Vacation Recap, Part 2

(Don't forget to click the pictures throughout this post to see a larger version - I kept them small for the most part because of how many there are!)

Alright, when I left off, I had covered pretty much only the drive out to Ohio and the 3 days of the Wilcox family reunion. I'll start off here with Day 4, which was a Sunday. We made plans to drive into Columbus to attend church with my cousin Andrew, who was blessing his first baby that week. Because of that, his parents (Uncle Harold and Aunt Adele) and my Grandma Crockett were also in town. So it was almost like another little family reunion! Andrew gave one of the most original baby blessings I've ever heard, it was really special. Melinda and Jacob got to experience what it's like to visit a different ward (and it sounds like they had fun!), and Jesse and I got to remember what it's like to go to a Gospel Doctrine class. We haven't been to one in over 2 years. Before we started team-teaching in Primary, we were in the Marriage and Family Relationships sunday school class. Which was great, but sometimes we both miss Gospel Doctrine. Andrew happened to be the teacher, and I just have to say that he was a wonderful at it! We both enjoyed sunday school very much.

After church, we went to Andrew and Sarah's house for a little dinner. It was fun to visit with everyone, but it was also brief. Just enough time to play "catch up" with everyone. (And my goodness, it had been about 7 years since I had seen Grandma Crockett, and she didn't look or act a single stitch different! She's really amazing!) Before long, we were heading back to the hotel. And Monday morning, we woke up, got dressed, packed up, and headed down to the lobby to have breakfast with Mom, Dad, Dallis and Kaija. After dragging it out as long as we reasonably could, we said our goodbyes and began the road trip again.

Two hours into our drive, we stopped at Kirtland, Ohio, to see some church historical sites. We stopped at the LDS visitors center long enough to discover that Alex was desperately in need of a diaper change, and let everyone else use the bathroom, and then we walked around the historical downtown. We didn't take the official tour because of the heat and general antsy-ness of the kids, so we didn't see inside the buildings. But we walked around and saw the Newel K. Whitney home and store and other surrounding buildings, and then headed over to the Kirtland Temple. It was the first temple built, completed in 1836, but was abandoned along with the rest of Kirtland when the early members were forced to leave the area. It is now owned and operated by the Community of Christ (formerly the Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, who believed that only direct descendants of Joseph Smith should be ordained Prophet). We did take the formal tour here, because we did want to see the inside. I was surprised at how different it was from modern-day temples! Still, it was an impressive building, and I feel glad that the Community of Christ has taken such good care of it, giving us the opportunity to see it. So many early members of the church sacrificed so much and worked so hard to build that temple... it's a blessing that it's still standing.

We left Kirtland and continued our drive northeast, eventually arriving at Niagara Falls, NY. Of course, what New York drive wouldn't be complete without toll roads? It baffles me that a state can take a perfectly good interstate highway and turn it into a pay-to-use road as soon as it's within their borders. We got to Niagara Falls around dinner time, and checked into our motel, and then found a Mexican restaurant just down the road to eat at. Hooray! I love, love, love Mexican food!! Of course, it was difficult for the kids to sit through a meal without drawing the attention of every patron in the restaurant, since they had just sat in the van for so long. Thank goodness it was a loud Mexican restaurant, and not a stuffy Italian place, huh? Once it got dark, we headed over to find parking near the Falls and to see them lit up at night. Very beautiful! But it probably would have been nicer to see from the Canadian side, since you can only see the falls from the side, instead of straight on, when you're on the American side.

We got up bright and early in the morning, grabbed some quick breakfast, checked out of the motel, and headed over to Canada. We sat in a relatively short border crossing line for a good 45 minutes. We were practically screaming with frustration. The lines just weren't moving!! Finally a couple extra lines opened up, and we got through. After paying $20 for parking (ugh!!), we walked over towards the sites. As soon as we stepped out of the car, we could see why the Canadian side was better. For one, you could actually feel the mist from the falls, even as far away as we were. Secondly, you could see the entire expanse of the falls, all along the walk. Compared to seeing only the side of one section of the falls from only a couple vantage points, if you're on the American side. We headed towards Journey Behind the Falls, where we donned our yellow plastic ponchos and went into some VERY damp tunnels that came out right under the falls. There were even a couple windows that peeked out to the falls, but all you could see was a wall of white and the very loud roar of the water falling! After re-emerging to the ground above, we bought a souvenir picture (somehow, it was actually a good photo of everyone!), and headed towards the Maid of the Mists. Based on a nice map, we thought it was a nice short walk. It was actually more like a good mile or two, and we were all very glad when we finally reached our destination. We were even more happy when we didn't have to wait to board a boat!! We arrived just as they began boarding. We put on our blue plastic ponchos, and got on the boat. I have to add that I kept getting the funniest reactions from other tourists who saw me carrying Alex in his pouch carrier. When it came time to put on the ponchos, I just ripped a hole through them for Alex's head, so he would be covered, and my torso would still be covered. When I did this before the Maid of the Mists boat, a whole bunch of Japanese guys near me just absolutely burst into laughter. It made me laugh, too. :) We really loved the boat ride - we got absolutely drenched, going right to the base of the horseshoe waterfall. Alex was awake at that point, and kept trying to eat his hands, so I added some armholes into my poncho for him, so he wouldn't be sucking on plastic. The lady next to me thought it was pretty funny!! And he kept grabbing anything he could reach... he was grabbing the lady's hand in front of us at the edge of the boat. Later, he grabbed an old woman's shirt while we were on an elevator... she looked at me as if she were trapped when it was time to get off the elevator and I hadn't realized what he had done! But anyway, the boat ride was great. Lots of fun! I miscalculated where the mist was coming from at one point, though, and Alex got a very sudden face-full of mist. If you can even call it that! It's more like a solid wall of a million tiny water droplets! He instantly started wailing, poor guy. But he recovered quickly, and we all enjoyed the rest of the ride, just grinning and laughing the whole way.



