Oh. My. Goodness. Road trips with two kids are no joke. To be fair, our seven hour car trip to Rochester was mostly Leo maintenance with a handful of Seth thrown in. Most newborn babies are so easy - they just need to eat and then they are awake and then they cry for a bit and then they fall asleep. Feeding in the car isn't the BEST time I've ever had - wedged in between two car seats, using my down coat as a Boppy, casually wondering if I should care that I can't feel my legs. It's annoying to have to stop, but then again, the Little Debbie selection at gas stations tends to be pretty choice.
Leo, on the other hand, different story. We decided to leave at Leo's bedtime so that he would fall asleep in the car and have some snoozes for a couple of hours before reaching the HoJo's where we would be spending our evening. Why we thought Leo would suddenly sleep great in the car after 20 months of refusing to sleep in the car is a question that a reasonable person might ask. We fed both kids, loaded everyone into the car, and set off on our journey full of love for one another and the open road. FALSE. I asked Eric to turn the car around as soon as we hit the traffic in lower Manhattan. Needless to say, no one listens to me and we made it out of the city. Great. Now, Leo was going to fall asleep and we were all going to listen to Serial like the cool, hip people we are not since we were about two months behind everyone else.
8 pm, 8:30pm, 9pm...the half hours were rolling by and Leo was definitely not falling asleep. He was also not just hanging out, relaxing all cool - he was DEMANDING constant entertainment. It is at this point that I have to confess that the only Leo occupations I brought were a board book, milk, and snacks because I really, truly thought he would be asleep within an hour of his normal bedtime. So, Leo ate all the snacks, drank all the milk, read the book twice, and then he was DONE. By done I mean, wielding his toddler nunchucks of screeching and clawing to indicate that he was bored and would very much like some entertainment.
We started off with some singing, but singing gets old pretty fast when you only know about 10 songs and they were all 10 seconds long(why aren't there longer children's songs?!?) It was at this point that I began searching the car for "toys" for Leo. By toys, I mean anything that Leo would enjoy playing with and wasn't going to put him in imminent danger. If you are ever in this situation, might I recommend: containers, pens, bottles, keys, watch, blanket, adult shoes and a pocket LED light that Elizabeth happened to have on her person. In turns out that trips with toddlers aren't measured in miles or minutes, but in how many toys it requires to occupy them.
It was getting later and later and Leo still wasn't sleeping. He was, however, starting to show signs that it was in fact WAAAAY past his bedtime (two and a half hours). It was around this point that the singing of "This Old Man" began. I suggested a myriad of other song choices which were all rejected until we finally hit upon this classic. There are parts of this song that are super fun to sing(at least for me) but let me tell you, by round 100 it starts to get to be a little much. Unfortunately, I didn't want to change songs because this was working and Leo was finally falling asleep! YAY!
WRONG. Leo fell asleep about 10 minutes before we reached the hotel(otherwise known as 10:50, 3 hours and 20 minutes past bedtime). So, when we woke him up, he simply could not fall back asleep. We put him down in the pack and play and he cried and cried like there was no tomorrow. So, I pulled him into bed with me and sang a few verses and then put him down again. Still crying. Sang to him while lying next to the pack and play on the floor. Still crying. Eventually, around 1 am, he finally conked out. Only to wake up at 7 the next morning. Hurrah!
Overall, we had a great trip and had the opportunity to spend a lot of quality time with family which was the entire reason for taking the trip in the first place. I would do it again if I had the choice. But, I would do it very differently. I'd aim to be at the hotel by bedtime instead of leaving at bedtime and I would bring waaay more things to occupy Leo. Also, I probably wouldn't forget the Raffi CD. And snacks. Lots of snacks.
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