Nonetheless, in my absence over the past month we've taken our first trip to Tucson, our first family road trip to Flagstaff and my 5 month old has now turned into a 6 month old and this weekend we're venturing to Apple Annie's in Willcox to visit the pumpkin patch. We'll start with our first trip/mini vacation to Flagstaff.
To prepare Jman for a 5 hour car ride strapped into his own personal jail we decided we'd break him in with a trip to Tucson at the beginning of September. It was overall, a success so we figured "Hey, we got through that Flag will be a breeze". Oh dear. We made it. But, oh dear. We went at the end of the September to visit my brother who goes to NAU for Family Weekend. We left on a Friday and returned on Sunday. I'm letting you know that minor detail because for a 2 night and one full day stay you'd have thought we were moving there with all that we packed...for Jman. We took his Pack-N-Play, the bumbo, an entire suitcase full of clothing for both warm and cold weather, towels, sheets, blankets, an entire pack of diapers, an entire gallon of mixing water, an entire tub of formula, 6 bottles, his bouncy activity chair, a huge bag of countless toys and books, his floor mat, his carseat and his stroller. It took almost 30 minutes and a few configurations and repacking just to pack everything in to the truck with the stroller strapped to the lids on the bed. I shutter with the thought of what we'll need when we go on our own Family Griswold-esque trip to Florida and New York this upcoming summer.
Anyway, I think we finally hit the road around 9ish and with several stops we finally pulled into Flag around 4:30-5:00. Jman started off really strong...napping along the way only having fussy bouts every now and then but by the time we hit the huge mountain we had an all out meltdown due to the change in elevation. Poor baby. The only thing that managed to calm him was sucking on my finger and having me sing the Itsy Bitsy Spider on repeat. Seriously, as soon as I'd stop singing he'd start up again. But we finally pulled into our camping ground and unloaded the truck into our cabin and then headed off for dinner at the restaurant where my brother cooks at.
The first night went well. I was worried as Jman has never really slept in his Pack-N-Play but he did well. Saturday we hung around the cabin, went shopping hit down town and celebrated the brother's birthday. That night was a different story. Jman was down around 7:30 but back up at 10 and would not go back to sleep for anything till around midnight. He and I finally fell asleep on the red vinyl couch downstairs. So uncomfortable and not at all a good idea when the next day you're going to be spending it in a truck for who knows how long on the journey home. Sunday we had breakfast at my brother's restaurant and then headed back home. The journey home took about the same time but we made it. Thank goodness the hubs and I decided to take Monday off to recuperate, only for me to go into work on Tuesday and then have to go home with a stomach bug (no I'm not pregnant although the thought did gross mine and several of my coworkers minds).
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| Enjoying the Flagstaff trees. |
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| Hello, Uncle Jake. |
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| Looking out with Opa. ( No babies were harmed sitting in their Bumbo's on elevated surfaces.) |
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| Playing with my plethora of toys. |
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| Tired daddy feeding me in the morning. |
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| Getting ready for my walk with Opa. Yes, those are socks on his hands...don't judge, we live in Southern AZ. |
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| Nana. |
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| Uncle Jake ruined a good picture with his hand gesture. |
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| Family picture. |
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| Happy to be heading home. |
Overall, the trip was really fun and made me miss Flag something bad. Oh, what I would give to live there. But it was fun to spend time with my family and bring Jman somewhere new. We're hoping to start to a family tradition of going there for Christmases and renting a big cabin.
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