Once we got off the boat, we had to walk all the way back to our car, so it was another ~1 mile walk. Only this time, we were all even more tired. We took a few rests - we had to. Jacob refused to walk (you can see how he got around on Daddy's back most of the time!), Melinda was too tired to walk very long, and my back was getting tired of carrying Alex, too. But we finally made it, and headed back to the United States. I'm so glad we went to Niagara Falls. It's something I've wanted to do ever since we've lived out here on the East Coast, and we finally did it! It really is a must-see destination. The falls are HUGE and so incredible! You really can't imagine how much water is falling over them until you see them in person.




On the way out, we somehow managed to get into a non-moving border crossing line again, much to our extreme frustration. Finally we got through, and since the kids had all fallen asleep during the wait, we decided to drive for about an hour before stopping for lunch. And then, we were really on the road again! We stocked up with drinks and ice to put in our cooler, and headed east.

At about 4pm, we stopped at Palmyra, NY, another church historical site. We briefly visited the the visitors center to get our bearings, and saw the Hill Cumorah from a distance. Unfortunately, we missed the big pageant by about 4 days, but then, we didn't really plan on staying for any length of time, anyway. We took a map and pamphlet and drove a few blocks to find Joseph Smith's childhood home, and toured it with the Sister Missionaries there. It really was incredible how very SMALL their home was, with so many children to fit inside! It hardly seemed possible to have a second story, and yet there it was, and that's where all the children slept. And the living room/kitchen was so small and cramped, it made me feel a little selfish for wanting more space than I have. I have a smaller family and more space than they did! But it really made the whole account of Joseph Smith's childhood come to life for us.

Then we walked as quietly as possible through the Sacred Grove, where Joseph Smith had received his vision. It was gorgeous and peaceful, and I would have loved to stay longer and just enjoy and think about the scene. Unfortunately, young children (at least, our young children) don't have much patience for that sort of thing, so we left after a short while. And got on the road, again. We stopped at a service station to grab some dinner, and the kids were crazy and Jesse was frustrated with them, and when I accidentally set off the car alarm, Jesse got even more frustrated, and got on my case about how he was trying to keep 2 kids from being run over while carrying food, and good grief, why did you do that? Again, it was a complete accident, and I thought it was no big deal, but obviously I was a little frustrated, too, because I actually snapped at him. I yelled at him to stop getting mad at me for what was an honest and harmless accident. Now, Jesse and I don't always get along, sure, but we don't tend to argue and yell with each other. We're the type to just avoid each other until we're ready to talk calmly. I don't think I've ever yelled at Jesse before that. And it seemed really silly to snap at something so trivial. But we both got over it quickly, I'm happy to say, and everything was good once we got back to driving.

We had originally left it up in the air whether we would make one more overnight stop between Niagara Falls and home, but after 5 nights in hotels, we were more than ready to sleep in our own beds and stop living out of our suitcases. So we bit the bullet and decided to drive all the way home that night. Between Palmyra and home is about 6 hours, and it was already 4:30ish when we left, so we had a long evening ahead of us. And unfortunately, Alex didn't quite cooperate as nicely as he had during all the previous driving, and I couldn't take a turn driving, because I had to spend so much time trying to keep him happy. Or at least content. After a gas station stop around 9pm, when I had a chance to change him and nurse him thoroughly, I did try to drive again. It lasted a little while, but before long, Alex was fussing loudly. The sun had set, and we ran into road construction. Suddenly, our GPS was telling us to take exits that were blocked off due to construction all while Alex was screaming his head off, and we all just desperately wanted to find a safe place to pull off the highway and take care of the screaming and get our bearings and figure out where we were going. Oddly enough, this all happened in Scranton, Pennsylvania (home of the television show, "The Office"!). We did eventually find an exit that wasn't blocked off, only after I felt excruciatingly horrible because of how hard Alex was screaming in his car seat, and after much stress and confusion as to where to go to find a safe place to pull over. I took him out of his seat once we stopped, tried to calm him as best as I could, and nurse him some more, hoping that would help, but the rest of the drive home was difficult. I spent a lot of time balanced- not buckled- on top of the cooler in the back next to Alex's seat, trying to keep him calm and entertained. Finally Jacob and Melinda fell asleep, and Alex fell asleep after much effort. Around 11pm. Jesse and I enjoyed the rest of the drive home in peace and quiet, finally getting a chance to listen to some music and just chat. We arrived home just minutes after midnight, and eagerly took the kids out of their seatbelts and headed to bed, bringing in minimal luggage, just wanting to sleep.

Hooray!! Home sweet home. It really was a whirlwind of a last day - From tourism in Canada to home in Maryland, with stops in between, all in one day. PHEW. The good news was that Jesse had the rest of the week off, so we could kick back and relax! We did take the opportunity to go to the National Aquarium in Baltimore on Thursday, which was great! All except for Jacob, who really didn't care to stand in front of the displays and watch the sea life. All he wanted to do was move, move, move... keep walking, no stopping. I didn't take any pictures of it, unfortunately, but was fun to see aquariums full of sting rays, sharks, tropical fish, river fish, ocean fish, frogs, and even jumping dolphins! There was a lot to see, and I'm glad we got to go.

And THAT, folks, concludes our Vacation Recap! I hope you survived at least as well as my typing fingers did. :) And now, I must go and remove a too-small toy from Alex's grasp... he scooted about 3 feet to get to it. He won't be happy, but hopefully he'll forgive me!