Gallavanting Across the Midwest

DH and I headed to St Louis this week to visit his parents. We had a long weekend because of Columbus Day. It was a pleasant and relaxing weekend. FIL was unfortunately sick with a lingering cold/fever. Because of this we kept it low key. MIL and I did some shopping and hung out, the guys mostly watched football. We all watched some football. I bought a pretty new fall jacket from Kohl's. It's orange and it makes me smile. (see if here). I also bought a couple of patterns (a simple skirt, shirt, and dress, as well as a doggie jacket, which may be the first project because River needs it). We had a lot of fun sorting through fabrics and drinking Starbucks.

Saturday night we went out for Mexican (FIL was feeling a bit better), and then watched "Book of Eli", which was terrible in my opinion - boring, preachy, and unrealistic. Great combination. After the movie we bowled, batted, pitched, hoola-hooped, skiied, and flew on the Wii. Lots of friendly competition, lots of fun. By Sunday FIL was mostly better and MIL was starting to go down hill. We watched the Lions beat up on the Rams, did a bit more shopping, and just enjoyed the day and each other's company. We had burgers and fried potatoes for dinner, and my Apple Cake for dessert, all of which was delicious.

Monday morning FIL had to head off to work bright and early. MIL stayed home for a couple of hours to see us off. We watched "The Express", which was pretty good, sorted through some of MILs fabric, and eventually headed off, which is when the real adventure began. DH was driving and I was not paying attention. We crossed the bridge from Missouri to Illinois and thought we were on our merry way across 70E, towards Columbus. WRONG. At the bridge, about 6 gajillion roads all cross the same bridge and then branch off their seperate ways. Apparently while I was babbling about random gossip, or singing along to some song, DH managed to take the wrong lane and head for Chicago on 55N. We did not realize this until we stopped for lunch over an hour later. After eating we went to get back on 70 and realized 70 was not there. By this time we were so far north it did not make sense to just back track. We also managed to do this on the one trip that we did not have our GPS with us (this might actually have contributed to the problem, since when I do have the GPS I check it frequently for fun). So, with no map, and no GPS, I ended up calling home for directions. My mom pulled out her map and directed us across 48 to 72. This new route happened to land us directly in Urbana-Champaign, so we called up our friend who live their and stopped for ice-cream before continuing on. Back on the road, DH managed to get a speeding ticket, so I took over the wheel. It felt like it took FOREVER to get around Indianapolis and back to Ohio. We left St Louis before noon and did not get home until after 10pm. While it was great seeing our friends in Illinois, it was a really long day and rather exhausting. I did not get to sleep until after midnight and had to be up at 6am this morning.

I think I will be hitting the sack early tonight. Now lets just cross our fingers and hope that DH and I did not catch the bug that was going around STL.

PS: WHat does it say about middle america that you can be 50 miles away from the area you usually see and not notice a difference?