Summer Road Trip 2015 Begins....

We love to road trip, like looooove. 

I (rebecca) grew up taking long road trips in the summer with my family. We would all (2 parents, 7 kids & 1 dog) cram into a minivan, with a car top carrier on top and set out for weeks of tent camping and PB&J sandwiches. 

Rich and I road tripped for our honeymoon (so fun), but last year we took our first long (7,877 miles) road trip as a family. 

We packed up our 6 kids (no dog) in the Suburban and tent camped all around the USA. We had such a great time exploring National Parks and visiting family and friends that we were not ready to come home after our 5 week trip, we could've gone a few weeks longer!

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Needless to say, we have been excitedly anticipating this year's trip! This year we are traveling in an RV (which is awesome); some of our boys think it is "cheating", but it definitely makes the traveling part much easier. The gas is $1.00/gallon cheaper this year and the RV only gets 2 miles per gallon less then the Suburban, so we are projecting similar gas expenses as last year. 

(We were totally blessed to find an RV that was right in our price range, 

but worth more than double what we paid)

It is *tradition* (since we did it last year) to visit a Bass Pro Shop in the first leg of our trip. So we stopped at one in Tallahassee last night.

(Seriously, the way they are both holding there shirts because they are slightly embarrassed...ah, sooo cute!)

I found a cowboy hat for Wilson at a thrift store last week and he has been talking about being a cowboy, so Rich told him he'd buy him a gun when we went on our trip. Needless to say, he was very excited to pick out a gun at Bass Pro!

(Daddy & Cowboy Wilson)

One of the best things about having an RV is that we no longer have to smuggle 6 kids into a hotel room when traveling one of the camp-less stretches of the trip. Last night we boondocked at a Walmart in Pensacola (which basically means we called the manager and asked if we could park there overnight).  We just parked, pulled down the shades, turned the A/C on and we all slept great in our own beds. Best part is it only cost $9 in gas to run the generator all night. A much better experience then unloading sleeping children, bags, pillows, more sleeping children and anything else that we may need late at night and dragging them into a hotel room that only has 2 beds and spending $75-$100.

(Eating breakfast in the Walmart parking lot.)

(This is what boondocking looks like. Not very exciting, but when all you need to do is sleep, it works out great.)

(Marking our progress and mapping out the next leg of the trip)

We realize what a wonderful experience we have been given and thank God for Rich's job and all the hard work he puts in and for the many other blessings from the Lord that allow us the opportunity to spend time with eachother like this. 

Stay tuned as we continue our journey...

♥ rebecca