Mom and Dad decided this year to take us all down to southern California for the family reunion. It had been at nine years since I was down there last and even longer since I've seen some of my Aunts, Uncles and Cousins. So I was super excited to go, dreading the long drive, but still super excited. Boy-oh-boy was it and adventure or what?
Day 1 (yes it was so eventful that I have to section it into days) : The plan was to get in the car and drive the 8 hours or so to Bakersfield where we would stay in a hotel for the night and freshen up for the 3 hour car drive and family fun the following day. All went really well.....until...dun dun dun. Was that ominous?
Okay
Anyway
About, oh I'd say 3 hours before we normally would have reached our destination, the car breaks down. It was weird, everything electrical just turned off but the car was still running fine otherwise. Then Kate (we were riding together in her car) realized she could no longer accelerate. We pulled over and called Mom and Dad, and YAY for California highway patrol men. One stopped and asked Dad if they were okay and Dad told him about our predicament. He helped us get to a safer- is that a word? It is today! - part of the highway.
Okay, do you actually want to hear all the details, probably not. So, to make a long story short - too late? - the car died on us three different times, the last one in the dark, before we realized we would have to leave it - yes leave it, ugh - on the side of the highway and move on to our hotel and sleep and then take care of it the next morning. If it was even still there, with all our stuff in it I might add. And so our 8 hour drive turned into a 15 hour drive.
I must say the kids were awesome considering the situation. Very few and minor meltdowns, they handled it really well, way better that most of the adults in fact, myself included.
So anyway, we got to the hotel and got rest and oh lucky day for us the was still there in the morning.
onto
Day 2: The new plan - instead of us all driving the three hours to the family reunion together and getting there early and having a great time - was that Mom and Dad rent a car and go to Kate's car and move all our stuff to the rental and have the car towed away to a mechanic, while the rest of us go on to the reunion and they would join us when they finished dealing with the car.
That supposedly 3 hour drive would have been longer even without the cashew incident (oh, I'll get it, don't worry) because the kids were a bit grumpy, who can blame them. We had to make a lot of potty and tantrum stops.
And oh yes, the cashew I mentioned. We discovered, in the middle of the desert 20-30 minutes to the nearest town which luckily - previously unbeknownst to us - had a hospital, that Kate's little girl, not yet 2 years old, has an allergy to cashews, or to the peanut oil the cashews were most likely cooked in (I'm leaning more toward the peanut, her brother has an allergy to peanuts, though not as severe as hers seems to be). So three hours in the hospital - that we were ever so grateful for - and another half hour on the road later, we reached out destination and our 3 hour drive had become an 8 hour drive. After a whole lot of hot and sweaty hugs, we settled in for the weekend and
tried to sleep through a very hot night.
Days 3&4 went on smoothly without bad events, for us at least - my aunts stepson broke his arm but he got a cast on it and came back up for more fun. Even though we were hot and exhausted, we had a great time. I was so happy to have seen all - well, a lot of them anyway - of my family that I haven't seen in so long. Unfortunately my camera battery died and I couldn't charge it while we were there and so I have very few pictures. But here are some of the few that I do have.
My Beautiful Grandma
Nathans Paparazzi Shot
Uncle Gene, "I got a snake".
Mike at the Shooting Station
After the family reunion fun we headed to our hotel in Newport and got ready for Disneyland the following day, Yay!
