Camping by the numbers: A summary (& the lessons we learned)

Well, folks, we made it.  Home, that is.  I am typing this last post from the comfort of my own kitchen, sipping a cup of Dunkin' Donuts coffee while Olivia watches Super Why.  Life is back to normal.  Well, sort of - Pat's company car wouldn't start this morning, but that is fairly normal too since this is the 3rd time in less than a year that we will have to have it towed.  Don't ever buy a C Max.

But I digress...the trip home was, as you might expect, LONG.  I had a pretty good attitude about it considering it was the 3rd consecutive day that we spent in a car, and I tried my best to keep my driver entertained - I read a children's book about the 50 states aloud to him, I sang out loud to Johnny Cash, I looked up random trivia facts on my iPhone (did you know that in a room of 23 people there is a 50% chance of at least 2 people having the same birthday?  It's called the "birthday paradox" and I actually remember learning about it in a college stats class - look it up).  Olivia actually hardly needed to be entertained - she literally watched the same "Olivia" DVD the entire ride home.  9 hours of hearing the same theme song music over...and over...and over.  But hey, whatever.  If she was happy, I was happy.  But even with perfect driving weather and road conditions (no contstruction!  How is that even possible in the Midwest in the summer?!?), we were soooo ready to get out of the car when we finally pulled into the driveway.  Olivia literally screamed and clapped her hands when she saw our house:  "YAY!  We're HOME!  Ahhhhhhhh!"  And she ran around the house singing, "I'm so happy to be HOME!" for at least 10 minutes.

Would you like to know how far we traveled on this trip when it was all said and done?  Curious as to how many beers we drank (spoiler: too many to count)?  Here is a look at our camping trip when you break it down:

Miles driven:  3,014

Hours on the road:  47

Dollars spent on gas:  $1,000 (ish)

Number of times I shaved my legs in 10 days:  2

Number of times I used a blow dryer in 10 days:  0

Number of times my brother-in-law Paul blew a fuse because he blew his hair dry EVERY DAY:  1  (his hair did look better than mine)

Fast food meals eaten:  7

Glasses of wine drank:  unsure.  That's the beauty of boxed wine!

Pounds gained:  3.2  (2.4 lbs for Pat; 0.8 lbs for me - I think this is a win considering the fast food and wine numbers above)

Number of times Olivia peed through her pants and onto her car seat:  5

Loads of laundry done from the road:  5

Pairs of shoes I brought:  3  (this is absolutely amazing considering how much I love shoes.  I actually meant to bring a few more pairs but forgot to toss them in the morning we left...turns out 3 pairs was enough)

National Monuments visited:  2

Number of times I cooked anything:  0  (I know!! Unbelievable, right? Makes the whole trip worth it for that alone!)


"You know what was fun about our trip?  Cramming 3 humans and 2 dogs into a 200 sq foot box and bumping into each other all the time!  And constanting putting up and taking down the pack 'n play for our kid!"...said no one ever.  On our drive home yesterday, we reflected on what to do differently the next time we go on a long road trip.   Here's what we came up with:

1) Leave the dogs at home.  Or at least Buddy.  He is basically as big as a person.  Imagine having to navigate around a 100 lb. person on all fours in an RV all the time.  Yeah, not fun.

2) Olivia will sleep in her own bed above the cab and we won't have to constantly disassemble and reassemble the dining area to accommodate her pack 'n play.  'Nuff said.

3) Bring extra RV parts that might be difficult to find on the road.

4) Bungee cord the crap out of all of the cupboards.

5) And most importantly, BE PATIENT.  Everything takes longer in an RV; and by that I mostly mean getting to your destination and finding a place to park.  I think overall I get a pretty good grade on this one for this trip but next time my expectations will be different so I have a more patient attitude from the beginning.

So that's it.  Back to real life, which is comforting but also means I have to start wearing make-up again.  Bleh.  I hope you enjoyed reading this blog as much as I enjoyed writing it.  Cheers!

"Take me home, country road..."

Well, this trip is finally coming to an end. FINALLY. I am not kidding when I say I feel like we have been on the road for weeks, maybe even months. And the trip is ending the way it began - eating McDonald's in the car (for the last time in my entire life, I swear - if I ever see an Egg McMuffin again I am going to vomit).

I know I skipped a post yesterday, but I had absolutely zero energy when we finally made it to New Ulm. So here's what you missed:

North Dakota proved to be everything I thought it would be: flat, brown, and boring. If I never set foot (or a tire) in it again, I will be perfectly content. Sorry ND...I tried to be nice, just like you told me to on your billboards. But it's the end of a long road trip and nice just isn't my first priority at this point.

