Road Trip, Pt 1

We finally decided to break in our fancy-pants minivan with a trip from Oregon to Utah. We took off on Friday evening, stopping to wait out rush hour traffic at Red Robin. William had his traditional noodles and red sauce. As he picked at his food after Kip and I had finished eating, I began to fear for my white t-shirt. In my attempt to move farther from his red-stained reaching fingers, Anna took advantage of my distraction and dumped Kip's chocolate shake on me. Hooray. I got to start a 12 hour overnight drive in chocolate-shake stained clothes.

The drive wasn't as bad as I had feared it would be. Kip did the first big leg while I attempted to sleep in the front seat. Then, I took over and drove from midnight to 3 am. In the thick darkness of deepest night, all I could see of the scenery was the small stretch of road my headlights illuminated as I flashed past and the twinkle of lights in the towns I passed. I loaded the CD player with 6 CDs I hadn't listened to in a while and enjoyed myself singing softly along in the solitude of a carful of sleeping companions. William woke at one point and talked for a while about the toy cars at his Grammy's house and the Matchbox fold-out city she saved from our childhood. He was also a little concerned about the fact that we hadn't brought his bed along.

Kip drove for the early morning, sun-rising time. As he coasted through the freeways of Southern Idaho, some kamikaze deer attempted to take us out. He hit the brakes and swerved and William and I came awake. William somehow got the idea it was rabbits we were about to hit and still talks about the rabbits on the road whenever we drive anywhere.

We spent the first half of our visit in Kaysville with the Parker side of the family. Grammy and Grandad were there, and Uncle Trevor. Janean and Jeremy and Craig, Lesley and Enoch frequently came to visit. We finally got to meet the elusive little cousin Enoch and he and Anna seemed to do fairly well, although she tended to bully him a little bit. Of course, she is a little older and has the advantage of having an older brother to toughen her up. I think she was just trying to let Enoch see what it was like to get picked on.

While in Kaysville, we toured the Air Force Museum. William loved looking at all the airplanes but was a little depressed that he couldn't get on any of them and fly away. We also had fun swimming in the family hot tub.