road trip

my mother and i decided to take an impromptu road trip to see my sister and her family. they live over 1300 miles away. so without much planning except for a few phone calls back and forth...


 "wanna take a road trip?"


"ok, when?"


"next week?"


"sure."


then a couple of calls to my sister...


"want some houseguests?"


"sure. how long are you planning on staying?"


"ummm...don't know...four or five days?"


"ok. as long as you don't mind my busy life."


so it was with almost no plan that we hopped into my father's truck and headed out.


it took three days of travel. not one meltdown. not one yelling incident. never once did i raise my voice. no traffic. just a peaceful three day trek over the 4th of july. blessed i would call it.


we left on tuesday july 3 at 9 AM. we stopped in ohio around dinner time and had a lovely Chinese food dinner and crammed 4 children and my mom and myself into one hotel room for the night.


day two we were back on the road around 9 AM again. this time we stopped in iowa for the night. we ate at Cracker Barrel and then swam in the hotel pool. they didn't have a room to accommodate all of us, so i had B and S with me and mom took E and A with her.


the third day we also got on the road around 10 AM. we stopped in iowa for lunch at this neat rest area. it was a museum type of rest stop dedicated to windmill energy. too cool.

standing at the base of a windmill vane in 95 degree weather

too big to fit it all in the picture

looking up 

we saw trucks driving in both directions carrying the vanes-this one pulled into the rest stop and everyone ran to snap pictures 

picnic lunch under windmill inspired shade awning

there were windmill farms all around us in every direction. so peaceful. so cool. so blessed to have the opportunity to see this surprise on I 80.