Road Trip!

Last week, I was able to go home for a few days.  I had to turn in my rental car and take care of a bunch of relo paperwork with The Man, but aside from the 'business' part of my trip, I really needed to see my people!  It was good to get home, but man-oh-man, what a whirlwind!

This is what waited for me - a month of mail - ugh!  I haven't made it through the stacks yet, but I brought all of it with me.  In between work and meeting everyone for dinner, I managed to declutter the house (just don't look in the garage), meet with the realtor to finalize the listing stuff, and pack up my car.

Oh my goodness!  I really don't have room for any of this in the hotel, but once I got started the stuff just seemed to multiply.  Best friend, Mel, is awesome and she rode shotgun for the entire drive.  I left a little, tee-tiny spot for her bag on the other side of the back seat.

Then we wedged ourselves into the front seat and started on the long, long drive.  It was 17 hours of drive time, but it took us a bit longer because we may - or may not - have stopped at an outlet mall.  The time went really quickly.  We drove about 10 hours the first day and stopped in St. Louis for the night.  I felt extremely uptown as I strolled into the hotel carrying my Ikea luggage.

The next day, we saw our first snow.  It's been a fairly mild winter - thank goodness!  And that made for an easier drive, too - the roads were clear all the way.

We did see some areas that were frozen - the rivers and ponds were really pretty.

When we finally arrived at my home away from home, we unloaded most of the junk out of my car (some is just going to stay in there until I move into my more permanent home).  Here I am trying to sort through various bags and find a place for everything.  Ugh - I'm going to have to upgrade to the 2-bedroom suite just so I can have a place for all of it!

And lookin' oh so pretty after that 2-day drive - but obviously pretty darn happy to be out of the car!