North Carolina

We made it to Heather's house the afternoon of Friday June 7th. My parent's were already in town.  The kids got right to work making messes playing and we had a picnic outside.

Henry (who is 6 months older than Maverick and Violet...It took awhile for the boys to get along but by the last day they finally decided to be friends)

These two cousins are only 6 weeks apart...I was surprised by how much they "played" together.

Cousin bath

Story time with Grandpa

This was after the longest baptisim.EVER. Heather hosted a very nice meal with about a million people.

Baptism boy

Then we had an Easter Egg hunt (a week early) since the Bakers' other cousins were in town for the baptism.

The next morning we decorated eggs...The kids followed all Heather's rules, for a little bit.

One of the rules was "no dumping the liquid"

Then we went to the biggest zoo ever?  The kids were more interested in eating than looking at the animals...oh, well.

They also enjoyed the splash pad at the zoo too.

Autumn and Alice spent a majority of their time making projects.

Maverick and Henry played with a lot of cars/trucks

I think my favorite thing we did was go to this strawberry farm.  It reminded me of the pumpkin patches we visit in the fall here.

Sharing a shake.

Who doesn't love a place that has cut out faces!

Fire truck! Henry was pretty obsessed and just chilled in this sweaty spot all afternoon.

We went to some park that was like a mini amusement park.  We did mini-golf, rode a train, carousal, and mined for gems.

Apparently I let Violet wear her jammies to the park. I guess I was choosing my battles that day.  Also I did not cut her bangs she gave herself some back in December and they were finally growing out!

Minning for gems.  Apparently its a North Carolina thing

The weather was perfect while we were there and we ate outside each night.

Playing in the creek at Greg's brother's place.  Autumn sat in the car since she doesn't like getting dirty...Maverick was in heaven.

Heather does a great job of celebrating Easter.  One night we had a lesson on Christ blessing the temple and my mom had the kids make these cute mirrors.

We did a service project one night-tying quilts.

Heather afraid of a mouse.  We probably overstayed our welcome, but we had a great visit.

#NorbyEpicRoadTrip2017

This epic road trip was a year in the works.  I planned to go to my nephew's baptism in North Carolina and my brother-in-laws master's school graduation.  The dates of each ended up being kinda close together SO...the epic road trip was born.  Oh yeah, and since the road trip ended up being 5 weeks long, I went with the kids by myself!

JUNE 4, 2017-All smiles on our way out of town!  I stuck all the kids in the back on purpose so I couldn't reach them and they'd just have to deal with what they had.  Autumn's catching skills did drastically improve.

Still winter in Nebraska...

Iowa...

Missouri (these stops for the signs were short but added the perfect breaks to change a diaper, or two, or three, and pick up all the toys that were dropped.) We also hit Kansas on the first day, but the sign was on a bridge (pretty much the story for the rest of the states signs on this trip)

The first two nights we stayed at the Great Wolf Lodge in Kansas City, KS.  Not the smartest choice on my part...Really? A water park with 4 kids and one adult?? Not my best choice. The kids loved the pool.  Maverick and Violet wanted to go on one of the water slides, but Lark was too little to go. I ended up asking a nice lady waiting in line to hold Lark while I took the twins down.

Playing in the lobby during "story time" which didn't even keep my attention so I can't blame Lark for being squirly.

Meeting some creepy character.

Violet is a terrible hotel sleeper.  We put her to bed about 6:15 each night...The first night in the hotel I couldn't get her to calm down until after 11 PM I was exhausted. It wasn't like I could leave three kids in the hotel alone while I walked the halls with her...Which reminds me...In case you plan on an epic road trip by yourself make a plan to get all your stuff and 4 kids in the hotel in one trip.  I just loaded up the double stroller with the stuff and Lark and made the other's walk all very slowly. Luckily Autumn figured out how to use the key card to help me.  Very glad I'm a super awesome packer and made space for the gigantic double stroller.

Craft time-Coloring sheets...I was very underwhelmed with their activities outside the pool.

After two nights we headed east to Nashville. We drove a bit our of the way to see the Kansas City Temple...The kids were unimpressed.

Then Maverick and Autumn drew all over themselves in the car.  I had planned on stopping at the St. Louis Arch but most of the kids were napping so we kept driving. After a very long day we stopped for the night in Nashville.  Lark miraculously fell asleep in her pack n play in the smallest hotel room ever while the kids "ate" McDonalds (really just drinking the chocolate milk) on the beds.