Nine kids in one car however nice, is never quiet or boring.

We started out with nine kids and unknowingly, a cat. Halfway down the driveway one of the kids hollered ‘STOP! THE CAT IS IN HERE!’

We came to a dusty stop in the middle of the driveway, bid him farewell and gave him a gentle toss back in the direction of the house.

He knows his way home, he is the cat that comes on a walk every day with myself and the two dogs, and sometimes the four year old.

And we definitely did not want that cat in the car, he hitched a ride with us to school before and it was a disaster.

He remained hidden until we were too far to turn back.

Then he screeched and mewed and climbed all over me and the dash and tried to go under my feet while I was driving. We had to pull over and I caught him and made the four year old hold on VERY TIGHT to him the rest of the way home. Not fun. I can hardly believe he didn’t cause a collision with his initial nonsense.

Anyway we carried on without the cat.

We had to make a few stops on the way out of course.

The kids behaved like kids, which means I had to repeatedly remind them to buckle, and then threaten if they didn’t buckle, and put in my ear plugs, to mute all the sounds that kids make in their active communication to each other, along with complaints about who was in whose space, and who was being annoying, and remove them a million times to answer repeated questions.

And turn around every 30 seconds to hand something back or receive a thing being handed, and try to fulfill requests for listening material, and meet demands like ‘TURN OFF THE HEAT IT’S SWEATING BACK HERE!’ Followed not too long after by ‘TURN ON THE HEAT IT’S FREEZING BACK HERE!’

Our first stop was a restaurant in the Columbia River Gorge for dinner.

Every one of the kids got whopping big plates of pancakes with sides of massive homemade buttermilk biscuits and mountainous piles hashbrowns. And the big kids finished what the little kids couldn’t. Shane and I both got meals with unlimited fries. And shared with all those hungry caterpillars.

And yet. Plates are cleared, bill is paid and we hear;

‘I’m still hungry’

Most of the trip was quite enjoyable. No one got carsick. We saw gorgeous countryside, and lots of family.

The way back was equally uneventful. In the last hour of the drive I started a chapter audiobook for the kids. Surprisingly to me, I found a book that all the kids liked, from age 15 down to age 4

Called Doctor Proctor’s Fart Powder. Go figure. They all voted for it.

It worked out pretty well, and I will plan it this way next time we travel, the book still had about ten minutes left when we got home, so I let them finish listening.

On the one condition that they got the van cleaned out.

I heard a lot of ‘PAUSE!’

‘I have to carry these bags in!’

But the van got all emptied out.

And we made it home two hours before an ice storm hit the interstate we were traveling on.

Couldn’t ask for more.