North Carolina – Our Relocation

Several months ago a woman in our church approached the Happy Hubby after Sunday service and asked him when the last time our little family had taken a non-work-related vacation.

The Happy Hubby sighed a bit on the inside because we had not been able to (afford) go on a vacation since before the Happy Buddy had been born.

So when the lady opened her mouth and said she felt led to offer her family’s home in North Carolina to us for a little getaway, the Happy Hubby almost cried with delight.

And thus started the plan for our Happy Home’s North Carolina trip!

I have to be honest.  Having a two-year-old has made me a little less excited about travel.  A friend of mine put it perfectly, “Vacations with little ones are not vacations.  They are more like RELOcations.”

I was nervous from the beginning!

But God has a way of working things out…

It wouldn’t be a vacation without a few stops at Cracker Barrel along the way. 🙂

We spent the night in Savannah, Georgia.  I was kind of excited to see Paula Deen’s restaurant.

I think we ate at Chick-fil-A about 7,894 times along the way as well.  Those little playgrounds helped the Happy Buddy cope in between such long bouts of sitting!  And we NEVER would have made it without the portable DVD player.

Once we hit the mountains, the Happy Buddy was a little confused about why suddenly he had to wear so many layers (when he is used to running around in 80 degree Florida weather).

But a friend lent him that super cool hat and you’d have thought that thing was surgically attached to his head by the end of our time there.

The first couple of days of vacation were kind of rough…

Toddler+lonnnng drive+lack of sleep+new sleeping quarters=a hundred million meltdowns a day. 🙂

The picture above captured one such meltdown when I saw this awesome giant stuffed bear on a sidewalk bench and really wanted a photo op.

The Happy Buddy apparently did not want to say cheese at that particular moment.

We laugh about it now.

There was a neat 50’s-themed soda shop downtown that we enjoyed!

We bundled up and went on a hike one day.

There are my two handsome boys and their walking sticks.

These images were the rare moments where the Happy Hubby and I were not carrying our little buddy.

At one point, after we had been carrying him for a long stretch, the Happy Hubby set him down and he took two steps, stopped and said, “I need to take a little break.”

Haha!

But, man, that glorious view at the end of  our walk was so worth it.

We found an amazing park.

And driving into town to the local grocery store to ride in the ‘cool cart’ and get a free cookie was the highlight of our days.

When it was too cold and rainy to venture out, the Happy Hubby and Happy Buddy held jam sessions.

And then our little rocker rocked so hard that his drumsticks broke.

Of course there was some fort building.

And a funny game that the Happy Buddy invented where he threw a ball down the stairs and we had to chase after it.

Between carrying a 35-pound kid on a 2-mile hike and chasing balls up and down stairs, I got a pretty good work out on this trip! 🙂

But my favorite thing of all on our vacation was when the Happy Buddy went to bed and the Happy Hubby and I played Battle Ship for hours on end.  I wish I had some pictures to show you of me winning almost every time!

By the end of our trip, we were all so grateful to the Lord for providing us with such a special vacation.

And the Happy Buddy was thankful to be back in his crib.

Thanks for bearing with this post!  I just wanted to record a little pocket of our time away.  And y’all are like my family, so it felt right to share!

Happy North Carolina-ing! 🙂