After we made a quick stop in Fargo yesterday to fuel up - and I saw a grown @ss man wearing pants with Cookie Monster all over them, not lying - we said good bye to North Dakota and charged on into Minnesota. A couple of hours into MN and we were STARVING. And Olivia was losing her mind, screaming about how much her bottom hurt. We finally found a place to stop in a town called Lake Henry - the place was barely lit and was the sort of restaurant that doesn't actually have menus, just a board on a wall, even though it's a sit down restaurant. I was very skeptical of eating anything other than peanuts from this joint, but you know what? The food was KILLER. I got a Philly cheesesteak sandwich and Pat got a burger, and they both blew us away. So if you're ever in Lake Henry, MN, stop at the Sportsman's Den and grab a bite. It's worth it.

After another hour and a half, we had finally made it to our last destination before home - New Ulm. Pat cleaned the RV out while Olivia and I went shopping downtown. We went to Lambrecht's, one of my favorite stores in New Ulm...and one of the worst to bring a toddler to. It's a store full of all sorts of beautiful glass home decor items. 10 minutes in and Olivia broke a glass ornament. Oops. We said hello to our friend Lisa and then hightailed it outta there before she broke something else.  My SIL brought over BLTs for dinner and we chatted until it was time for Olivia to go to bed. You know what I hate about summer? And especially summers in the north? The fact that it stays light out until 10:00 p.m. Growing up, I thought this was awesome. Now that I am a parent I wish it was pitch black outside at 6:00. Every single night of this trip has been a battle to get Olivia to fall asleep, even though she's absolutely exhausted, and a lot of it has to do with the fact that she can still see what's going on around her. Last night was no different. But after she finally went down, Pat and I hung out with Uncle Mike for a bit before retiring to our camper for the LAST TIME.

We woke up late this morning because Pat forgot to charge his phone overnight, threw the last of our junk in our truck and took off, St Louis-bound. As I'm typing this, we passed an RV on the road and Pat pointed at them and laughed and said, "Suckers!" So I think he's ready to get home too. 

(Me and my pup snuggling for the last time in the RV)

(Yeah, she dressed herself)

(I am only smiling because the trip is almost over)

Tomorrow I will wrap this blog up with a "by-the-numbers" summary of the trip. How many times did I shave my legs in the past 10 days? Stay tuned to find out!

The long journey home - Day 1

Hello from Jamestown, ND! I'm posting late because a) I am at 90% of my cell phone data usage and am trying to not post from my phone from the road, and b) the internet at this campground is the slowest I think I have ever used so I am just now getting it up and running, and oh yeah, my kid just went to bed. 5 minutes ago. At 10:30 at night. Yeah, that's a problem.

This has been one long, long day for this road trippin' family. It started out fine - we actually got on the road only about 15 minutes behind schedule, which for a family that includes a 3 year old is a flipping miracle in my book. We got the RV packed in record time, and Pat made sure to put a blanket down for Buddy so that, you know, he didn't get the carpet dirty with his fur and whatnot...uh, was he on the same camping trip that I was the past week? Because I'm pretty sure that a little dog fur is the least gross thing that's happened to our carpet in this vehicle this week. Good god. After saying goodbye to Rod and Vic (and stealing a bunch of their leftover pizza from last night, which is now gone - thanks guys!), we headed east on a two lane, hilly road with no shoulder whatsoever. Not a road you would want to drive on in the dark given the amount of wildlife in Montana, let's just put it that way. Pat did a good job driving and eventually we got to a real, live interstate where we could drive more than 60 mph. We had a picnic lunch at a rest stop and Olivia made me walk around the whole dang thing looking for her "friends" - I think she really misses all of her little kiddo friends back home! It was cute.

After many, many more hours on the road - that included me doing lunges and marching in place in the RV because I was so bored - we finally made it to Jamestown, ND, our respite for the night. My first impression of this campground was that it was pretty nice...after all, there was a cute little playground right when we pulled up. After about 5 minutes, though, I discovered that this is a place I never want to come again: no toilet paper in the women's restroom, the laundromat locks you out at 9 p.m. (and charges you $1.75 per washer load AND dryer load! Highway robbery!), it's about 10 feet from the interstate and apparently the people who stay smoke pot at their picnic tables. Sweet. Olivia apparently likes it here, though, because she stayed up until 10:30 pm after throwing multiple temper tantrums over wanting a snack (but, of course, not the raisins, crackers, or peanut butter I offered her...ice cream or candy only, please!), wanting to pet Ally, and any other excuse in the book she could come up with for getting out of her bed. I did let her get out when I noticed something on her face when I went in to check on her that looked a little like ketchup, but she didn't have any today. And then I realized it was blood. From her mouth. Fortunately it wasn't anything major, since it wasn't even bleeding anymore by the time I got to her. But I did have a little twinge of mom guilt that I hadn't prevented it from happening.

