Hmmm....maybe closer to stupid

First the bad news. We're not leaving overnight again until Ian is 18.

Nights were pretty terrible. The first night we got into the hotel at about midnight. Ian was exhausted so he didn't put up much of a fight going down. He was up about 4 times but did go back to sleep with some reassurance. Not great, but livable. It was the second night that sealed the deal. Over two hours trying to get him to sleep, then he was up for over three hours straight in the middle of the night. And of course since we only have one room, anytime Ian was up, so was Rinnah. Blech. We actually seriously debated coming home a day early, but since we knew we weren't going anywhere again for a very long time, we decided to tough it out for one more night, which was better but certainly not awesome. So now we have two very overtired kids with some overtired parents. Oh, and Rinnah screamed for a good portion of the 4.5hr ride home. I'm disappointed since this has pretty well dashed our hopes of making it to California this year. Between a little one who screams while in her carseat and now a toddler who isn't great in the car and apparently has major difficulty sleeping away from home, I think it's just too far for us right now.

On the bright side, Ian LOVED the Children's Museum. Everything was geared towards younger kids and there was so much he could do and explore. He loved pushing all the buttons, turning gears, and pulling handles to see what would happen. The water exhibit was a big hit too. And he loved the car room with toy cars to race. He also got a big kick out of just seeing what would be next with so much to do.

The Museum of Science and Industry went better than we expected too. We actually got to see (at least briefly) most of the museum. There was an Idea Factory exhibit for kids that Ian thoroughly enjoyed-lots of balls and bubbles to play with there. And he loved climbing in the big tractor and combine and pretending to drive them. Jeremy's favorite exhibit was definitely the toy factory-a whole room full of fancy robots & computers to drool over. We all enjoyed the huge model train exhibit too.

We have pics, but that will have to wait until after I get some real sleep.

Overall, I'm glad we went. Partly because it was a lot of fun to watch Ian exploring and enjoying all the different activities. And partly because now we really know what our kids are like when we uproot their schedule and leave home overnight. I think this was a stretch for them, so it's good that we found this out before trying to travel somewhere 12 hours away instead of 4 or being gone for a week instead of a few days. Hopefully they'll be better travelers in another year or two and we can try again.