September 3

My grandma has progressively worsening dementia, and a few months ago Grandpa and their kids decided it was time for her to move into a nursing home. It's been a really challenging time for the family, and the fact that they live 8 hours away from us has made the situation even harder for my Mom. She has made the long drive many times over the past few months, and we decided that it was finally time for our family to make the drive to visit Grandma, too. Unfortunately, the logistics of traveling with 4 kids and work and school and everything meant that our visit would be really short.

We hopped in the van at 8:00 this morning and headed north to our first destination. Amazingly, we only had to stop once, and it was just for gas. Praise the Lord for DVD players! We made it to the halfway point, where we met my Grandma (my dad's mom) for lunch. At least, that was the original plan. But then we realized that my parents would actually be in town, too, for my dad's 45th high school reunion. So Mom and Dad met us for lunch, too.
And then Mom decided to invite my half-brother, Tim, and his wife, Carli, and their son, Isaac, to join us. It turned into quite the lunch party!

The last time we saw Grandma was on Memorial Day weekend, and she and the kids spent a lot of time coloring together. Today, she saw Lily coloring and immediately asked if she could color, too. I love watching my kids do something with her that I remember doing with her as a child, too!

I wanted a picture of me with Grandma, and Lily insisted on being in the picture, too. None of the other kids seemed to care about being in pictures. Their loss.

Grandma is 95 years old, still living on her own, and feisty as ever. Gotta love it!

Mom cheesed for some pictures with Tim and Carli. Aren't they cute?

And Dad with his Mom. 

Not pictured is when Isaac hit the jackpot in the arcade, twice. He graciously shared almost all of his winnings with my children, who were delighted to have new toys to play with during the rest of the drive. What a good kid!

Once our bellies were filled with pizza and the kids' hands were filled with toys, we got back on the road. Amazingly, the kids were great and we didn't have to stop at all. Seriously - DVD player for the win! We rolled into town, grabbed some dinner, and checked into our hotel room. Luckily, we still had plenty of time for a quick visit with Grandpa before the kids melted down from sheer exhaustion and road-weariness. (It was that road-weariness that kept us from visiting Grandma in the nursing home tonight; we wanted to take cheerful, well-rested kids to visit her, not wild animals who had just been released from their cage.)

Eli loved his great-grandpa's condo! The balcony, which overlooks a busy-ish street and the lake, was his favorite spot. 

He was so excited to watch all of the cars and trucks drive by.

Pointing at a truck and making the noise that is his word for truck: "Brrrr-brrrr!"

My brown bear.

This one is totally out of focus, but I love it. 

And then the kids were done, and we whisked them off to the hotel room. Except that our hotel also has a major waterpark attached to it. So while I nursed Eli to sleep, Chris took the older three for a quick bedtime swim. It worked out perfectly - when the happy, tired children returned, Eli was sound asleep in his little crib. Hooray!

So many more pictures tomorrow!