Friday
I brought along a few books on CD to help me pass the time on this looong drive. Silly me, I didn't listen to a single one of them. Instead, we all listened to countless hours of Adventures in Odyssey episodes. The boys also watched several movies. They are such good travelers, and I am very thankful. Even Ginger traveled well. We only stopped twice during the 11 hour trip!
On the west side of Iowa city, interstate traffic came to a screeching halt. As I braked hard, I kept an eye on the cars behind me. Were they going to stop? Yes, they all stopped in time. We began wondering what happened ahead of us, since there was no road construction on this stretch of road. (Probably the only part of our route without construction, actually!) I looked in my rear view mirror again and saw a huge cloud of dust, along with vehicles parked in the median and on the shoulder. I had a feeling there was now an accident in front of us and behind us. As it turns out, there was a car fire in front of us. We drove past the burned car as it was being loaded onto a flat bed. The next day I did an online search for these accidents and discovered the accident behind us had turned deadly. Someone didn't stop in time and plowed his truck into a semi. He didn't survive. The boys and I felt very protected in our bubble on the interstate, surrounded by accidents but untouched. We thanked God for our safety!
Saturday
The highlight of this day--attending a Schaumburg Boomers baseball game! Someday I hope to take my boys to a Cubs game. But this baseball game was a lot of fun! The weather was perfect, the game was entertaining, and the boys even ran the bases after the game ended. Oh, and the Boomers won--that's very important to Aaron, my most competitive son! It was also free hat night, so we all received these snazzy orange hats. :)
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| My parents and my boys before the game. Dad looks tall, and Mom looks short! |
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| Waiting in line to run the bases |
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| They sure had fun! |
I never would have thought Aaron would hold a python snake at church, but he did. Not only is he competitive, but he's brave too! I love attending my parents' church. It's very different from when I grew up there, but it's still my home church. A friend of mine (Paul) from my youth group days attends church there with his family, and he's the one who keeps pythons in his office. The boys loved hearing stories about these snakes and even asked to see what they eat. Paul pulled a frozen rat from the freezer and that grossed me out. Aaron and Braylen thought it was cool. Can you guess what Kaleb thought? :) To his credit, he did touch one of the snakes. That is enough for him, and that's just fine by me!
Coming home is like stepping back in time for me. It's a weird feeling. In my mind, everything and everyone should still look like they do in my memory. But they don't. We live in Derek's hometown, with his past and his present all rolled into one. My past and present worlds are very different and going home feels a bit like stepping from one timeline into another. And as I step backwards in time, I bring my kids with me. So weird!!!
We made lots of memories during this trip, and I'll have more on that next time! :)
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