Home Again. Home Again.

We made our way to Springfield, IL yesterday to meet Grandpa and Grandma to get our boys back. It's a 6 hr. drive each way, and while that might seem a little far to have to do in two days, it could not be a better drive. There are virtually no other cars on the road and in my 12 hours of driving, I only had to pass two trucks. Yes, you read that right - I passed them. On this particular highway, trucks actually follow (or even drive UNDER - shudder, shudder) the speed limit. I had told Christopher about all the hawks I saw last year on the trip so we watched for them again. With no leaves on the trees yet, they are easy to spot. On the way there we saw 28 and TWO BALD EAGLES!!! On the way home today we saw 33. We also saw some foxes and turkeys. The sparse traffic doesn't make the license plate game very easy but I am totally ok with that.

But, back to the boys... So we arrived at the hotel just before dinner. Not sure why we didn't think of this before hand but putting three tykes who have ridden in the car for 6 hours and have not seen in each other in a week into a hotel room and then taking them to a quiet sit-down dinner is just not a good idea. Someone needs to create a hotel with a Monkey Bizness inside - and put it in Springfield, IL. They were wound up to say the least. We made it through dinner - just barely - and promised them we would do some swimming at the hotel. Unfortunately, someone forgot to heat the pool!! Brrrr! Lucky for us, it seems they also forgot to heat the hot tub so it was perfect temp for the kiddos. We worked off a little of their "enthusiasm" and then hit the sack. It was lights out about 8:30. Abby finally stopped crawling over me and throwing her toys on my face about 11:00 - when daddy took her flashlight away. She finally stopped kicking me in the gut about 4:30 and was wide awake at 7:00. (Good thing we don't take this girl to a hotel very often!) We had our breakfast and said our goodbyes.

And look - everyone is still smiling! All reports were that the boys were fantastic on their vacation. Every where they went (in public) they were so well behaved. We are very thankful for this but daddy thinks we should send a webcam next time. (He finds it a little hard to believe, I think.) We made our way safely back to the house and had all 3 in bed by 7:30. The perfect end to a perfect vacation.

**Pictures from their stay to come when I get them transferred to my computer.