Saturday night dinner with friends after a couple hours at the swimming pool

 Rob was more than thrilled to receive five packages of his favorite Forbes Beef jerky for his Birthday.  (let me know if you ever need to get a present for Rob, he loves this stuff)

 This kids decorated his birthday chocolate pie.  Em drizzeled the chocolate on top.  Dallas helped make the pie and then sunk a General Lee in the middle. 

 We had an extra pie crust, so quiche or as well call it "bacon pie" made  a good lunch this week.

 Our first bloom from the lilles, I love that it is Cyclone colored

Early morning reading time

Hair designs

My summer seems to be turning into "how can I tire out my kids today". 

Since we have been home in Ames, all but one weekday has been devoted to visiting a park.  The day we took off was spent in the church parking lot teaching Em how to ride a bike.

We either picnic or come home for lunch, let Noelle nap a couple of hours, (and me sometimes) and then around 3:30 we hit the pool for an hour or two.  We then finish our Mondays and Wednesday with Dallas at T-ball, or our Tuesdays and Thursdays with Emily at softball.  These are each an hour and are at a park so often we all go, and the kids not playing sports get to play on the playgrounds.  Dinner and then bed!  Emily sleeps until at least 8:30!

Another thing I have learned is that kids will eat anything after a trip to the pool.  We are on our third bag of apples.  I bring three in the swim bag.  I seriously think I could bring whole  green peppers and they would chop down on them.

Vacation Day 5, Charlotte, NC

After we saw the Wright Memorial, we headed for Charlotte.  The drive was about 3 hours and really scenic.  We crossed several bridges.  Bridges connect mainland NC to the Outerbank string of islands.  After the bridges we drove through about an hour of what I would consider marshland.  Every now and then we would cross another long bridge, but most of the road wondered through a lot of nature.  I think at one point we were on a two lane road named Crocodile Hwy, we also saw a couple of signs that warned against feeding bears from your car. 

 

We arrived in Moresville and grabbed dinner.  Day 5 consisted of seeing Charlotte Motor Speedway and the NASCAR Hall of Fame. 

I had booked the "Over the Wall" tour package, which gets you into a couple extra areas at the track.   

 

A view from the box

 

Waiting for our ride, outside the track

Our van, we loaded the kids car seats inside and buckled in for our tour. 

 

This was in the media center.  Drivers will come here and talk to the media.  The rest of the room consisted of long tables with tons of outlets for all the media to hook up their laptops.  Each row of tables had two tv suspended from the ceiling.  One tv showed the race as broadcasted, the other tv would be spitting out facts or insider statistics

They had a lot of neat and rare photos inside the media room. 

 

This was winners circle

 

This is the PRN broadcast booth.  I think Rob was enamored with the recording set up

 

This is the Memeber's only restaurant.  It is open to the public for lunch but dinner is reservation only for members.  During a race members can sit at a window side table for 1 hour alotments, then they are moved to a different table.  A scene from Talladega Nights was filmed there. 

Charlotte Motor Speedway also has the biggest outdoor HD tv screen.  It was huge!  I could spew random facts about the whole tour, pretty interesting.  I think the kids enjoyed driving fast in the van, and going on the embankment.  I think this speedway has 29 degrees embankment, and the van would start to flip at 33!

 

Up next our trip to the NASCAR Hall of Fame...

Vacation Day 4, Kill Devil Hill, Outer Banks, NC

First Flight!  The Wilber brothers picked the Outer Banks for their testing site even though they lived in Ohio.  The lure of a need for a vacation and the soft landing the sand and dunes would create sealed the deal.  We learned a ton of information at this National Park. 

 We woke up on Sunday, checked out of the motel and drove five miles down the road to get to park. 

Monument resurrected on Kill Devil Hill, I think funded by Congress

Inside the museum

Three of the markers that mark the distances of the first three flights

Standing at marker 2

and at Marker 4 (because he is four)

The rail the plane used for take off

Walking up to the Monument, we made it.  I took turns carrying either Noelle or Dallas, Emily was a trooper and walked the whole thing without complaining (it was hot, 90 degrees).  Robert was walking with his Dad

We made it!

 

Family pick

This little statue showed the positions of the seven men who helped with the flight.  They had a timer, a photographer among them. 

 

I could write a ton more about all we learned, but you all should really go see it for yourselves!

Nags Head, Outer Banks, NC

We had originally planned to head straight to Charlotte, as our objectives were in that city.  I have had several friends vacation in the Outer Banks and say how great it was, and I thought we couldn't pass on the chance to show the kids the Atlantic Ocean.  After 20 hours of driving what is 3 more to get to the coast? 

