Happy Trails

So what does one do the night before embarking on a 3000+ mile road trip?

~ pack up everyone's party clothes, pool stuff, health and beauty aids, comfortable shoes, the Hannah Montana sleep mask, and all of the other necessities
~ type the itinerary into an Excel spreadsheet and attach the hotel confirmations, maps, eTickets, and list of places to stop when the Prozac stops working
~ make goody bags for the half-way point of each day's drive so I can hear "Are we half-way there yet?" eight hundred and ninety two times every day
~ load up the iPod - we're up to 4 days and 2 hours worth of music, just about enough to get us there and back if we listen to the Christmas stuff too
~ sort through the DVD's and leave behind all of the ones that are too scary (The Lion King?!?!), find the missing cable that makes the second screen work, install it in the car and hope that the petty thieves are otherwise engaged tonight
~ write detailed instructions for Ben, who is missing the first 11 days of this journey, on how to keep the cat and dog alive
~ wash all of the laundry so that we don't come home to moldy underwear - I was all caught up Friday night but somehow there were 5 loads waiting down there for me tonight
~ catch up on all of my work-related email so that everyone can live without hearing from me until at least tomorrow night
~ keep the kids well-behaved enough (bribery, threats, and the hairy eyeball) to make Uncle Josh think he might actually survive the first half of the our trip - at least until we get him into the car and too far away to jump out and hitchike home
~ fill up the spray bottle and stash it on the front seat floor so I can break up fights without taking my eyes off the road. As a deterrent, I told the kids I was going to fill the bottle with pee. The other morning I heard Aliya tell Adlani, "If you do that on the way to Tennessee, Mommy's going to squirt you with pee." Hopefully that one didn't make it to school.
~ get everything ready for the last big day at school tomorrow so I don't say "f*ing cheese stick" in front of Uncle Josh
~ most important - make sure everyone (especially ME!) gets a good night's sleep

Nightie-Night!
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I found Aliya's packing list in my to-do notebook...everything we need for a fun and exciting road trip (click on photo to enlarge):

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