Road to Hanover: Day FOUR

DAY FOUR: Austin, TX to Kansas City, MO

After our little break from traveling, we hit the roads as early as we could Monday morning, which was ummmm 9am?!  Not a typo at all, let's just say that this Momma doesn't do so hot getting up early.  It's sort of never been a strength for me and there is definitely a reason why I have never taken a permanent 7am-7pm nursing job in the seven plus years of my career.  I am a very happy rising at 7am or later.  Add that to the heavy duty packing required each and every morning on the road, and it makes for a late start no matter what you do.  That's okay though; we were just happy to finally have a radiator fan to replace the broken piece.

 Robby became completely attached to our cell phones after starting our trip back East and J downloaded several game apps for him.  His faves right now are: Air Attack, Raging Thunder- car race, and Angry Birds. This is basically how R looked each and every morning while we packed our car for the road :)

 Mr E was so worn out by Day FOUR that he didn't make a peep when we moved him from his pack and play to Dad's bed in the morning. Once we were pretty much all packed up, we finally awoke him and hit the road shortly after.

{he looks big and grown up in this picture}

{Little Miss chowing down on her breakfast at Grandpa's house}

Due to our not so early, early start we made the decision to just keep driving until our radiator started giving us problems.  We were really hoping to make it most of the way to Kansas City before stopping to fix the car, unfortunately we began to follow this super fun heat streak all the way across Mid America.  Yep, record highs in each of the cities we traveled through coupled with extreme humidity.  I don't know why people complain so much about how miserably hot Arizona is every Spring/Summer/Fall, I would much rather suffer through 115 degree DRY weather than 90 degree WET weather.  I've decided that humidity is the pits and I would live almost anywhere in the world as long as the weather is not humid.  I detest feeling like I have just stepped out a steam shower. Okay, okay, back on track now................

We were making pretty good time until our car started overheating somewhere between Austin, TX and Oklahoma City.  When we would stop for gasoline and restroom breaks the engine's temperature would jump to an alarming level and then gradually cool down after driving for a few minutes, provided we didn't have to stop at all.  If we hit a stop light the temperature would jump back up to the previous scary level.  All of this was happening as we were dealing with problems starting the car as well.  For some reason the key was also having problems catching in the key wheel [complete idiot mechanic terminology of course] and it was difficult for the right pieces inside the steering column to turn the car over.  Jesse started having to shake the key up and down while simultaneously turning the key in the wheel.  At times it would start the first time and other times it would take 10 minutes to get the car started.  So in the middle of worrying about the car overheating, we were also having a difficult time starting the car every time we turned it off.  We seriously had some wicked back luck.

While in Oklahoma City, the one highlight was the Fazoli's that we found.  My family was always a Fazolis loving family until all the stores closed in Arizona about six or seven years ago.  Us Sheffield's practically went through the "Seven Stages of Grief" due to this sad misfortune.  So when I realized I had a chance to eat there once again I was 100% for it.  The end result: the Fettucini Alfredo was delicious and just how I remembered it, garlic bread was good---even though they didn't walk around and hand out extra bread like they used to, but the lemon ice left a lot to be desired.  The drink tasted like a powdered substance had been used to mix it up and was far from how I remembered it.  It turned out to be a winner with the kids because:

  A) They all ate their food like champs

  B) It was air conditioned and Oklahoma City felt like I had just stepped out of a shower, gross 

 C) The store was practically empty and so the kids ran circles around the place and used up a fraction of        their energy before being stuffed back into the car 

 {Oh, how I've missed you}

{Funny story: I was so giddy about being able to eat at Fazoli's that the first thing I thought was that I had to tell my Mom about it, maybe even brag a little.  I took this cute picture of my soda cup with M smiling in the background and texted my mom a message that said "Look what Oklahoma City has. I figured you would appreciate this find on our journey".  At first I was surprised I never heard back from her, but quickly forgot about this until I mentioned this to my Dad.  He sort of laughed and then told me that Mom cannot receive picture messages on her phone. Major bummer}

Eli "Spiderman" Toronto showing us his new trick in the restaurant booth

After our Fazoli's stop and several traffic jams while attempting to make it back to the interstate we gradually realized that it was time to have Jesse really replace the radiator fan once and for all.  This brought us to a friendly Circle K that just so happened to be butted against a rather busy intersection.  It was my job to watch all the kids outside of the car and make sure they didn't run into the street or in front of cars at the gas station. Swell right?  First we decided to make a short trip across the street and rent a few Redbox DVD's for the children.  Hand in hand we walked over and back.  When we got back to the car we were all drenched in sweat.  Next came the incessant whines of being tired, hot, thirsty, etc.  After hearing enough of these demands I caved in and took them to the convenience store where we stocked up on way too much candy, soda, and treats to occupy ourselves until the car was ready. FINALLY we were off!!

At the gas station, some of the things we did to entertain ourselves included:

PRACTICING OUR AMERICA'S NEXT TOP MODEL POSES

 EATING MULTIPLE CONTAINERS OF PRINGLES CHIPS (CHEDDAR CHEESE IS OUR FAVE)

PLAY WITH OUR MATCHBOX CARS

 FIND AS MANY STICKS AS YOU CAN WITHIN A 3 FOOT RADIUS, AND THEN TRY TO ATTACH THEM ALL TO THE CAR LUGGAGE. WE DON'T HAVE ENOUGH TO CARRY AS IT IS.

 TAKE SOME MORE DEJA VU PICTURES OF HANDSOME J FIXING THE CAR

 PRETEND THE STICK IS A SWORD AND ATTEMPT TO "CUT" THE BUNGEE CORDS THAT ARE ATTACHED TO THE CAR

 PULL WHOLE BRANCHES OUT OF THE TREE NEXT TO THE CAR

THEN PICK OFF ALL THE GREENERY AND LIKE MAGIC YOU HAVE YOUR VERY OWN SWORD :)

The rest of the day passed uneventfully, aside from the fact that we arrived in Kansas City at J's cousins house quite late (after midnight).  We were lucky that two of the three kids were passed out asleep and Robby went to sleep fairly easy as well.  I think we hit a record breaking unpack time before climbing into bed and practically falling asleep before our heads hit the pillows.

 During our drive, we stopped "a few times" for J to snap some pictures of small town America in the heart of Kansas. In places like this you find many Americana themed flags that truly are rustic and old {not just designed to look this way}

Also found are rustic Farmhouses such as this in "Kansas corn country"