The Great American Road Trip {Day 1}

When we started contemplating our summer vacation in late winter, early spring a road trip sounded like tons of fun. Turns out that once summer actually gets here and you are forced to spend those 12 longs hours {one way} cramped up in the car with your family...it ends up not quite being all you envisioned. Nonetheless, we managed an almost week long trip away from home and managed to see new things for all of us!!

We left on a Monday morning and headed out on our adventure; keeping an open mind about how often we would stop and where we would bed down for the night. {With the exception being that I did maintain we were NOT staying at the Roach Inn as a matter of convenience or money saving!}



By the way, DVD players are good for awhile, but kids do need a few other distractions! Like mom's cell phone camera, lol!





We traveled North into Nebraska



and made our first official stop at the Heartland Museum of Military Vehicles in Lexington, NE. If you are or have a war/military lover in your family you should make a point to go to this museum. It is one of the most comprehensive military places we have been to yet. Preston is our resident military expert and he was like our own personal tour guide. IT ROCKED!

The museum is privately owned and is dedicated to the restoration and preservation of historical military equipment of all types. They have done some wonderful work and in fact a lot of the vehicles they have restored are functional and used in parades...how cool?!







From there we headed West down I-80 to Ogallala, NE where we managed to find a decent hotel...with a POOL. So we chilled by the pool for a little bit.



For dinner we checked Trip Advisor {highly recommend for traveling!!} and ate at Open Range Grill. One of the best burger joints we have been to. It had great atmosphere, an intriguing menu and delicious burgers!!

Since we still had a couple of hours to kill until bedtime we found the local movie theater and were able to catch Monsters University. It was fun because it was a small town theater like ours, except that they had 2 screens, and the atmosphere was excellent. The best part of the whole night was before the movie even started though. The kids suggested the movie at dinner and even bargained with us that if we took them to the movie they would buy their own snacks. DEAL! So upon paying for our tickets Cambree opted out of snacks and Westynn found a perfect Root Beer and popcorn combo that only cost him $2...Best deal of our whole vacation! Preston opted for a medium sized Pepsi...it cost him dearly!

Preston could not contain himself once we sat down. He wanted popcorn SOOOOO bad, but just couldn't bring himself to pay for it. After about 5 minutes of serious negotiations with Westynn for some of his, Preston realized the battle was over and he caved. $5 bill in hand he returned to the concession stand, alone, for popcorn. Before he got back to his seat I could hear him...

"MOM! Look at this bag of popcorn! It cost me $4!"

Granted, it was a big bag of popcorn, but I'm not sure it was worth the $4 he paid for it! If you've ever seen the bags of popcorn that Papa Jene gets from the bank on Fridays, this was nothing! He was happy as a lark though and devoured almost the entire bag through the course of the movie!

Back to the hotel and bed for us...oh yeah, after a heated discussion about sleeping arrangements and that when we are on vacation sleeping with your sister is not only permissible, but expected!! In his defense, Preston did fall out of the bed that night about 3:00 am!