The Big Trip, Part 3: Louisville & Nashville

 The evening of Monday, July 25th, we set out at 7PM in our rental Hyundai Sonata for what we feared might be a 6+ hour trip to Louisville. We hoped the girls would sleep for most of it. They didn't. But thanks, Granny, for loaning us the iPad--it definitely came in handy.

We saw the Gateway Arch as we sailed down I-64, then crossed the bridge into East St Louis. We made it through, unscathed. East St. Louis looks like what SimCity looks like when you are losing the game.

Fortunately, southern Indiana, though heavily populated with corn, is very sparsely populated by humans, so we sailed through in a mere four hours.  It was an uneventful drive, save for an awkward pee-by-the-highway moment with Natalie. With so many miles between each exit, it was either pull over or have her pee in the rental car/seat. Ah, boys have it so much easier.

At around 11PM, we arrived at the disappointing Red Roof Inn near my brother-in-law's house and crawled into the scratchy, questionable sheets for a relatively good night's sleep.

It's not that the Red Roof Inn is so horrible, or that we even had rude neighbors or anything disgusting enough to brag about. It's just--we're used to fairly nice hotels, the kind that have actual hallways and don't reek of cigarettes several years after they were declared non-smoking. And all those news stories in the past few years about the return of bedbugs added up to my feeling too creeped out to sleep well.

So after convincing Rob not to stick this one out, I cancelled the remainder of our reservation. Rob and his brother David quickly found a much nicer hotel (Ramada) for us, last minute, at $2 more per night. Score!

Visiting with my in-laws in Louisville for a week seemed like a daunting proposal. We have two toddler girls. They have two boys, an 11-year-old and a 13-year-old. Then there are the grandparents and my other sister-in-law in town with her husband and 17-year-old son. They are all-around sweet and loving folks, but what would the girls do when they couldn't play with the older boys? Wouldn't the older boys shun them and keep to themselves?

As soon as we walked in the door at David and Carol's house the morning after our late arrival, Natalie and Rachel strode into the kitchen and Tyler and Jacob walked in and high-fived them, like they were best friends from down the street. I was amazed. They got along famously the entire time. The boys were so interested in the girls, so great about playing with them gently, making them giggle, making sure they didn't get hurt. These guys are going to make terrific dads.

Rob and I also thought we wouldn't get out much while we were in Louisville. Wrong! We all went to a community center with a great pool (zero entry, fountains, huge water slides) one day. Afterwards we all went to a Mexican restaurant, where several of these pics were taken.

The next day we all went to a rock climbing gym, where Tyler and Jacob were Spidermen--they've obviously been doing this for a while, and defied gravity impressively. The girls enjoyed the bouldering section, when we could snag a bit of it--the gym was packed on a 100+ degree day.

My sister-in-law, Deb Stone

Carol, Jane and I learned how to belay (manage the rope for the person climbing.) David offered to belay while Rob and I took turns climbing. The girls hated being separated from either of us, but got into the spirit of cheering us on when they looked up and saw how high we were climbing. It was exhilarating.

The Linton Siblings

On one of the last nights of the trip, we conspired with the adults of the family to all meet at our hotel after the girls went to sleep. We took shifts watching the girls, sneaking downstairs afterwards to hang out, drink beer and play Cornhole and shoot pool in the lobby.

We also celebrated Natalie's 3rd birthday on our last day in Louisville. I don't know where those pics are at the moment, but it was a sweet and special little party. My wonderful sister-in-law, Carol, took me to Target to pick up supplies and shop for birthday presents. We bought her a pretty white cake with white icing (her favorite) and blue, purple and turquoise roses. I showered her in girly Mardi Gras beads. She enjoyed all the books and sweet gifts from the Linton family. It was a poignant moment and culmination of our trip. Now that she's 3(!), I think she will remember this birthday and talk about it in the years to come.

We said our warm goodbyes, gathered our increased load of luggage, and followed Jane down I-65 to Nashville, our last stop. We had two nights and a day to spend there before we would board the plane to return to Austin. Again, I thought we wouldn't do much.

I underestimated our capacity to go all out and have a great time.

The afternoon we arrived, went swimming at the hotel. At night, I got to go out (all by myself!) to Jane's house to meet Mary, her sweetheart. We played Wizard, a fun twist on an ordinary card game.

The next day, we all headed out to breakfast at Bob Evans near Opryland, then to a lovely park with a couple of playscape, a nature center and a great rustic outdoor play area. I wish I could remember the name. This park also hooked up to/included a bike trail that winds around the city for miles.

Rob did the double pole slide.

Rachel continued perfecting her stair descent.

Jane showed off her skills on the barrel roll.

We headed back to the hotel (a very nice Holiday Inn) for our daily scheduled nap. This was something we started in Louisville that really made the trip, in terms of our overall mood and energy. No way could we have pulled off all the activities without those naps, and still had a shred of sanity left at the end of it.

Rachel is getting sleee-pyyyy...

After a glorious nap, we ventured out again, this time to the Adventure Science Center. Austin has a Children's Museum somewhat similar in concept to this, but Nashville's version is bigger, with a planetarium and a 5-story rocketship atrium.

It is so cool to be a kid these days!

Natalie boards the bus.

Rachel spent quality time absorbed in this simple Lego table, all by herself (well, except for me) in the toddler zone.

After dinner at Logan's Steakhouse, Jane showed us the way to Centennial Park, home of an impressive Parthenon replica.

A breakdancing DJ entertained the small crowd with 70's funk hits and lots of smooth moves. Natalie joined him on the plywood dance floor. I wish one of those photos had come out! She was in her element, I tell you.

Mmm, snowcones...

Shortly after this picture was taken, Rachel got extremely frustrated with the snowcone situation, and Rob chucked a snowcone into the water. Rachel proceeded to have her first real tantrum, accompanied by Earth, Wind and Fire. Stomp, rage, cry, repeat. I followed her and tried to be empathic and let her do her thing. She started calming down when she noticed a flowering shrub and stopped to inspect it. An onlooker stopped and remarked, "that's your scientist there!" What a moment! Joy, fun and pain all rolled into one.

Really, after such a long and eventful trip, being away from home for two weeks, with a shifting array of strangers who really want to get to know you... who wouldn't have a tantrum? It was a quick, bright hot blaze, and then it was over.

We danced and made yoga pose shadows on the sunlit walls of the Parthenon. We meandered across the great green lawn to the huge shaded playscape across the street.

We played our hearts out, and the girls had a great time getting to know their Aunt Jane, one on one.

The next morning we got up at 6AM, packed up in the best unhurried rush we could muster, and headed to the airport. A few minor hassles later, we were on our way home. A two-hour plane ride seemed like nothing after the huge, exciting two weeks we had.

It was such a great trip!