Other fun things that happened: Pat realized he had left some piece of hardware he needs to drain the water out of our tank at the last campsite; we listened to 'A Prairie Home Companion' for about 3 hours straight (if Garrison Keillor's voice doesn't put you to sleep, I don't know what will); and we can now add wine to the list of liquids that is embedded in our carpeting after Ally knocked an entire glass of it over while trying to get Olivia's leftover hot dog. I think tomorrow I  am going to dump an entire bottle of shampoo on the floor so I can say I left my mark too in this thing too.

I would post some pictures, but the internet here is waaaay too slow to wait for that tonight, so I will just post some extras tomorrow. Good night!

"I'm gonna pop some tags, only got $10 in my pocket..."

If you know me, you know that one of my favorite pastimes is shopping. One of my best friends even told me that if I were a superhero that would be my superpower. Thanks...I guess? I love mall shopping, boutique shopping, online shopping...I love it all. I even, on occasion, like thrift store shopping. Which is exactly what my sister-in-law and soon-to-be niece-in-law did today. Check out all of the loot I got:

All in all, I got 22 items from 3 different stores today, including sunglasses, a silicone mini bundt cake pan, an unopened bottle of Wen hair product and a gag t shirt that I can't wait to give my little brother for Christmas. Ha. And guess how much I paid for all of this? $10! I'm telling you, Lewistown, MT is a thrift shopper's dream. They also have an amazing pizza joint here called Little Big Man pizza, if you're ever in the are. Which of course you won't be, but I felt I needed to give them a shout out here because it was so good. 

Besides going shopping and stuffing my face with cheesy bread, today was pretty tame. Olivia had a super mega meltdown in the morning literally minutes after one of my brother-in-laws commented that, "Olivia is such a good kid. I didn't hear her scream or cry this week at all." And then...instant tantrum. I actually think it was just because she didn't want her cousins to leave, which was kind of sweet. I also took a 1 mile walk with my hubby where I almost stepped in horse poop 57 times and had to walk through weeds that were over half as tall as I am. And it wouldn't be a successful summer trip if my husband didn't get burnt to a crisp. I brought at least 3 bottles of sunscreen on this trip and guess how any times he put it on? Zero. Seriously, what is it with men and their aversion to sunscreen?? Sunburns suck! And they are so easily avoidable. I am going to invent a type of beer that had an ingestable SPF in it. No American man would ever get sunburned again.

Now I am just trying to mentally prepare myself for the 25 hours or so we will be on the road over the next 3 days. And for those of you who think road tripping in an RV is like this:

Let me paint a more accurate picture for you. Here is what it's really like:

"Mom! I dropped my [insert random toy here]! Get it for me now!!"

"Mom! I need a snack!"

"Steph, can you get me a bottle of water?"

"Steph, adjust the mirror for me"

"Steph, can you plug my phone in?"

"Mom! I need a toy!!!"

"No! No watch Cat in the Hat!" (crying hysterically over a show she loved 5.8 seconds ago)

Me: "Ally! Get down from there!"

"Mom! My bottom hurts! Help me! I'm kinda stuck!"

And on. And on. And on. Every hour. So I don't anticipate a relaxing, scenic car ride on the way back to MN, and subsequently STL, this week. Wish me luck.

(Double rainbows!)

(Brothers in arms)

I used to be in shape...and then I went camping

Happy 4th of July!

Day 2 in Montana today. Yesterday was a good day overall; low key and full of firecracker pranks (I'm coming after you today, Ryan!). We hung out at my in laws' house most of the day, except for a 100 mile drive to get a burger and fries. Not kidding....we drove to Utica, MT to eat a late lunch and it took us at least 45 minutes to get to this rinky dink town. I hope the 3/4 lb burgers were better than my BLT was because that was a LONG @ss drive for some bar food. But we were all able to sit outside together and the boys tossed around a football while we waited for our food, so it was worth the drive in the end.

