When our children were young, we didn't have much money and Grampie had a lot of responsibility at the hospital. Grampie was frequently on call for the hospital lab. There where so many times we wanted to go to the beach or do something else and it just wasn't possible because of the cost or no time. It was hard to be so tied down, but we think we made up for it whenever we could.
One way to afford a vacation with a family of eight was to make good use of our tent. When we traveled to Illinois to see Grandma and Grandpa, we spent most of our nights in the tent. I usually cooked a turkey ahead of time and froze packets of it for the trip. We packed our food in our ice chest and did whatever we could to keep costs down.
Along the way, we would find at least one "fun thing" to do. It was memorable to take our children one time to Niagra Falls and to take the Maid of the Mist boat to where we could hear the thunder of the falls and feel its spray on our faces. And the kids thought it was cool to wear the yellow slickers. Wayne and the children went to the wax museum near the falls and I decided to stay out in the car in order to save money.
Once we took the long way home and went to Washington DC for a brief visit. Another time we took a ferry across Lake Champlain from Vermont to New York. We drove to the top of Mount Washington in New Hampshire and experienced the wind and cold on a day when it was pretty hot at the base of the mountain. We traveled through Canada sometimes, too.
We took the children to Abraham Lincoln's home in Springfield, Illinois and we also toured New Salem, Illinois and learned more about Lincoln. We took a visit to the Museum of Science and Industry in Chicago, enjoyed a visit to the Brookfield Zoo. We even had a happy 3rd birthday party for Jonathan with a grocery store cake and balloons somewhere in New York along the throughway.
Tenting along the way often found us putting kids into their jammies and sleeping bags and then I would take their clothing to the laundry facility on the campground to wash and dry their "duds" and have them ready for the next morning so we wouldn't have to disturb too much in the suitcases until we got to our destination.
At least two meals every day were from our ice chest and a grocery store along the way, but sometimes we stopped for an inexpensive meal at Wendy's or McDonalds. One trip we had oatmeal and brown sugar all premeasured in plastic bags so that I could cook breakfast while Grampie and the kids (your parents) took down the tent and packed the car up for the next leg of our journey. We didn't have instant oatmeal back then, I think. Or maybe we just thought we couldn't afford it!
We had a lot of fun traveling and looking for license plates from the various states or looking for things along the road beginning with each letter of the alphabet. The biggest problem we had is that people couldn't schedule bathroom breaks all at once. You can imagine with 8 of us that we stopped fairly frequently. Oh, well! We survived it and had fun doing so. A few extra bathroom breaks have little significance today when compared to the big picture.
We had things to do at home, around the community and in our Churches as well:
That trip on the fairy was not fun for me as I got sea sick. That was when I saw a sea cucumber and thought it was the weirdest thing I had ever seen (it freaked me out a bit). I mostly remember the times when I was older. Trips to Hersey Pennisylvania, Florida, Gettysburg, etc. There is a picture of Kevin, Marica, and I at a pool. I remember we were in florida and my bathing suit had white patches on it. That evening I was in pain from the sun going right through those white patches. I guess I didn't think of putting sunscreen on under my suit. We had wonderful times camping, until the one time we were in Florida and had to pack up and travel quite some time to find a hotel because of a hurricane (gloria?) We slept/stayed in the lobby of the hotel until a room became available. What wonderful adventures we had.
ReplyDeleteMarcia sent me this comment: "I remember seeing the head of a pig swirling around in the waters when I was on the ferry leaning over the edge to see the water. No kidding..then I wondered where the pigs head came from and worried that if the head of the pig could fall in the water, maybe my glasses would fall off my face and I would never be able to see anything the rest of the trip...so I decided to not lean over anymore."
ReplyDeleteBethany sent me a note that even though she was sea sick it was a nice trip. She remembers the pig, too: "I also remember the pigs head....I don't think it helped my sick tummy looking down into the water like that."
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