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!