The main event of my day, however, was a 3 mile run. Not all that extraordinary, really, except that I almost DIED on this run. And not from a rattlesnake bite or anything like that. One week ago I could have run 5 miles without feeling like I was going to keel over, but somehow over the past 7 days I went from feeling like I was in pretty good shape to feeling like a total slug. Now there were some hills on this run, so I'm blaming my wheezing partly on that, but that couldn't have been the whole reason for my horrible run. Except for the McDonald's at the beginning of the trip, I have been eating reasonably healthy for being on a camping trip (I know processed meats and store-bought bread aren't really healthy, but they're 99% fat free at least). So I think I have to face the music when it comes to a little lie I've been telling myself for the past 12 years: Wine has calories! I so wish that wasn't true, but until they start making Diet Sauvignon Blanc I think I am going to have to start factoring that into my daily caloric intake if I want to get back to my pre-camping running shape. Boo.

(View from my run yesterday morning)

As much as I felt out of shape yesterday, there is one member of my family that is in far worse shape to run (or even walk) 3 miles. No, I am not dissing my husband. Would you take your 99 year old grandpa on a 3 mile walk in the mountains? In 85 degree heat? Yeah, I didn't think so. However, my husband thought it would be a brilliant idea to take our 12 year old Weimaraner who has joint issues, even steel plates in his legs, on a walk while I was running. When I caught up with them, I really didn't think he was going to make it back. But miraculously, he did. Then this happened.

Yeah, that's right. He drank about a gallon of water when he got back and then puked it all up (along with his breakfast) all over the RV. Just when I thought our camper couldn't get any grosser. Needless to say I was not the one who cleaned that crap up.

Yesterday was also the first time I let Olivia play with fireworks (those popper things, before you judge...my nephew popped one in his hand first to show me how harmless they are). Here she is having a good time with her big cousins:

That's about it for yesterday. More shenanigans to come today, I'm sure.

Parenting fails from the road

Before you read this post, you have to promise me one thing: you will not call CPS on me. Because even if you do, I doubt there's a branch in the small Montana town I'm in right now, and I have an RV so I can get away before they find me. So don't waste your time.

Overall, I think I'm a pretty good mom. This trip, however, has pushed my patience level to the limit so I have let a few things slide that I normally wouldn't. And I have been a bit distracted at times as well so we have had a few "oops" moments I'm not very proud of. But for the sake of keeping my loyal blog readers entertained, I am going to share them with you now.

Fail #1: Letting my kid eat Cap'n Crunch Crunch Berry cereal for breakfast every morning. It's fortified with vitamins though, right? That's gotta count for something.

Fail #2: You know how I posted about how noisy riding in an RV is? It's noisy because stuff is constantly rattling around in the cupboards. And sometimes if you go over a really big bump in the road those cupboards fly open and crap falls out. Like the other day when bottles of V8 and brandy fell out of the cupboard right behind Olivia's head...yeah. Probably should have put a bungee cord on that.

Fail #3: This RV now smells like an armpit, so last night I lit a candle to try to get it to smell more like pink magnolia, turned around to so something else, and when I looked back Olivia was putting the lid back on the candle. No harm, no foul, right?

Fail #4: We were "snuggling" one morning (aka, I let her watch PBS Kids on my phone while I tried to go back to sleep), and all of a sudden I am being handed an insulin syringe from my purse: "Here you go Mommy! Here's your medicine!"

Also - you might find these Olivia quotes amusing:

"Knock it off, guys! Ick!" Apparently she does not like my singing. She's not alone on this one.

"I'm kinda stuck!" This has been said over and over and OVER while we are driving. I know you're stuck, kiddo. That's the whole point of a car seat.

"Stop talking! Change my diaper NOW!" I think she needs to be potty trained ASAP.

"My bottom hurts. Touch it, Mommy!" She wanted me to massage her tush while we were driving. Thanks, Dad, for starting that trend.

Ok, that's enough teasing my kid. She is in my good graces today because she slept in until 7:30 this morning!! We made it to Pat's brother's last night and had a good time eating tacos, listening to some live music, and setting off some fireworks. The ride to Lewistown was fairly uneventful, although we did see a real, live Indian teepee and got flicked off by two hitchhikers that we didn't stop to pick up.

Time for breakfast!

Editor's Note: Pat informed that in yesterday's post I erroneously said that Billy the Kid was from Sundance, WY. He laughed hysterically when I read him the post and said "No, it's the Sundance Kid!" Like I would know the difference. They were both outlaws and are both dead now, so whatever. Same thing.

Outlaws and towers and prairie dogs, oh my!

