Over the weekend, we took our first big trip as a family of three. Destination: Eldon, Missouri. Our friends, Derrick and Jen Lodge, live there and invited us to visit before Derrick deployed to Afghanistan.
Cory and Derrick go way back. They met in the Air Force and have been stationed/deployed together at different points for a number of years. He was also Cory's best man when we got married! That's him and Jen (5 months preggo with Riley at the time) walking with me and Cory through MGM Grand.
The trip was great! Cory and I both needed a break from our everyday routines. We left Thursday afternoon when he got home from work and just agreed to take the drive easy, stop when we needed to for Savannah, and just make it as far as we could before stopping for the night. Cory told me hilarious Air Force stories along the way and the drive went surprisingly fast. We were aiming to make it to Joplin, but when we got there and found out that Springfield was only another hour away, we decided we could make it. That meant our drive would be less than 2 hours the next day.
We were so excited to finally make it to Eldon. While we were there, we hung out, talked, went to Derrick's parents' house for dinner, watched a little Eldon High School football, left the kiddos with a sitter and went out...all kinds of stuff. The big event was a pumpkin festival in a t-tiny town called Hartsburg. It wasn't quite what anyone expected. We pictured a big pumpkin patch with maybe 20-30 people milling around at any one time taking pictures and searching for the perfect pumpkin. Boy were we wrong! This town of like 100 people had been invaded by thousands and thousands of people who were not only in search of the perfect pumpkin in the one tiny pumpkin patch we saw, but who were also accosted by countless vendors selling the sorts of things that are cool for a minute, but then quickly become that thing you wish you hadn't wasted money on because it'll never get used or doesn't go with the decor of your house. We made the most of it though! :o) Mostly we all just walked around aimlessly, ate a little fair-type food, picked a pumpkin or two, and then hit the road back to Eldon. Savannah was a peach while we were there even though it was pretty warm outside. She chilled in the stroller at first then perched like a big girl in the Baby Bjorn.
The time came on Sunday when we had to get back in the car and head toward Texas. It was sad to say goodbye, especially knowing Derrick was leaving for Afghanistan, but we're already planning the next get-together after he gets home in June or July.
The drive home was not as easy as the drive there - mostly because we were more aware of how far it was I think. Savannah still did really well despite having a stuffy nose and not feeling well. Our last leg of the trip was kicked off with an ice cream stop in Sherman. It provided one of the most ... umm, odd moments of the whole vacation. We sat down, I started feeding Savannah, and Cory went to get ice cream for us. Savannah was her typical charming self and was smiling and laughing which apparently caught the attention of one bold, and old, lady. She approached and confidently stated with arms extended, "give me back my baby now!" Umm, NO! She was prepared to take what wasn't given to her, that being my kid, but Cory jumped in and sweetly explained that Savannah was sick and we didn't want to spread her germs. Bullet dodged there!
The woman stood there and continued to chat it up with us about how beautiful our baby was, etc. which is all well and good, but you can understand that we were exhausted and not in the mood to humor Chatty Kathy for very long. She finally let us be, we finished feeding the kid, ate our ice cream, and headed to the car to finish our drive home, but not before receiving a hearty "be safe, girl!" from our dear ol' friend Kathy.
