This has been one crazy trip! We had 3 car seats, 2 strollers, 3 roller suitcases and 6 carry-ons between 3 adults. (Thanks Julie for coming again! :) ) It has been one huge juggling act. You should have seen us at the airport in line to get our boarding passes. Push stroller, luggage…. drag car seat….check and make sure all kids are accounted. We slowly may it up to the line. It was such a relief getting everything checked and only having our carry ons and strollers. * note: 2 carry ons were backpacks for the boys to carry their activities.
Going through the security was a joke! We used every bin they had I swear! Even with the kids not having to take off their shoes we still had about 10 bins. We had things for them to check in one bin. each of our laptops in separate bins, all the bags and oh man, it was ridiculous. Then we calmly walked to our gate since we left so much time to sit and meet up with Andrew’s sister and fam, who were also on the flight. HAHAHA I wish! We ran, yep, RAN! Andrew said it jokingly and then we saw what time it was and we sprinted. I didn’t have my belt on tight enough so I also got to run and hold up my pants. I’m sure I looked just like the perfect specimen of an athlete running through, dodging everyone that was in my way. I’m sure I’m up for the next running back. What was worse was they moved the gate on us so we had to run down to the end of the hall and take the elevator down and run some more! Yeah, that was a great way to start out our trip.
We did find Andrew’s sister and they hadn’t board our section yet so we were able to stay together and enjoy the flight. Anyone who has flown Southwest knows you get to choose your own seats so if you’re late you get whatever is left. There was nothing to report on the actual flight. We didn’t have time to do lunch but luckily they had all sorts of snacks for us and let us have however many we wanted. so we survived the 4 hour flight that took off at 10:55am.
We all got exhausted! I had a women take this. All of them were asleep. As you can see Austin woke up to see a strange lady taking his picture. I can see that on his face! funny!
We got our nice car rental it had some fun features like the windshield wipers that sense how fast they need to go and the' back seat gets put down by an electric switch. We enjoyed our “blue truck”
Our drive started at 8pm and we didn’t get there until 12:30 I think. It took us so long Sharon, our host of the family reunion was starting to worry about us. There was a car crash and it took 40 minutes to get out of the stop and go traffic, but we made it safe and sound. Thank goodness! I hope those in the car accident are safe now as well.
It has now been long enough since the trip I don’t remember everything we did. I have no recollection of Sunday. I’m guessing we did shopping and interacted with family. I’m sure it was filled with joking and playing. :)
Busch Gardens
This was the boys favorite of all the places we went in Virginia. It still shows up in Austin’s prayers from time to time. (2 months later) The kids had a blast 
going on lots of kids with daddy. I am not in any of this pictures. Why? Am I camera shy? Not really I ran off with the adults to go on as many fast rides as possible. There was a storm threatening to come in at anytime so we couldn’t take it slow with the others.
What was really funny is that is ended up being all the in-laws together with Mitchell and Julie. All the siblings stayed with mom and dad. I told Mitchell he didn’t belong with us he was the only sibling that left but he was alright about it.
The kids look like they having the time of their lives doesn’t it?
We did catch up again and Andrew and I decided to go on one ride together since we haven’t been together all day. Julie said she wasn’t feeling good still so she offered to stay out with the kids, Our 3 and Charlotte’s little guy Patrick. The ride we went on was inside a castle called the dark castle. One of those haunted mansion type rides. This one was 3D. There is a movie prior to the ride you watch and then stand in line after. As we were in line, an employee came in through the exit door drenched. Telling us the rain is really coming down out there!
Andrew and I look at each other knowing that Julie is out there with 4 children and 3 strollers. Andrew says “Should I go out there and help her?” I say “Whatever happened has already happened. Let’s enjoy the ride. I know Julie has it under control.” We get out of the ride and can’t find her for a little while. Since we went the wrong way but we found them in a nearby store. Julie recounted the story from her side.
She was sitting out there with the kids and she felt one drop of water Austin said “we need to go in there (pointing to the store) its going to rain.” Julie says ok just a minute then the rain started. Now according to Julie this was not a gradual thing It was one drop of rain to basically a monsoon. She grabs the kids and takes was it 3 trips to get everyone in the shelter of the store. It was crazy rain. It reminded me of when I was in Disneyworld and there were 3 hurricanes surrounding us.
Park with the cousins.
Busch Gardens take two. I watched the kids at the splash pad while Julie and Andrew hit all the rides they can in an hour. Andrew didn’t get to go the first time around since he stayed with the kids with his parents and sister.
It was so hot and humid we had to keep Jordan with very little clothes to keep him comfortable. It was hard to get him to nap otherwise.
The worker of this ride said that our kids could take over his job. They had it down to an art. They went on this ride over and over again while Andrew and I went on a ride together and Julie watched them.
Richard helping us get out of the park faster to get to a family dinner.
If our kids are ever missing at a family function we basically look for this guy first! All our kids love Steve even if he does make them cry from time to time. ;)
