Six States. Four Days.

We're home. Actually, we got home last night. After encountering a lot of traffic on the way up -- I'm talking coming to a complete stop on the interstate kind of traffic -- and some signs urging us to find an alternate route on Sunday, we decided to come home a day early.

The trip up was uneventful, other than the traffic. And speaking of, seriously fellow-I77 travelers, what is about a tunnel that makes you absolutely freak out? Traffic was stop and go for miles before the first tunnel and then zoooom, off we went.

We did see some snow on the ground in Virginia, but the kids slept through most of it.



In fact, they slept through a lot. Bubba slept through both tunnels, unfortunately, though Punkin was awake for one of them.

We finally arrived in Huntington and went to Mr. Daddy's sister's house. She had the brilliant idea to make s'mores that night and the kids had a blast.

As you can see, a good time was had by all. Especially Punkin, who really knows how to eat. That's chocolate on her face and a graham cracker on her coat. On the whole, though, everybody stayed miraculously clean!


On Thursday, all of Mr. Daddy's siblings, save one, came to the sister's house. Mr. Daddy's mom and her new husband joined us as well. It was great to see everybody. I hadn't seen Mr. Daddy's brother Ratboy in at least two years and we see the others very infrequently. (Remember they all have nicknames). His brother Blub brought his two kids over and they, along with Flip's (the sister) kids, had a great time getting to know their Southern cousins.

The only family missing was Chuck (aka Craig) and his family. A while back I posted about Craig and his daughter Emma, who was recently diagnosed with ulcerative colitis. As Craig was about to board the plane to travel to the half marathon that he was running to raise money for ulcerative colitis research, he received a call from his wife that Emma was very sick. Emma spent over a week in the hospital with a severe stomach infection and only got to come home right before Thanksgiving. We're so Thankful that she's feeling better, but if you believe in prayer, please say a prayer for Emma and her family.

On Friday we did the Huntington Reminiscing Tour and Mr. Daddy showed Bubba the house he grew up in. And no, it hadn't been uncovered by archaeologists. We went to Stewarts Hot Dogs for lunch, a must for delicious hot dogs and Root Beer when you're in the Huntington area. Ironically, as we were sitting there (it's a drive up restaurant) another car from Athens, Georgia pulled in. Just another Huntington native reliving the good old days.

On Saturday we decided to go home a different route and went down US 23 through Kentucky. I've never been to Kentucky and it was gorgeous. Hwy 23 is the country music highway and periodically there'd be a sign telling you which country music star was from that county. Pretty soon we saw a sign for Van Lear and I knew we were in Loretta Lynn country. We saw a sign pointing the way to her birthplace and Mr. Daddy asked if I wanted to stop. I opted not to, but when I got home and found out that HER BROTHER leads tours at their childhood home, I've been kicking myself ever since. If you've never listened to Van Lear Rose, the album Loretta Lynn did with Jack White of the White Stripes, you are missing out. Below is my favorite. It is a rockin' song.






So that's our trip in a nutshell. We had a good time. And we will be going back, I'm certain. And next time I'm stopping in Butcher Hollow.