How to Drive Across the Country in Less Than Three Days

(with two kids, a husband and everything your family needed to live for a year...while seven months pregnant).

Prepare by leaving your window wide open during a rain storm, directly beneath the garage gutter so that your seat is soaked. 

 Pack everything you own, then applaud your husband and the boys as they squish it all into the two cars you own. 

Leave bright and early in the morning, 

And be sure to take as many pictures as you can safely justify

while driving down your beloved Sunward Path for the last time.

 Oh, and do not forget to lock your keys in your car within the first 10 minutes of your trip.  Then pose, super annoyed, as your husband takes a picture so that a few kind-hearted men toting slim jims will help your poor pregnant soul redeem herself.

Then realize as you leave the state of South Carolina that it's raining for you.  The sky is crying, just like you're crying. This place was amazing.  What an amazing chapter.  God has been here with you.

Stop at a retro McDonalds to satisfy the boys' road trip cravings. Thank the husband for being the lead caravan, pushing the pace with the kids in tow.

Stop for bathroom breaks off random freeway exits.  Be grateful for baby wipes.

 Enter Kansas mid tornado season and grip the steering wheel with white knuckles as you drive strait into the monstrous thunder storm.

 Count the lighting bolts with the boys, say a few prayers when visibility is zero, call the husband to talk through the what-if options, and search the horizon hoping for a ray of light to lead the way through the storm.

Pause with awe and gratitude when you make it through.

And then stop at the most amazing McDonalds on the planet to celebrate.

 And enjoy the ice cream.

Reach Colorado at some point in the middle of the night and struggle to find room in any inn.  Be grateful for what you get, and hope there aren't any bed bugs at the six and forty motel...

Wake up in the beautiful Rockies and get the sense that you've almost made it.

And then remember that you still have the entire eastern half of Utah (aka the moon) to drive through before you're anywhere near home base.

But as soon as you hit a few southern small towns you realize that it's only a matter of time until you'll see the faces of the people you love.  And then giggle as you pull up the long driveway of your parents home to see five sweet welcome home signs made just for your family.

Hug your family.  And then make your little brother (who is not so little any more) carry all your suitcases into the house.  And then eat the best meal you've had in a long time.  A really really long time.