I Scream, You Scream, We All Scream.....

...."for ice cream" is supposed to be the next line, but in our case it's "because we hate our carseats" ! And I hate them too ! We took our first road trip to Alabama to visit family and Dad couldn't come. I dreaded the drive, just under 3 hours, because Benjamin (as his brother before him) hates being in his carseat. Short drives in town are generally screamfests, so I figured how this was going to go. We were supposed to leave Tuesday, but Ben woke up that morning with blood all over the top of his sleeper. He spit up more blood after he got up, so we went to the doctor instead. The doctor thought it might be related to nursing and he ran some labwork; Ben was fine the rest of the day (and has been since), so he was probably right. Ben took a good long nap after the dr appt because they drew blood and I think he "wore himself out" crying. We had to go back Wed morning for a lab recheck (which turned out fine) before we left, and I think the same thing happened because Ben actually slept in the car for the first 2 hours---yay! So, we just need to have blood drawn from him before every car-ride ;>) I stopped to feed him after he woke up and then he pretty much screamed the rest of the way to my mother's house. Samuel only started whining a little before the finish line, so all in all I considered it a very good drive.

Coming home, I didn't get so lucky. Samuel got up so grumpy from his nap that I had two screamers pretty much the whole time...actually, 3 if you count me yelling at Samuel to knock it off ;>) I drove home looking over my shoulder every other second. Even if Ben would fall asleep for just a little bit, Samuel would wake him up with his carrying on. I tried toys, music, snacks, threats, and a "hands on" approach when Samuel was within reaching distance ;>) but all to no avail. Poor Benjamin was due for a feeding about 45 minutes before we got home, but I decided I couldn't stand to be in that car any longer than necessary, so I just kept driving. Of course Samuel did quit about 10 minutes before we got home, but at that point, what was the point---too late to save my sanity! I probably need to get tranquilizers before I do this again ;>) We have a trip to the Smokies in a few weeks, but Mark will be along to share the misery. And I need to find my ipod before then ;>)

Anyway, here are some pics of our trip and our little screaming banshees---they look so innocent, don't they?

Screaming Banshee # 1

Screaming Banshee # 2

Ben with Grandma

Ben with Uncle Wayne & Aunt Stacy

Ben with cousin Peyton & Aunt Sherrie

Samuel with his bud, cousin Trennis

Trennis, Ben, & Samuel; Samuel was so happy to be able to "take pictures".....even if the camera didn't work !

Samuel with cousin Brooke; Samuel was her little shadow, doing whatever she did. Brooke was a wonderful babysitter with both Ben & Samuel while we were there---as long as it didn't involve prolonged crying or changing diapers ;>)

With cousin Kayla, who just turned 16 & who discovered that "babysitting/babyholding" interfered with her ability to text on her phone ;>) Priorities, priorities.....

"When in Alabama, do as the Alabamians" ......Roll Tide

These next 2 are not from our Alabama trip, but thought they were cute:

Can you guess what Samuel has discovered? Powdered donuts! Obviously, he loved them, but I discovered after he ate the first one, that what he REALLY loved was licking the icing off and moving on to the next one.....a lot of dead donuts there that could have been put to good use ;>)

There IS an Easter bunny.....and her name is Shelby ! (This was a pic Jessica took and I couldn't resist posting it.)