On the Road Again

It has been a few days since we returned home from our summer road trip, and I have mainly been visiting Mt. Washmore -- the giant laundry pile. But, I still have three days to share from our #saskmomtravels summer family road trip. Here is a recap of where we have been:

Day 1: Saskatoon-Kindersley-Kananaskis 
Day 2: Kananaskis, AB
Day 3: Revelstoke, BC
Day 4: Vancouver, BC
Day 5: Furry Creek, BC
Day 6: Vancouver, BC
Day 7: Vancouver to Portland
Day 8: Portland, OR
Day 9: Oregon Coast

Day 10 of our summer road trip was spent mostly in the car driving the 1,100 kilometres from Portland, Oregon, to Idaho Falls, Idaho.

There was some beautiful farmland between the two places and several spots we would have loved to stop and explore. But, we needed to get back home for my husband's work, and we still wanted to spend some time at Yellowstone National Park. So, we had to buckle down and get some miles in --707 miles to be exact.

Near the end of our trip, this was probably the most draining day of all. This particular day spurred a lot of discussion between my husband and I about whether or not we would take on such an ambitious road trip with young kids in the future!

The few days we had of hard driving were admittedly a bit tough on the kids. While we did try to stop and stretch our legs a bit, it still is ideal to break up the drive time even more.

One thing I thought to do when we would stop for gas, food or washrooms was challenge the kids to a race. I found this was great for burning some pent-up energy and getting some wiggles out. They seemed to look forward to it.

Even with the extra time in the car, we all still agree that the trip has been enjoyable and we probably wouldn't change a thing. I have loved the time to simply have uninterrupted conversations with my husband and kids and to listen to them play and chat with each other.

For example, my son and daughter both have trouble with their Rs, which has made for some pretty cute car-time discussions.

K: "I'm a dood dull." {good girl}

J: "It's not dull, it's g-g-gwull." 

K: "No, it's d-d-dull!"

J: "No, it's g-g-gwull."

K: "D-D-DULL!"

J: "G-G-GWULL!"

Me: "Actually, kids, it's g-g-girrrrl." 

K&J simultaneously: "I TOLD YOU!"

Me: Giggles for days.

From that conversation, you probably also noticed that my 2-year-old's Gs sound like Ds. Her Ks and hard Cs also sound like Ts when she speaks. This makes many of the nursery rhymes she has been reciting sound pretty cute. 

"The itsy bitsy spidow tame down the water spout, down tame the wain and washed the spidow out. Out tame the sun and dwied up all the wain, and the itsy bitsy spidow went up the spout adain."

But, our favourite one to date we discovered during this leg of our trip: "Little Miss Muffet, sat on ho tuffet, eating ho TURDS and whey!"

{I am mostly writing this all here so I won't ever forget these precious moments.}