Our 1st road Trip As Four

*Warning: This is a very pic heavy post. Slower computers or connections may not handle it well!

In the past few days, I've been a bit worried about how this road trip was going to go. This is the first time we've gone a long distance since Micah was born. We've taken Laural to Canada 3 times and she did great each time. Micah isn't as easy going. The good news is that he did quite well and only had 1 really bad episode that lasted an hour or so. He just really wanted to get up and moving. After about 20 minutes of running and jumping around, he was fine for the rest of the trip. We left our house at 2:39 PM and stopped for gas and then headed off to Grove City to get the umbrella stroller at Steve's mom's. We officially got on the road at 3:30 PM. It was cold and about 43°F when we got going. It was rainy and quite windy. I was quite happy to be heading south!

Near Pittsburgh. Isn't that a lovely sky?

We made it to Weat Virginia;. The weather was still rotten.

Micah acting silly with a scrunchie.

Laural entertained herself for a while by coloring in a New River Gorge coloring book we got from the West Virginia visitor's center. Somewhere in West Virginia, we stopped for gas and a stretch. When Steve got Micah out of the car, he was soaked! He must have drank a lot more than I realized! We had to change him in the front seat of the car (which was cold with the door open!) and I had to dig through the luggage in the back to find him dry clothes. Poor kid. He wasn't happy!

The kiddos at night about ready to crash out.

The tunnel to Virginia

Welcome to Virginia!

And they're out.

While the kids slept, we drove through Virginia and into North Carolina. We found a place north of Statesville to pull over and sleep a few hours.

Laural started getting restless as she slept, so we woke up and headed on to South Carolina. My camera went weird on me, so I missed the Welcome to South Carolina sign. I took a pic of the Welcome Center sign a few minutes later. Micah woke up here and stayed awake for the rest of the night.

The skies were clear and blue in South Carolina but it really wasn't much warmer than home - about 51°F. It was fun to see the plam trees all over the place though.

Love the palm trees!

Not long after the sun came up, Micah fell back to sleep and Laural woke up.

Hello Georgia!

Since we were running a little ahead of schedule and would need to kill some time before we were able to check into our Jacksonville hotel, we decided to get off I-95 and take the Coastal Highway - Rt. 17. This was good and bad. There were some really neat things to see along the way which kept us awake but there were also some pretty dull stretches that made the drive a little rough at times.

Pretty, but this is one of the longer stretches of Rt. 17 - not so good when you are tired.

One of the more exciting parts was this bridge. It was huge and so high! I'm generally not good with heights, so this brought on some adrenaline!

A view from the bridge.

Lovely flowers along the road. Poppies, I think.

Welcome to Florida!

Once in Florida, we stopped at the Welcome Center for free orange juice, literature and a photo op. The weather was much more acceptable here. It was sunny and 78°F! Beautiful!

It didn't take us too long to get to Jacksonville from the Welcome Center and we were able to check in to our room a couple hours early. After getting out car unpacked, we snoozed a bit and then went for a quick swim in the pool before getting ready to head out to visit some friends. It was a very nice trip with only a few little issues along the way. I hope the drive home will be as easy!