Monday, May 30, 2005

Family Trips

We're going on our first family road trip in a few weeks. Driving to the Okanagan and maybe Vancouver and taking our time getting there. I'm excited about it, though with a crying 3 month old and 2.5 year old who somewhere learned the phrase "are we there yet?", I'm sure it won't all be fun.

But I'm still excited about it. And tonight I went out and bought Madeline some things to give her on the trip. We're going to buy one of those car dvd players, so I bought her the new Winnie the Pooh "Heffalump" movie (we rented it for 3 days last week and she already has it memorized -- accents and all!), a new Dora dvd, and "The Tigger Movie" because it was cheap. I also got her a couple of activity books and a few little toys. I have these romantic notions of how she's going to play with all of these toys and be so excited about the movies, and how we'll stop and have a picnic at some nice roadside stop while I nurse Luke, and we'll arrive at the hotel really late and she'll sleep on Marc's shoulder as he carries her into the hotel room, and she'll be SO excited when she sees all of the animals at the Calgary Zoo, and we'll buy her a little stuffed animal there that will be her favourite toy for the rest of the year...

I'm sure this won't happen, but I'd like to think it will, and Madeline will probably remember it something like that. I remember taking a big trip to BC once when I was about 7 years old. I remember going to Sears with my mom and buying an outfit for the trip -- dark blue jeans and a yellow shirt (that was size 3! -- as I remember it, anyway). I remember being woken up in the morning and being very sleepy and wearing that outfit as we started driving in the dark to Kamloops (I think we did it in one day too -- my dad was quite the man!). And that's pretty much all I remember about the trip. I think I remember something about the Enchanted Forest, but that's about it. But just the image in my head of that outfit from Sears makes me happy.

I wonder if my mom remembers it that way?!

4 Comments:

At 7:41 AM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

Have fun on the vacation! We had our first real family camping trip on the long weekend and it was great. Next time one of us will spend more time playing with Elijah instead of leaving him to his own devices...he can find trouble in almost anything (threw a rock at our friends' truck and tried to poke a stick THROUGH their tent! YIKES!!!!). It was a great time and we came home completely exhausted.

I'm glad they didn't have tv's in cars when I was growing up...I would have missed so much! D's brother bought one for their van and that's how they "managed" with 2 kids on their trip to Florida. A 2-year-old who can't yet read is one thing, but shouldn't 12 and 10-year-olds be able to find some non-digital form of amusement (reading, talking, games, etc.)? I guess some kids get car-sick when they read...I was lucky that way.

 
At 9:37 AM, Blogger Dixie Vandersluys said...

Ya, we debated getting the dvd player b/c Madeline is usually really good in the car (we've made countless 3.5 trips to Caronport). But, this is a 14 hour drive I think, so for our sanity's sake we decided to get -- we still need to buy it, though. We won't tell her we have it until she's good and restless, though. We know some people that as soon as their kids enter the car, they turn the tv on. But we plan to play a lot of eye-spy and I'm sure Madeline will enlighten us with many of her (not funny, but cute) knock-knock jokes.

 
At 10:02 PM, Blogger Randall Friesen said...

We did a similar thing when our kids were much younger. We headed to BC. But being preTV, we purchased a set of "Christian Stories and Songs on Tape."

I've never come so close to renouncing my faith...

But it Was good. The ferry ride, the stop by the side of the road for a picnic, in the mountains. Yes it was tough too, but I hang on to the fun memories.

You do too. And have a great time.

The TV will give you some freedom to enjoy the trip too. Good call.

 
At 3:00 PM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

my dad rigged up a black and white tv in our old van when we drove from Saskatchewan to Illinois in 1987 (I was 9, my sister was 12 and my brother was 6). of course, it didn't have cable or a vcr or anything. just a tv. I think it got used for a grand total of 10 minutes - reception wasn't, um, very good :) but my dad is creative and handy like that, and I've always loved it.

I read A LOT in the car as a kid. I never had a problem with car sickness. I don't know how my sister and brother kept entertained - neither of them are readers. I lucked out.

with older kids I think the DVD player is plain lazy, but yes for a 2.5 year old it's probably going to be very nice.

 

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