Missouri Trip - Day 1

Just thinking about blogging about the entire trip to Missouri makes me panic. I took 1200+ pictures! Granted, some (a lot) of them were pictures taken by my 4 year old niece and won't be making it into the blog or the scrapbook, but regardless, that's a lot to go through! Plus, that's just a lot of information for one blog post.
So. The plan is to break it up by day. I don't like when people do that, and I've never had an instance when I needed to do it too, but now I have a reason, and I'm going to do it and I no longer blame other people for doing it!
So. Here we go.
Day 1 (March 5):
The journey

{I just wanted to include this picture from when I went down to NC to pick up Beau & Isabella before we officially started our trip because I think it's amazing. I have no idea why there is a stuffed lion there, but I found it hilarious!}

So, in terms of state line pictures, I need you to keep an open mind!
A couple of them were taken at different points in the trip - like this one :)

 So, we left Buena Vista at around...9:00 AM

Brandon took Deadpool along again (see Boston trip pictures)

First state line to cross:

West Virginia!

The only thing I didn't like about West Virginia was that there was a bridge that pretty much went from one mountain top to another and I about had a panic attack. I never would have imagined I would react that way! But...next time I think I'll opt to either be asleep during that section or go around it.

Next up:

I think this was the first time I've driven through Kentucky. Too bad it was raining and I 

couldn't really enjoy it!

Next:

a stop at Big Boy (and a few jokes about local Kentucky people by Beau and Brandon that made 

me afraid that they would all gang up on us and kill us).

After Kentucky:

For SURE the first time I've been in Indiana - Brandon used to live in Indianapolis, though

By this point it was about 7:00 PM and we'd been in the car for 10 hours (10 hours!) and there were still 3 states to go! (through Indiana, through Illinois and then to the other side of Missouri)

Just so you know - I was crankier than Isabella :)

She did have her DVD player, after all

Well, only 2 more state lines to cross....

What, can't see it? Well, you try and take a picture of the state line in a moving vehicle at night!
That does say Illinois, by-the-way.

FINALLY!

{Vision Goggles: we actually crossed into Missouri at around 11 PM, this picture was taken
on the return trip -more on THAT later-}

So...St. Louis, MO is right on the border between IL and MO, so the state line sign was in the city as we crossed over the bridge over the Mississippi River, and we weren't able to get that picture, which actually bums me out, but you know, I got a picture, so I'm good :) I'm so strange about getting state line signs (noticed yet?). In addition...I was the one driving in St. Louis and it was a NIGHTMARE. I have an extremely hard time keeping my calm at night in a city that I travel often, but throw in the fact that I've never been there before and it was terrible! I had to literally peel my fingers off of the steering wheel as we drove out of the city.  Ugh.

Well, St. Louis is on the east side of the state and we were headed to the west side...so there were 4 more hours to go... But we eventually got to Mom and Dad's place at around 3 AM (2 AM local time).
{Uh, in case you weren't counting, that's 18 hours}

Next up:

Day 2! (naturally)

P.S. More pictures on our Shutterfly page.