chair.

While driving along, Liam started saying his high-pitched "poo poo." I said, "Liam, did you go poo poo, do you need me to change your diaper?" He kept saying it and Ian looked back to see Liam pointing to his "boo boo" on his knee and puckering up to kiss what was just barely out of reach. Oh those dang car seat straps holding him back from kissing his own boo boo...

After a 1.5 hour nap, Liam awoke with smiles. He didn't miss a beat to start groovin' to Dad's country music playing on the radio. It was the cutest car seat post-nap dancing I've ever seen.

We pulled into Snake River RV Park a little after 10pm. Liam ran wild while poor Dad set up the tent trailer by himself with minimal help from me. (And as usual, I am of little help for guiding large vehicles going backwards into a specific spots as well.) I was so scared I was going to lose Liam in the dark so I kept close as he darted to and fro.

Once we were settled and ready for bed, Liam wouldn't be left in his porta-crib. Uh oh. We fought him for a long time climbing all over us and such. Ian decided he would take him for a drive at around 1am. Apparently he fell asleep, but when Dad tried to transfer him, he awoke. Ian and Liam snuggled and he finally settled down. I think around 3ish he woke again and I resorted to nursing him and I slept in those awkward ways for fear of moving and waking him.

Liam woke us up early. We lay there and let him crawl all over us for awhile... We finally sat up and said, "What a great night of rest!" [hardee har har]

We got showered and/or freshened up and made our way to Wal-Mart to pick up a couple things and then we were on our way to the family reunion at Tautphaus Park. We found a couple people we knew, chatted and ate lunch. Liam found some folks to entertain and got a few people laughing as well as himself. He is such a clown! Not long after that, went to the Zoo located there in the park.

It was Liam's nap time, but he had a blast at the zoo even as exhausted and hot as he was feeling. I can't say what animal was his favorite. He thought the Lions were cool, the goats too. It was his first time in a petting zoo type of setting. He thought it was fun to brush the goats and he even tried brushing two at once! He liked pretty much everything about the place! I look forward to taking him to Hogle Zoo later in the summer.

We got him loaded in the car and not 2 minutes later he had his hat down over his eyes and he was out like a light. Completely ZONKED.

We drove around for a bit, got some treats at a drive thru and headed back to camp. Liam slept in the car with the door ajar as we sat at our picnic table and enjoyed our eats.

After Liam woke from his nap we went over to the pool and had some fun. Liam was so excited about the water! Dad was his favorite toy as usual. I jumped in a couple times, but I got a chill pretty quick and got out and dried off to take more photos. Liam was shivering by the time I got out and we tried to get him out to warm him, but he was too anxious to get back in with Dad. I love how he clung to Ian. It was very sweet. It was also cute when he'd jump off the edge into Ian's arms.

After getting changed and freshened up again, we headed to the mall to see if we could find a better pair of sandals for Liam. We lucked out at P@yless Shoe Source because they had a safety recall on the @irwalk (croc look alikes) and we got Liam new $14.99 shoes for 2 bucks because we got a refund for his old shoes. SCORE!

We found a couple shirts for Liam at Old N@vy and then got in the car to find a place to eat dinner. There were 3 BBQ places listed in the visitors guide we had. While at the gas station I rolled down my window and asked a local guy what restaurant of the three were best. He said Bubba's BBQ. Boy am I glad I asked! Those were some awesome baby back ribs!!! Even Liam chowed down on them! He also had bread and corn on the cob. We stuffed ourselves and our small boy.

We found ourselves back at the camp site trying to get Liam to go to sleep for the night. I thought after the long day outdoors he would zonk out pretty easily. I was wrong. He fought for 2 hours. He even got out of his crib and opened the camper door to sneak a peek at what we were up to. I had walked over to the park store to get us some ice cream on a stick and I came back to Liam in Ian's arms watching Baby Einstein outside the camper. Ian relayed how the camper door slowly opened and he saw a smiling Liam peering through. Cute, but infuriating at the same time.

Minutes later our new next door neighbor drove up and parked his old clunky SUV WAY too close to our car (he had to hold the door sorta closed as he squeezed out of the car). They had set up camp while we were gone earlier in the day, claiming our picnic table and setting up a couple feet from our camper (they had a TON of space on the other side, but decided to cramp our style instead of spreading out a bit). Little did they know they'd have a crying baby keeping them up in the night. I wish we could have stuck around to teach them a lesson, but with oblivious neighbors and a relentless toddler, we decided to NOT stay the night and started the long trip home after 10pm.

Ian and I had to switch off driving duty way too many times. We were so exhausted. We rolled into our hometown at 3am Sunday morning. I was so grateful we said a prayer before hitting the road. I prayed a lot as I was falling asleep when Ian would take the wheel too. Both of us would wake if the other would hit a bump or swurve just a little too much... "Are you okay?" We were scared to death that sleep would take over us as we traveled in the night.

Sunday was a TOTAL day of rest. Liam allowed us to sleep in until 9:30am. Then when he took a nap at 12:45, we both went down for naps too. Liam slept for 3 hours... Ahhh! We didn't start unpacking the car until close to bed time. The camper is still waiting to be unloaded... ;)