we're home!

we had a really nice visit in IL. we went to the st louis zoo, even though it was raining off and on and pretty chilly. friday, my aunt tammy came over to watch kylie [& later lay her down for a nap] while me, nicole, haylee, terrisa and nana went shopping! we 1st went to kohls and terrisa got mostly haylee stuff there. then we went to target and terrisa got mostly kylie stuff there, which was SUPER nice of her! saturday, papa stayed with kylie while she was napping so me, nana and haylee could run to a different kohls and nana bought me and nicole some clothes. i got a casual dress, a black top and a black short sleeve blazer. about that time it was lunchtime and we were getting hungry but nicole didn't bring any food for haylee so we had to run back home to get some food for haylee then we had lunch at ruby tuesday. once we got back, we had to get everything ready to go visit my grandma. we picked my cousin up on our way and got there around 3:30. there's not much to do at my grandma's so we just sat around watching kylie's movies and watching her play. it was also pretty warm in her house because hasn't turned her AC on yet. around 5, we started dinner and ate shortly after. it was a good meal. around 6:30 my aunt terri got there and we visited for a little bit. my grandma got kylie a cake for her birthday so we gave her that and shortly after that, the girls were ready for bed so we had to leave. sunday, after kylie's nap we went to Splash City, their local waterpark. we picked up terrisa and later my cousin ashleigh and her boyfriend, ryan met us there. we all had a lot of fun. after a couple hours, kylie was starting to get cold so we decided it was time to leave. when we got home, we had to finish packing and get the girls baths. we had family stop in throughout the evening to tell us goodbye.



monday morning.... we were on the road by 8:30am. the first day back wasn't too bad, nothing too eventful and all in all we made it to the hotel in good time. after we got there i suggested we walk to Steak & Shake for dinner because it didn't seem to be too far but once we got going, we were got and there wasn't really a sidewalk but we walked anyways. then we decided to drive to Chick-fil-A so Kylie could play in the play area before it was time for bed. after we got there we were thinking we should of just ate there for dinner too! oh well. after CFA we went back to the hotel because Haylee was getting fussy for bedtime. we decided to put Kylie to bed first so she could get her screaming fit out and hopefully it wouldn't take long this time for her to fall asleep. in the meantime, nicole & haylee went back to CFA because i forgot Kylie's shoes there. she drove around for a while because haylee had fallen asleep and once i told her i thought kylie was asleep, she came back into the room and laid haylee down. shortly after we went to bed too since we couldn't watch TV or anything since the girls were sleeping. on the second day of traveling it was not so good! we got up late because the girls slept in until 8. which was nice for us but not good for our time. so we got up and ate some breakfast at the continential breakfast the hotel had. then we got gas and got on the road around 9:15. literally as soon as we got on the highway we saw smoke in the air. as we got closer we were hoping it wasn't on our side but as soon as we went over a hill we saw it was. our side was stopped. apparently a semi truck had blown a tire and lost control. his gas tank had detached and was on fire on a small bridge. the truck was no where in sight. we saw people running from the other side of the highway to the fire. it had JUST happened. someone had a fire extinquisher and put the fire out. no emergency crew were there yet. we were maybe 10 cars behind the whole thing. eventually the police and ambulance and fire trucks and road side crew and a bunch of other emergency vehicles showed up. everyone who was stopped on our side was out of their cars and walking around. we got the girls out of their carseats and let them stretch their legs. we heard from a UPS driver that was also stuck there about what had happened and that the driver had gotten out of it with just a broken arm so that was good since his truck had gone off the edge of the bridge. we were there from about 9:20 to 11:00 am. a LONG time sitting there! eventually they had checked the bridge and let us go! so we were 2 hours behind schedule when we just started. we then kept hitting construction parts all through West Virginia. we never thought we'd make it home and i don't think the girls did either. they were getting fussy and over the car. we finally got home around 8 pm.