One more day of vacation down...7 more to go. With all that's happened on this trip so far, it feels like we left St Louis weeks ago. After yesterday's disastrous morning, we didn't get on the road until about 10:30. This is what happens when your kiddo only gets 8 hours of sleep the night before (which, incidentally, I would KILL for right now):

Naps before 9:00 a.m. Aren't they cute?? Guess which member of the family didn't get a nap, though? You got it. This girl. Because despite the fact that our camper has plenty of sleeping options - it's a very nice RV, really - the couch was taken by these two, the bed was full of crap we didn't want to get wet on the floor, the bunk above the cab had a bunch of miscellaneous junk in it, and the two dogs were occupying the driver and passenger seats. So my options at that point were, a) sleep on a table,  or b) sleep on the damp and very dirty floor. The table was out, and since I wasn't really keen on getting bronchitis from inhaling the floor fumes I passed on a nap. I'm sure I'll get one today after getting up at 5:15 again, right? Hahahaha. Right.

We left South Dakota and motored on into Wyoming. We stopped at a very nice rest area as soon as we got into WY and picked up a map to figure out the best way to get to Devils Tower and where we might want to stop to get lunch along the way. There was a very nice lady at the campground that we had just left who told us to stop in a town called Aladdin to eat lunch and check out a very old general store. Which is what we had planned on doing, but fortunately we asked about this tiny (and I mean TINY) town at the WY rest area, because we needed gas and guess how many people live in the town? 15. In Wyoming, the least populated state in the U.S., 15 people constitutes a whole town. So the lady at the rest stop couldn't guarantee there was a gas station there. Another crisis crisis barely averted! Pat is always pushing the limits on the gas tank whenever we drive anywhere long distance, but usually we are within 10 miles or so of a gas station. In this part of the country you could literally go hundreds of miles without there being a place to fuel up. So instead of Aladdin, we stopped in Sundance, which at pop. 1,000 seemed like a booming metropolis compared to that other place. This is where Billy the Kid is from...don't ask me what he is famous for exactly. Killing people or stealing or gambling or something cool like that.

Next stop: Devils Tower! This is a natural phenomenon I had never heard of. It apparently is a huge rock formation that was formed many, many years ago that crazy people occasionally climb up. It was actually the fist National Monument in America. Native American folklore says it was formed when 7 sisters climbed atop a tree stump to get away from their brother (in the form of a bear) who was trying to attack them. Sounds like something that would have happened in the Wesselmann family back in the day! Run for your lives, Bev, Theresa, Connie and Deb!! ;)

And those little squirrel-y looking dudes are prairie dogs, which all over the place in the Devils Tower National Park. 

After driving for about 2 hours to get to DT and spending about 20 minutes there (Olivia conveniently fell asleep as we were pulling into the park), we started the drive to our last stop of the day: Aunt Bev and Uncle Jerry's house. We were greeted with pink squirrels (no, not tye dyed rodents - a fancy, boozy ice cream drink) and...a kitty cat! Olivia officially has a new BFF, Jake. She chased this poor cat around Aunt Bev's house all night yanking on its tail and trying to coax it down from the windowsill to play with her. It was pretty cute to watch. But the best part of all was that I got to sleep in a REAL bed! With no dogs around to wake me up!! And no musty, wet-dog smell in my bedroom, which is now what the RV smells like 100% of the time. Awesome.

Time to get on the road again. Next stop...Montana!

4 little words...

Question: What do you think is the worst thing that could happen on an RV road trip? Getting attacked by a bear maybe? Well, that very well could have happened yesterday given our proximity to about 4 dozen brown & black bears (see my last post from yesterday for more details on this), but it didn't, so I think the camping gods threw us a bone on that one. Oh no. Here are the 4 little words that you definitely never, ever want to hear on your camping trip:

"The floor's all wet!"

Yep. That's right. Our toilet overflowed during the night.

I thought it was bad enough that this morning Olivia chose to get up at 5:00 a.m. sharp (I might as well set my alarm for 4:30 a.m. tomorrow right now), but oh no. A leisurely morning of coffee, eggs, and talk radio would have been too much for this accident-prone family to ask for. Instead, we spent our very early morning hours moving suitcases, bags, clothes, etc. off of the floor and sopping up the water which now covers about half of our RV carpeting. Which leads me to my next camping tip:

2) When camping in an RV, I suggest covering the entire floor with Saran Wrap. That way, if the toilet overflows, you have a ready-made slip 'n slide! Fun for the whole family!!

After checking various buttons, pumps, and valves, my husband fortunately determined that it was only clean water that had overflowed when the toilet slide thing didn't close all the way and therefore the water that flushes everything down just kept filling up in the bowl. Major crisis averted, I suppose...for now.

Oh, and did I mention that after Pat took the dogs for a walk this morning he came back to the RV and said, "Can you hand me some wet paper towels and some dry ones? Buddy just fell in his own poop." I didn't? Because that happened too.

And it's only 9:30 in the morning.