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How to make a 2 day trip last 5 days

July 16, 2013 Ticia 19 Comments

My Mom, the kids, and I are heading up to Colorado.  We allowed 5 days to get up there, and we got the question, “How do you make it take that long?”  Well, we enjoy the journey, we take the random side trip to see what we can see.  Here’s our first three day’s progress.

 

We stopped twenty miles into our trip and got beef jerky.  Then the boys attempted to convince me we NEEDED to buy as their souvenir of the trip, a rubber band gun rifle. I looked at the price and said, “It’s over your budget,” then they tried to convince me they could go in together, I responded “First, you are not buying your it until we get out of Texas, and second you didn’t actually play with the last rubber band gun you got.”  This ensued lots of promises they would play with it.  Needless to say, we did not leave the store with rubber band guns, we did leave with 2 pounds of beef jerky, candy popcorn, half a pound of sausage, and 2 pouting boys.

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We made it about 90 miles before stopping in West, TX to get kolaches.  You need to get kolaches, or so my Mom informed me.  So we did, and found out this one store has raised quite a tidy sum to help the victims of the West explosion.  I was glad to do my part to help.

 

Stopped and had lunch with the paternal grandparents in Dallas, then spent 20 minutes trying to get back onto the interstate due to road construction.  The truck with the Oklahoma license plates was apparently not going back home because he tried to lead us off somewhere else.  Eventually got back on the interstate.

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We almost reached the Oklahoma border when I saw a sign for a WW2 memorial, and I HAD to go see that, so we turned around, backtracked to the Texas Welcome Center, and took pictures of it.  I committed the cardinal sin of parenting and woke my sleeping child to get pictures.  She was not happy.

 

Drove for 4 miles after figuring out how to get back on the interstate, stopped at the Oklahoma Welcome Center.  The kids learned all about the stuffed bison there, and were told his name is George.

 

Stopped in Oklahoma City for the night and had dinner with friends.  The kids attempted to half drown themselves in the pool while I recovered from a migraine.

Oklahoma museum

Get up, have a leisurely breakfast, hang out with friends more, then head to a museum at the crack of 12:30.  Spend 3 hours there, and decide to head off for the day.

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Decide you don’t want to take the interstate, and start finding other roads.  You know those windy two lane roads that no one travels on, through towns so small they don’t have a stop light. 

 

Nearly drive off the road, when you don’t see it’s turning because you’re looking at the road that’s not actually you’re road, but looks like it is.  Pull over until you can stop laughing at the near accident while your kids ask “Why are you and Mimi laughing?”  Start laughing harder.

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Take a picture at the Kansas border.

horse statue

Stop to take a picture at the cool statue of a horse.  Read and find out it’s in honor of the man who helped found this town and raced to stake his claim along with hundreds of other settlers in Oklahoma and Kansas.  This is only five minutes after the last picture.

 

Drive for an hour looking for a hotel, there are no hotels in small Kansas towns, finally find one in a town of 6,000 people.  They quite kindly tell you where the Wizard of Oz museum you went to as a kid is.  It is three hours the wrong direction.

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Set off to said museum.  Stop at a Nature Center and spend 2 hours playing there.  Let your kids play in the mud/sand area just after it’s rained.  Literally, two minutes earlier it was raining.

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Drive for another 30 minutes, then decide to stop because it’s raining really hard.  Sure, it’s 4:30 in the afternoon, that just means more swimming time at the hotel.  Swim for a good long time, then play at a playscape after dinner.  Wear your Batman hoodie to dinner because it annoys your Mom………  Or it’s cool.

 

We still have an hour before we get to the Wizard of Oz museum.  Before we leave town, we’re going to a museum that is supposed to have a recreation of a sod house, and a late 19th century pioneer town.  As you can imagine, I’m happy as a clam.

 

Hmph, it didn’t publish this morning, Wizard of Oz museum was a huge hit, as was the Yesteryear Museum where they climbed all over tractors and fire trucks and played in a one room schoolhouse, but my camera is all the way over on the other side of the hotel…….

family life, field trips, memories traveling with kids

Comments

  1. Kylie says

    July 17, 2013 at 1:52 am

    Sounds like you are all having a blast!!