It was worth it!  We allowed an entire day to unwind at the beach, no other object, we only got in the van to drive for donuts (and to get antibiotics), we walked to all other meals!  The kids and I needed the space to unwind after all that sitting.  I would love to vacation an entire week in the Outer Banks.  There are tons of fabulous beach houses that entire families rent (read: hold 30-40 people).  It was perfect for the kids, its one of God's greatest playgrounds.  Sand, water, and abundant shells to be found, plus little critters running around!)  No one got bored. 

 

We left a message for Uncle Greg

We applied lots of suntan block

Noelle liked the sand better than the water...

Dallas did some push-ups

Emily loved looking for shells and hitting the waves.  A lady we were next to on the beach showed Emily where to go in the water and how to watch the waves/tide to find the good shells

Dallas really enjoyed karate chopping and kicking the waves when they came ashore

 

Noelle loved the water if you were holding her

Our beach hotel was right next to a restaurant that had built a big fishing pier.  We had lunch there and then checked out the pier.  While we ate lunch we watched a skate (skate a fish that looks like a sting ray, not a roller skate) being pulled in.

We ate dinner at a little place down the road, great pizza by the slice, really crispy cracker crust!

This is a picture of our motel, it wasn't a 4 star place, but the location was the point.  The windows of the rooms on the other side are ocean front.  We had a room right next to the ocean. Emily and I snuck out early morning while the others were still sleeping and took a walk.  No need for shoes, the beach is full of fine sand. 

Vacation 2013 day 1-2

This happened on the first day of the drive.  Three guesses as to which kid did this...

First nights stop was Cinncinati, but we really stayed on the West Virginia side near the airport.  As usual we used Priceline.com to make reservations on the road. 





Duck's Donuts - Outer Banks, North Carolina  It was Saturday, so of course we needed our donut fix, and who wants Duncan when you can go local, and watch them make your order right in front of you.  It was worth the 15 min wait.  We ordered a dozen and got about one of everything.  They fried and then dipped as ordered.  We all agreed they were yummy!

We found this lovely little bear in a rest stop that was basically a mall in West Virginia

Our plan was to leave Ames 7:00 am Thursday morning.  I was all packed, I went to workout at 5:00 and started my day.  Rob had to get up and work (this story repeats the whole trip).  Around 6:30 Emily woke up and said her throat hurt.  This is unusual.  Em is our healthy kid, and never complains of any pains.  I try to hydrate her and weigh the decision of taking her to the Dr.  Her throat was red, but I didn't see any spots.  We have never had a case of Strep in the house so I thought it was unlikely.  I decide to call (have to wait until 8:00 am when the office opens, I didn't think this warrented an emergency room visit).  I choose to get the earliest appointment possible, even though it wasn't with our Ped.  8:45 am.  We get to the Dr. (rob is still working and watching the other two kiddos).  The nurse practitioner gave us the once over.  Of course Em says her throat doesn't hurt anymore, she checks out fine, but they do the rapid swab just in case.  We wait 5 minutes to get the results, it is negative.  I feel like a fool--- I know the appointment will cost us $116 for 15 min of time plus a lab fee( I am such a cheapie), and we are almost three hours late.  Fast forward two days, we are leaving Duck Donuts Sat morning and we get a call from McFarland clinic.  They cultured out the swab, and Emily has strep.  Robert found a Rite Aid and we had the clinic call out the script, so we carried around antibiotics for the rest of the trip! 

After we left Ames, we traveled over to Cedar Rapids to pick up Gpa Dallas.  We traveled in and out of CR twice because we left something on at the house, and finally we were on the road.  Our goal was to get halfway.  We pushed on and made it to West Virginia (barely) around 10:00 pm.  The next morning Rob got up early and put in a couple hours of work, we went exploring around the hotel to kill the time.  We departed late morning, and made the drive to Outer Banks, North Carolina.  The BEACH!  We drove in around 10:30 pm!  And I save the beach stories for the next post! 

happenings

I have lots of bloggy blog stuff to catch up on!  We went on vacation for 11 days... eleven days, over 3000 mi.  I believe Noelle slept about 4.5 hours total while in the van, Dallas slept maybe 2 hours, and Emily, big fat zero (me too). 

The kids have forgotten how to fall asleep not sleeping five to a room.  As I type 2 are screaming and one is stressed because the other two are screaming.  They did all sleep past 8:00 am this morning, and I had to wake them to get Emily to Music Camp on time. 

We spent the day shuttling Emily to camp, cleaning out the disgusting interior of the van, finishing the laundry, and grabbing some groceries.   Dallas started Blastball with dad. 

And we only have one steak left of our very tastey 1/4 beef.  I am so sad.  The ground beef was so delicious, and I dread buying meat at the store again.  It was so handy to have in the house already.

-  Ok I am going to try to get a couple vacation posts up!