My Three-Hour Drive With the Kids (Or: How to Drive Yourself Slowly Insane While Trapped in a Speeding Vehicle With Two Screaming Maniacs)

I took the kidlets to my aunt and uncle's cabin this weekend. Eric was golfing in Door County with his friend for the weekend (my birthday gift to him; yes I know I'm the best wife ever) so I was looking for a way to pass the weekend without ripping my hair out.
My aunt invited us to her cabin, and my mom said she would join us there too to help out. Great, right? Laying around on the dock, having Grandma and Great-Aunt Trisha chase after Tate and feed Nora...couldn't wait. Only problem was, I had to get there first.
I picked Tate up after daycare, figuring after 4 hours of running around he'd be nice and tired and sleep for at least part of the 3 and 1/2 hour drive. Oh, how wrong I was. How very, very wrong.

Things were good for about the first half hour. Then Tate decided to pass the time by singing "The Wheels on the Bus". Cute, right? After the 2000th verse, not so much. And who knew? The babies on the bus go "up and down." And the wipers on the bus go "AHHHHHHHHHHH". In case you couldn't figure that out, that's a high pitched scream at the volume of a train engine. Which somehow woke Nora up. I mean, it made me almost drive off the road and scream "WHAT THE FUCK?" so I guess it makes sense that the baby sitting a foot away from the ear-piercing shriek wakes up as well.

So now Nora's screaming. Tate's still singing. I'm starting to hyperventiate. We've been in the car for 45 minutes. I start chucking Cheezits, Fruit Snacks, pretzels, margaritas, Valium, etc, in the general direction of Tate in the backseat in a futile attempt to stop the madness. All I accomplished was getting him to swith from "The wipers on the bus go AHHHHHHHHHHH!" to "Old MacDonald had a AHHHH! E-I-E-I-AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!". Much better.

I finally pull over to feed the baby, since I realize that maybe the poor thing is hungry. I let Tate out of his carseat to crawl around on the front seat while I feed Nora, and he's in heaven, pushing buttons, flipping the visor, etc. His glee is short-lived though. He soon realized that if you pull on the door handle while leaning against the door, you fall out of the car. Is it bad that I laughed? Nora thought it was humorous too. She couldn't stop smiling, which is great, except she decided she'd rather smile than eat. So we were in the parking lot for about 30 minutes waiting for the kid to fill her gut.

We're cruising and all is going well when Tate starts saying "Water? Water?" Smart Mommy forgot to fill a sippy cup with water and I'm starting to realize with a sinking heart that there will be no peace on Earth till Tate gets his water. He seems to think that the louder he asks, the quicker the water will materialize before him, so it's not long before he's yelling "WATER WATER WATER". Over and over and freaking over again. Have I mentioned that he hasn't slept a wink yet? Nora keeps trying to but there's a screaming banshee about 3 inches away from her so that's not going so hot.

I finally pull over, find a gas station, run in, buy a bottle of water, and come back out, only to realize I've locked the keys inside my car. Oh, the kids are in there too. I honestly don't think I've ever felt panic quite like this before. I start banging on Tate's window, saying "Unlock the door, honey! Mama's got water! Unlock the door!" I'm knowing full well as I'm doing this that there is no way in hell the kid's gonna actually unlock the door. Until he does. Huh...whaddya know. The kid's a genius. An evil genius, yes, but genius nonetheless.

So Tate gets his water and sucks it down, and I feel guilty for making my two year old almost die of thirst. I mean, that's not so nice. So we go tooling down the highway again when I start to sniff the air. Oh, you know where this is going. Poop. Baby poop. So I freaking pull over AGAIN and open the door to haul Nora out to change her when I realize that the poo is all down her legs, all over her carseat, the ceiling, etc. Projectile poop at its finest. Four million wipes later, she is clean, stripped, and wedged back into her carseat. I'm settling back into the front seat when I hear "Mama? Poop! Change diaper!". Well, at least the kid didn't wait till I actually started driving again. I get out and do damage control on kid #2.

Tra la la. We're driving, and the end is in sight. We're off the highway and driving down all the little county roads when Nora decides that the sun shining directly in her eyes is simply not acceptable and starts screaming bloody murder at said sun, who decides to ignore her and continue shining in her face. Yes, we have a sunshade for the window. No, it wasn't in this particular car at the time. Tate starts saying "Baby! You're FINE! Stop, Baby! Noraaaa...you're FINE". Nora didn't agree. Scream scream scream.

I pull into the driveway of the cabin, bruised, battered and quivering, ready for a drink, a smoke and to be knocked unconscious for awhile, when I look in the backseat. Tate is sleeping. He literally fell asleep the moment we pulled into the driveway. I didn't know whether to laugh or cry so I just turned off my brain, collected the baby and went in to greet my relatives. Tate spent the rest of the weekend refusing to let me near him, since I wasn't Gigi (my mom) or "Tisha" (my aunt Trisha).

Is it any wonder that when my aunt offered to bring Tate home with her to Eau Claire for a few days, I threw Tate's clothes at her, said "Ithinkwe'realmostoutofwipesbuthehasplentyofdiapershelikescerealfruitandcheese", grabbed the baby, and ran out the door? I'll pick him up on Wednesday.

The really strange thing is I miss that little demon. A lot. I wonder if he misses me too.