Our Trek West

The girls only van.

The boys - ready to hit the road again!

The kids love when Chris does the balancing baby act complete with circus music! I am not so crazy about it. I say, if he had had to suffer as much as I, to carry and bring that baby into the world he would not be so cavalier! He would not stop until I took a picture.


We partook of the hotel's complimentary continental breakfast each morning. Lunches were usually had at rest stops out of our cooler. Nothing like dining al fresco with the smell of exhaust and the sounds of the interstate to create just the right ambiance! Check out Ashlyn's nutritious lunch of chips and chips. We were then allowed to eat one restaurant meal each night.

Our trip westward equalled about 25 hours of driving and covered around 1722 miles. I am not a fan of long road trips especially when children are involved. I did not even have the luxury of sleeping most of it like I usually do. I actually had to drive the whole way. I wouldn't have made it without low carb Monster energy drinks and my dramatized CD's. Landon hates, hates his car seat and usually screams if he is in the car for longer than 20 minutes. Because I hate to drive and I cannot take loud noise Chris bravely took him in the moving truck. Chris said he slept almost all of the trip! We are thinking in large part due to the vibrations and white noise of the diesel engine. Plus he still slept at night time!!!! This was a huge blessing as he normally doesn't nap during the day much. Blessing number 2 was that the moving truck hauling a good sized trailer was actually able to go 75 mph most of the way! We were actually passing people!

Day 1 of our trek started out with Chris finishing up clearing while the kids and I breakfasted at "The Diner" in Daleville. My four kids and I were quite the entertainment for the locals and flight students. We stopped for lunch in the parking lot of a GIANT Baptist church somewhere in Mississippi. Which turned out to have a playground that we were invited to enjoy. We left with some yummy homemade sugar cookies and thanks for our military service. You gotta love Southerners!!! We stopped for the night in Shreveport, Louisiana.


Day 2 was all Texas all day long! Whitney and I were loving listening to our dramatized CD's I had gotten when I joined Living Scriptures but had somehow never listened to. They were mostly dramatized church history stories, scripture stories and stories of American heroes who demonstrated great values. She loved them so much she did not want to take a turn in the moving truck. Gavin did not want to take a turn in the van until the final day of travel. After a few hours he was ready to go back in the moving truck. Chris said he was a big help with Landon. We ended the day in Pecos, Texas. Despite all of the amazing blessings we had enjoyed I found myself becoming progressively crabbier once we stopped for the night. The room was too small for all of us, the kids were too loud, I did not want to hand wash Landon's bottles...then I thought of Mary Fielding Smith and was immediately ashamed of myself. She was our last CD of the day. What an amazing woman! I want to find a biography on her. As many of you may know, she was Hyrum Smith's second wife and Mother to Joseph Fielding Smith. She crossed the plains as the head of a household of (I think it was)10 people, with a wagon captain who had it out for her and she did it with an indomitable spirit. I thought of myself in my climate controlled van eating my homemade sugar cookies and suddenly didn't feel quite so sorry for myself. I had a little repenting to do that night.

Day 3 started out with me re listening to the Mary Fielding Smith CD. We were parallel to the the Mexican border for much of the day. That was my first time driving through El Paso. I never knew it was such a big city! We saw lots of Border Patrol vehicles. They also had a lot of stretches on the interstate that would say safety corridor though I never found out what they were exactly. We went through a check point where I think they just randomly check vehicles. My sweet husband asked the Border Patrol Agent to stop me and tell me I would have to have a full body search. This nice man stopped me and said, "your husband wants me to give you a hard time but I'm not going to." He seemed to enjoy tattling on Chris. We arrived in Tucson around 4:30 pm. I was amused to find that we left a land of cotton and pecans for a new land of cotton and pecans! Really it was a very smooth journey and went much better than I had ever dreamed it would. Even the cats were great travellers!