    Reply
    • Ticia says

      July 20, 2013 at 2:50 pm

      We are! Now the kids are rampaging around with their cousins and generally having a good time.

  2. Natalie says

    July 17, 2013 at 3:33 am

    Wow, sounds like a very full trip! It’s cool that you get to go on road trips with your Mom!

    Reply
    • Ticia says

      July 20, 2013 at 2:50 pm

      I know, we really enjoy these trips because it’s a reminder of vacations as a kid. This one in particular because we’ve been able to go back to places I went as a kid.

  3. Phyllis at All Things Beautiful says

    July 17, 2013 at 8:45 am

    You have so much fun. I love it.

    Reply
    • Ticia says

      July 20, 2013 at 2:53 pm

      I’m loving it too! Some of the places we’ve found have really made me wish they were closer, especially the nature center. I could sit there for hours.

  4. Joy says

    July 17, 2013 at 5:34 pm

    I love trips like this!! We enjoy riding and looking at the smaller towns and do the same thing and stop and take pictures! Looks like you all are having so much fun!

    Reply
    • Ticia says

      July 20, 2013 at 2:54 pm

      I’ve found some of the best museums and stops in small towns, I love them.

  5. Lindsay @ BytesofMemory says

    July 17, 2013 at 5:51 pm

    I always want to take a trip like this.. but then my type A gets in the way 😉 Looks like you guys had fun!

    Reply
    • Ticia says

      July 20, 2013 at 2:54 pm

      You could use it to cure your type A. 🙂

    • Lindsay @ BytesofMemory says

      July 20, 2013 at 6:58 pm

      I am going on a trip kind of like this later this month. I do know where I am staying.. but thats about it! It is totally stressing me out! Of course I think the most stressful thing is the driving in downtown Chicago (like a block from the water)! I don’t usually mind driving in the city but that is probably the biggest city I have driven in that I didn’t grow up near!

  6. maryanne @ mama smiles says

    July 17, 2013 at 6:36 pm

    What a fun road trip! Do you think I’m insane to try driving from MA to CA this summer? Contemplating it…

    Reply
    • Ticia says

      July 20, 2013 at 2:56 pm

      NOT AT ALL! That could be so much fun, as long as you take your time and stop often for the fun random places to visit. Makes the trip much more enjoyable.

  7. Almost Unschoolers says

    July 18, 2013 at 7:15 am

    Who knew Kansas could be so much fun. It might be the Batman hoodie that made the difference, though.

    Reply
    • Ticia says

      July 20, 2013 at 2:58 pm

      The Batman hoodie makes all the difference in so many things.

      I was surprised at all the cool things I found in Kansas.

  8. Melinda says

    July 18, 2013 at 4:40 pm

    See, I knew I wasn’t the only one who took long trips! lol

    I have to tell you I’ve been following your boards on Pinterest, and I really appreciate the quality and diversity of crafts related the Old Testament. Thank you for making my job as a homeschool teacher a little easier.

    Have fun on your trip.
    Hugs,
    Melinda

    Reply
    • Ticia says

      July 20, 2013 at 2:53 pm

      Since I’m writing a curriculum through the Bible, I have to admit I’m scouring the internet for ideas, and figure while I’m doing that I’ll pin them to let as many people as possible benefit from what I’m finding. If you haven’t yet, I hope you’ll check out my Bible posts also, because I’m really wanting these to benefit homeschoolers like myself.

      Oh, and I’m glad to find a fellow long trips fan. This trip overall has been a great break for me.

  9. Claire says

    July 19, 2013 at 11:14 am

    So much fun! I can’t remember, was all this on your summer bucket list??

    Reply
    • Ticia says

      July 20, 2013 at 3:01 pm

      No, at the time I was writing it, my Mom hadn’t asked me yet to go on this trip, so this came up a bit out of the blue…….

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Ticia Adventures in Mommydom Hi, I'm Ticia! This is the adventures of my family in life and learning. Follow along with us as we share our adventures. We're having a lot of fun and learning as we go.

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