Road Trippin'

We've trucked our way across the country to North Carolina. It was difficult to travel with an almost 3 year old and a 7 month old but things went well for the most part. We definitely had a chance to break in the new car and we love that it gets two times better gas milage than the durango. We are so thankful that we didn’t have to drive two cars across the country! Here are just a few pictures from our trip. We’ve drove through Washington, Idaho, Montana, Wyoming, South Dakota, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Illinois, Indiana, Ohio, West Virginia, Pennsylvania, West Virginia (again), Maryland, Washington D.C., and Virginia on our way to North Carolina. We stopped off for a lunch break in Spokane, WA and saw Gonzaga University. Since Mike and I met in college at a Jesuit university we're always interested to see other Jesuit colleges. They also have yheir own "iggy" (statue of St. Ignatious of Loyola, founder of the Society of Jesus) but we could not find a "touchdown Jesus" so Mike and Olivia demonstrated their own version.

One of the highlights from the trip has been Mount Rushmore. Neither Mike nor I had ever seen it before and it’s absolutely breathtaking. It is just so big! I like to think of myself as a “big picture” person but it just amazes me that someone can think artistically about something so large. We’re so glad that we had the opportunity to stop and check it out. Another trip highlight was our stop in Chicago. Unfortunately we really got to experience why they call Chicago the “windy city,” the weather was miserable. We stayed at a hotel right on the Chicago river and we were able to check out Navy Pier, and the Magnificent Mile. We went to Build-a-Bear where Olivia chose to make a stuffed Monkey, she named it “George”, and dressed it in a pink sparkly “Chicago” t-shirt. She seems to be having a bit of a love/hate relationship with her cross-dressing friend George. Sometimes she loves him and cuddles with them but then apparently George gets out of line and Olivia yells “no, no” and then throws him across the car. We figure she’s taking out some of her frustration about being in the car on poor George. Another highlight was a brief stop over in Washington D.C. We got to spend some time with Mike’s brother, Ricky who is a detective with the Washington D.C. Police Department. We saw Ricky’s house for the first time and Ricky got to meet Peter in person for the first time.

>



We’ve driven over 3000 miles and we’re very happy to get settled in Durham for a bit. A wonderful woman at Duke Medical Center helped us find arrangements close to the hospital. We’ll be staying in a spacious 2 bedroom apartment until Olivia is admitted to the hospital. I’ll post pictures of our new digs soon.


Unfortunately it rained the ENTIRE time we were in Chicago. Olivia and Peter were both nice and dry in the stroller but Mike and I were drenched.



The city of Chicago actually presented their proposal to host the 2012 Olympic Games while we were in the city so it was neat to see all the preparations and excitement about the posibility of hosting the games.