On the Road to California!!!

After we finally fit everything we possibly could into our car, we had my parents and sister help pack us in-both Madeline and I literally had no leg room-and we headed off to California!
The first day went pretty well, and I was amazed at how well the kiddos did. We did end up getting a portable DVD player before we left, and that saved us at the crucial times of trial!

I am kicking myself right now for not stopping to take more pictures, but when you're in the moment, and both kids have finally fallen asleep after not sleeping at all until 4pm, you just want to keep going. We saw some pretty neat things-like a dog park-not a normal park for dogs, there was actually a building/inn that was a huge dog, and then there was a dog amusement park, with little rides and toys and everything! It's amazing what pet lovers will do.
Then there was the dead tree in the middle of Nevada, which, by the way, the only great thing about Nevada is that you can go at least 75 the whole way through...other than that it is a straight, dry, desert-like state....but, back to the tree. It was the only tree for miles around, and it had tons of shoes hanging from it. I was almost tempted to find a shoe I didn't care about, and leave my mark, so to speak.:)
Here are a few pics from the first day, and the first 'big' stop at some random town in Nevada. (oh, another cultural note-every town in Nevada, no matter if the population was only 25, had a casino in it....hmmm). However, this town had ice cream that was similar to McDonald's, so we had to get some!




We ended up stopping in Winnemucca for the night, after a 10 hour day in the car! Thank the Lord for safety and very cooperative kiddos!