We made it!

Josie got home from YW camp late, late, late last night. She didn't get to our house until around 1:30 AM or 2:00 AM. I stayed up to wait for her and Andrew went to bed so that he would be rested well enough to drive. When she got there she asked if she could use my computer. She didn't want to go to bed because she didn't see the point in going to bed for only a few hours.

"Whatever," I said, "I'm going to bed."

As much as I wanted to sleep I didn't sleep very well. I never sleep well when I know I have to get up earlier than usual. When I woke up at 3:00 AM I noticed that the house was very dark. I went to go check on Josie and she was fast asleep on our couch. So much for staying awake all night!

I went back to bed, only to wake up about a half hour later. We ate breakfast and loaded the cars and were out of Orem by 4:45 AM.

Rachel, amazingly enough, stayed wide awake until we stopped, at around 6:00 AM. She was convinced that we were going to do something exciting. We weren't. So instead we stopped and I nursed her while everyone else got out and played frisbee in the gas station parking lot. Then we were on our way again.

It was a pretty smooth trip, really. Very encouraging for the plane ride that we have ahead of us. Rachel was a very good girl, crying very infrequently (mostly when we went to put her back in her car seat after a rest stop), taking long naps, and in general being a very cheerful girl. She drew on her little cheap-o magnadoodle, finger puppets, dinosaurs, and her many, many library books.

Our longest stop was to take a thrilling ride on Buffalo Bill's Desperado. This ride is one of those rides that I think I will only go on once in my life. Free falling 225 feet going 80 MPH was terrifying. I began to wonder why we didn't write a will before we left Rachel with Andrew's parents.

When we slowed down, I managed to ask Andrew, "Is it over?"

He patted my hand. "It's over."

My eyes were watering, my mouth was cotton dry, my head was spinning. So was everyone else's.

Andrew was nominated to drive just a few minutes after we got off the roller coaster and I was in the navigator's seat. We were both so disoriented from being whipped around so much that we got a little turned around, but we ended up making it alright in the end.

13 hours later and we're here in sunny California!