Been a little MIA

Sorry folks been MIA for a week or so, just trying to recoup from our trip still and deal with some medical things for Seamus(post on that soon.)
I've also been digiscraping alot lately check out that blog McDilda Scraps to see some of my pages.
And today I opened an Etsy Shop, for now just selling Tutu's but soon hopefully other things too. But I'm still trying to think of a name.
Should have a good post about Seamus here this week and some pictures from our trip, stay tuned!

We did go

Scratch that last post we did end up going. We had some issues with one car and at the last minute decided to take our smaller car on the trip. I got my hand smashed in the car on V-Day and broke 1.5 nails pretty low (trying to keep it from falling off though) so its hard to type. I'll try to get a post up tonight or tomorrow after the kids are in bed (w/ pictures)

Not going

trip canceled, packed and got Seamus excited for nothing. update later I'm not in the best of moods

Diapers

For weeks now I've been trying to figure out what to do about our trip and Kieran's diapers. We've cloth diapered her since August, so most of her life. I didn't want to waste money on disposables and I'm quite turned off by them now after using cloth. I was helping my mom one day after her surgery and one of her friends was there. I was very excited to tell her friend about my diapers and was showing her them and told her our story of how we started cloth. The next day I get a phone call from my mom saying her friend bought us diapers (my mom said because this friend felt bad we clothed!). I thought, well this will solve our diaper issue for the trip, because we couldn't bring our cloth since we wont be able to wash for over a week and with no wet bag that will start stinking bad and fast. Then I won a Fluff Friday giveaway at The Cloth Diaper Whisperer of a GroBaby and bio soakers! I was over the moon cause we could now use our cloth stuffs! I have a package of 50 bio soakers and I think that will last us from Friday the 12th till Friday the 19th, but just incase I've packed some BumGenius, FuzziBunz and Bummis prefolds for the return trip home. I'm so excited to use my GroBaby!

Wordless Wednesday: Yummy Foot!

Packing our bags

This week I'm going to slowly be packing our bags for our trip. But before I do any packing I need to figure out a suitcase for hubby and I...eek. I have a medium size duffel bag that will fit all of the kids clothes in just fine but our only other one is a huge one that is too big to be taking. I think my mom has a medium sized normal suitcase we can borrow, and I think I need to find one for my brother now that I think of it.

We went to the store the other day and bought the kids some travel sized soap/shampoo's, and us some normal sized ones(ours are almost gone and we figured for the price just buy the big ones). I've also been a laundry maniac, haven't folded it but I've done around 6 loads in 3 days with about 6more to go. I want all the laundry done and put away before we leave Friday afternoon. We did a pretty good deep clean of the living room, bathroom and kitchen, now we just need our room and Seamus' cleaned up good.

Hubby and I are also trying to plan our stops for gas. We're using MapQuest and when hubby was looking at it yesterday we noticed they had us going to Cheyenne, Wy and hitting I-80 which would take us out of the way since we need to stop in Scottsbluff, Ne on the way to where we are going. Luckily he noticed that now instead of when we were almost down there. We're figuring that it will cost about $200 each way for gas...dang I wish gas was as cheap as it was last year, right now its between $2.30-2.70/gallon depending on the state we will be in.

So far the panic of getting it all done hasn't set in, I think it will Wednesday especially if our car can't get fix(that's another blog entry later).

Traveling

The last few weeks I have been planing, and replaning and running a checklist all in my head for our trip to Nebraska. We are leaving around noon on February 12th, and hoping to make it to Sheridan, Wy late that night and spend the night then arrive in Nebraska on Saturday. I'm a little worried about actually spending the night in a hotel, for 2 reasons. The first reason I'm worried is when we came back up from Nebraska in 2008 we planned to stay the night in Billings, Mt but when we got there we found out that all the hotels(that we knew about) were full because of a local Native American convention going on and the tribes had the rooms booked, so I'm worried about finding a room. Hubby thinks we will just drive till we are tired, making it to Billings or Sheridan and finding a hotel then, I wanted to reserve one but I was warned about the weather and we may not make it to either place and I dont want to waste a reservation. My second reason for being worried...the kids. I think Kieran will be fine sleeping in a hotel in bed with me and hubby, but Seamus, I think, will have a hard time. Seamus already has a really bad time sleeping and being in a strange place will be even harder on in (especially sharing a bed with my brother).

I keep trying to think of things for the kids to do while driving, we were going to get a dvd player to strap on the headrest but didn't like what we found (hoping to borrow a friends player), so now I'm back to square one. I was thinking crayons, but Mr. Shaymee will color on anything and he will be riding right next to Kieran and I don't want him giving her the crayons so I nixed that one. What I've come up with is either buying them each a small new toy to play with, and/or letting Seamus pick something out so he'll be more excited to play with it.

We've (...well I've) decided to get a cooler and fill it with ice and drinks so we aren't wasting money at gas stations on those, I was also wanting to do the same with lunch but hubby said he'd rather stop to get that. Hubby's dad sent Seamus these cool cups that have a snack cup on top, and a straw runs through it to a bottom drink cup so that will be nice and compact for him to use. Not sure yet what to do for Kieran, cause I know she will want food when she see's Seamus eating something(hopefully he wont try to feed her).

We will be in Nebraska from mid Saturday till very early Wednesday. Wednesday morning we are leaving for South Dakota and stopping at Mt. Rushmore(4hrs north of where we will be in Nebraska). I've been to Mt. Rushmore back in 2004 but my brother and hubby haven't and I thought it'd be a neat little detour. Our plans are to stay the night in Rapid City then take I-90 straight home on Thursday making it home late Thursday night early Friday morning.

It will be fun seeing how the kids do on the trip. I'll be updating my blog as the trip goes on :)

Back

I should be back in the swing of things. The last few weeks have been too crazy with doctors appointments, teething 9month olds, colds, taxes and trip planning.

I'm planning a post here in the next day or so about planning a trip with a 3½yr old and a 10month old. And I'm asking for your help. I want to include some tips from you, what ideas do you have for the drive(appx 1200miles) in mid winter through pretty empty roads(Montana, and Wyoming into Nebraska), what do you pack, how do those that cloth diaper do it(we wont be able to wash ours so looks like bringing our cloth is out of the question). Anything that has to do with trips, snacks, eating on the road, sleeping in a strange house(well for the kids, its my dad's house, but there will be 2 hotel stays), etc. Post here in the comments or email me at j.mcdilda at gmail dot com