PA trip to visit old friends

Two weeks ago, we packed up the car and headed north to PA to visit Keith's family and friends. We hadn't been up there since Thanksgiving and we were all looking forward to the visit. Thankfully, since we are able to bring less stuff now, we were able to take Keith's car instead of my gas-guzzling Jeep. There is certainly not as much room in the Sonata, but we made it work. As you can see Jacob was happy sitting in the back seat eating a bagel with cream cheese as we headed out of town.
We left on Thursday morning around 8:30am (only 30 minutes later than we had hoped, which is pretty good for us!). We drove to Somerset to pick up Keith's mom and then onto Eighty-Four, PA to stay with Keith's cousin, Dave and his wife, Roxann. They have a beautiful (and very spacious) home that they moved into a few years ago and we had never seen it. In November, we had talked about us coming to visit sometime so when we planned this trip we asked if it would be OK for us to stay with them for part of it. We had planned to meet up with two of Keith's friends from college on Friday and Eighty-Four is closer than Somerset to where we were meeting them.

Dave and Roxann were awesome hosts - they bought the food that Jacob likes, Roxann is a wonderful cook who kept us very well fed, and they even put one of their two dogs in the kennel for the time we were there. Their dog, Dudley, is a mix of St. Bernard, Great Dane and some other things. Needless to say, he is quite big and a tad bit rough at times. Dave and Roxann were worried that he would be rough around Jacob so they decided to board him while were there.

Dave & Roxann's other dog, Otis, is so sweet and Jacob really warmed up to him quickly. He would say that he wanted to play with him or pet him, but then when Otis would come towards him, Jacob would shy away a little thinking that Otis might run him over. He also wanted to constantly pet their cat, who really didn't want to be bothered. He is just a natural lover of animals!

As you can see, Otis warmed up to Jacob too! One day, while Jacob was watching a movie on his portable DVD player, Otis jumped up on the air mattress and laid down next to him. It was pretty darn cute!


As I previously said, on Friday, we met Keith's friend Liz (who he knows from library school) for lunch. Then, we met his friend Kevin (who he knows from his undergraduate days) for dinner. I was worried about Jacob being in two restaurants for two meals in one day, but he did pretty well. Lunch was a bit more stressful than dinner because he wanted to get down from the table and was getting kind of tired by the end. Thankfully, he slept well between the two meetings and at dinner, he was content to sit at the table and play with the iPad while the three of us ate and talked.

On Saturday, Dave & Roxann hosted the rest of Keith's family so that we could all get together while we were visiting. His aunt Kay, uncle Barry, cousin Suzie and her husband, Tad all came over for lunch and together time. Jacob took a great nap after lunch which gave the adults time to visit. As is the case most of the time when we visit, the guys were all hanging out in one room (and this time, they were watching some comedy show and laughing hysterically) and we girls were in another room catching up and laughing. It is always great to gab with these fun ladies!

Once Jacob woke up from his nap, he got some Easter presents from Barry & Kay, including a puzzle. Tad, Suzie, and Kay all helped him put it together.

On Sunday afternoon, we left Eighty-Four and headed back to Somerset to spend the rest of the trip at my MIL's apartment. We were again meeting up with a friend of Keith's on Monday. Our meeting spot was closer to Somerset so it made sense to split up the trip and stay part of the time there.

I was nervous about Jacob sleeping well on this trip because this would be the first time we traveled without him in a pack-and-play. He was just getting too big for it and it wasn't very comfortable for him anymore. I purchased a child travel bed from One Step Ahead and was really excited (but also worried) about him sleeping in it. I bought this particular one because it is a mattress inside of a shell that has high sides. I was hoping this would keep him from rolling off, but I wasn't sure that he would like it since he has really only slept in something with higher sides (a crib or a pack-and-play).

He did remarkably well sleeping on it, except for the fact that there was a small leak that caused the mattress to partially deflate while he was sleeping. The first night he slept really well until he woke up about 6:30am on Friday morning and was clearly uncomfortable due to him being on a partially deflated mattress. We continued to add air to the mattress over the next few sleeps (nap on Friday, Friday night and nap on Saturday), but by Saturday afternoon we knew that he could not sleep on the mattress another night since it had completely deflated during his nap on Saturday. Thankfully, we had brought another twin size air mattress to use at Keith's mom's house so he was able to sleep on that Saturday night and for his nap on Sunday. He did roll off of the twin mattress once during the night on Saturday, but he got back up on it and slept pretty well the rest of the night.

When we got to Keith's mom's apartment on Sunday, we decided to have him sleep in her bed since he always sleeps in her room anyways. And, she has a day bed that has rails on three sides. We used pillows to "build up" the fourth side so that he wouldn't roll off and he slept great for the two nights & one nap that we were there.

Here he is getting stories read to him by Daddy after his bath on Sunday night.


Since Keith's mom lives in a one bedroom apartment on the 6th floor, there isn't much for Jacob to do. We often bring some toys along, but I worry every trip that he is going to get bored and go crazy with nothing to do. Thankfully, these days he is content looking at vidoes on Daddy's iPhone, coloring or playing games/reading books on the iPad and he did really well on this particular trip. It seems that a lot of things just keep getting easier and easier as he gets older!!

On Monday, we went to Seven Springs Mountain Resort and met up with one of Keith's oldest friends from childhood, JB. He and his wife and their son had flown up from Florida to visit JB's family. He and Keith grew up together and hadn't seen each other in over 20 years. They reconnected on Facebook and we planned this trip specifically so that we would be up there while they were visiting.

Keith used to work at the Resort. He was a night desk clerk there while he was in grad school and was also taking care of this ill grandmother (who raised him). From the stories I have heard, it was a very busy (and often stressful and tiring) time in his life, but he has a lot of great memories of the Resort. I had been there once (before we were married) and it was fun to return and bring Jacob with us this time.

Even though the temperature was very mild (in the 60s) while we were there, they had plenty of man-made snow to play in.

Here is a picture of Jacob and me with JB, his wife, Lori, their son, Thomas and JB's sister, Mary Ellen. Mary Ellen lives in Western PA but since the others live in Florida, Thomas was loving the snow! He had only seen snow once before in his seven years of life!

It was quite amusing to see people skiing and to make snowballs while I was in a short-sleeved shirt! I am sure that is something that I have never done before!


Jacob was not interested in standing still for a family photo. This one was the best of the bunch!

Seven Springs has a game room (similar to something like Chuck E Cheese where you play with tokens and win tickets) with a lot of fun games. After a delicious lunch, we spent about an hour there enjoying ourselves with the games!





On Monday night, we spent more time with Keith's mom and then we left to head back home on Tuesday morning. The car ride home was not very pleasant for me. I am not sure if it was being pregnant and being in the car so long or that I was having to turn around to help Jacob numerous times or a combination of both. I was nauseous for most of the trip and was glad when we finally pulled into the driveway.

It was certainly a busy trip but it was nice to be able to see so many friends and family members. We are blessed that Jacob is so adaptable when we are traveling. I always get worried that the car ride and the sleeping arrangements are going to be troublesome, but somehow, they always seem to work out fine.