Camping

In case one was wondering about what it's like to be on a Road Trip with the McGregor's... we stop at Rest Areas for lunch, with our picnic basket and cooler.  We are famous for peanut butter and honey sandwiches.  No refrigeration needed.  Plenty of protein.

Our happy picnicker's.

And the camping begins... we moved just about every day, in our efforts to get across the country.  I wouldn't exactly recommend doing that, but it worked out ok for us.  We will plan differently next time around, however:)  We stayed at KOA Kampgrounds, and that we will do again!  They were all so nice and had laundry facilities, electricity at the tent sites, nice pools, and were all so clean!

Carly showing off the KOA map we got at each place.  (These pictures are all from our first stop, in Little Rock, Arkansas.)

The Nightly Routine of setting up the tent... These boys got pretty fast at it!  Everyone had a little campsite job and we got ourselves organized pretty quickly.

Almost every campground had a Walmart close by and we were able to run in to get stuff for dinner and extra supplies... some nights we just ate at a restaurant, but our first night, we "grilled".  On the electric grill we brought from home.  Sitting on top of the campgrounds grill.  Hilarious.  We got a lot of use out of that grill!

Yum... dinner after a fun afternoon of swimming.

Trying out a recipe from Pinterest... waffle cones with marshmellows and chocolate chips, melted on the grill.  There were fire bans everywhere we went, so we couldn't make smore's:(  Rats!  

Not quite smore's, but they got us by.

And inside the tent.  We had a fan going:)  The first night was really the only hot night we had, but with the fan going, it was actually pretty pleasant. 

Our sleepy heads!  My sister, Laurie, got us these GREAT camp mats from L.L. Bean and they are so comfortable.  We all slept great in our tent.  Great accommodations!

Mississippi Capitol

It's pretty clear that we plan our vacations around our Capitol visits... we are working on our goal to get Ben and Carly to every Capitol building in our country by the summer Ben graduates high school.   It's such a great way to get them all over our great country!  Plus, we love to travel.  Hmmm, wonder where we got that trait from?!?!  

So, The Capitol of Mississippi... it's in Jackson.

... and sports the traditional dome.  With gold eagle on top.  

Cute McGregor's.

We loved the grounds, and the cool artifacts that are displayed there.

So, anyone who's been around for a while might see what McGregor's see in the picture below...

Empty cement for Statues.  Oh, come on!  They are just ASKING for some new statues for their grounds!

Capitol buildings are GREAT places to see some cool architecture in our country...

love the dome

Blindfolded Justice looms over the governor's office

Lot's of stained glass...

My little family, across the base of the dome

The ceiling inside the House of Representatives (it's the same in the Senate)

Pretty happy to find a pink trash can for Breast Cancer... 

Ryan wanted to be sure to get a picture of our car parked super close to the capitol, since we don't have any pictures of our car this close to a Capitol Building... the visitors spots were nice and close.

Vacation... all I ever wanted!

And so begin the stories of our Summer Vacation... I still feel like I need Vacation Detox, and I've been home for nearly 2 weeks!  Ben is still ON vacation and Ryan and Carly got home a week ago and immediately went to church camp... so needless to say, it's been somewhat chaotic around here!!  We had so much fun on our trip, I actually don't mind the fact that I can't find a thing and I think there might still be dirt clinging to everything we own.

Here's our car, the night before we left... this would be a few minutes before we met Rochel and children at Dairy Queen for Goodbye Ice Cream. 

I had to take a picture of the back of our car so we would remember how to repack it each morning!  I was convinced it would not have fit any other way, and I proved myself right around Day 3.  Yes, you read that right... we REPACKED the whole car (um, and car top carrier!) each morning... after taking our tent down and breaking down camp. 

I-75, early in the morning.  Our first Road Trip where we were HARDLY on our favorite highway!

We were a little worried about the car top carrier looming over our panoramic sunroof.  So we left the sunshade open the whole time, you know, so I could stare at it while we were driving down the highway.  The carrier was resting on the bars and wasn't even on the glass, but it still made me a little nervous!  Of course, it was perfectly fine.  all 7,500 miles.

The first day, we drove to Jackson, Mississippi.  When we got there, we tried really hard to find somewhere to eat... and everything was closed or out of business!

This place looked really fun... closed.

Um, apparently there were issues here.

FINALLY found somewhere to eat... and it was pretty good.  Kids were THRILLED because it was a pizza bar.  It was kind of a funny memory for us, we would have been happy with MCDONALD's at this point, and there wasn't even that!

Our first night we actually stayed in this classy hotel.  Couldn't complain since it was nice and clean and super cheap.  And trust me, after our long day driving, no one wanted to think about the tent yet!