Charleston, South Carolina

Okay, it's been a month since we got back from Charleston. We've forgiven Harper for her behavior there but we will never forget. The vast majority of our time was spent in the hotel - the really expensive hotel because of the historical district surrounding it and location near the beach. We never made it to the beach and we saw very little of the historical district. We did get in a couple good walks which were enough to get some really beautiful pictures. Not much to say about the photos, we just snapped them while walking around. Loved the old southern style of homes!

Fort Sumter. We took a ferry there and got a tour.

For me, the tour consisted of walking Harper around while she slept in the stroller. She wakes up if you stop moving.

Srolling inside the fort

Back and forth, back and forth

Walking the boardwalk

A $3.00 palmetto rose we got for Harper. She tossed it out of the stroller later that day when we didn't notice. 

Private residence out on gated dock

"Rainbow Row"

Pop only southerners know exist. They would never call it pop.

How long can her hair keep growing up?

A surprise evening nap meant a walk along the shore!

Live Oaks

See the canon and canon balls? Apparently those suckers could shoot 4 miles!!

Notice the big door leading onto the OPEN front porch?

Nap over

sneeze

I SCREAM EVERY TIME I GET DRESSED

But then I'm fine :)

Road Trip Part 1: Philly to Durham

I will start off this post by repeating a facebook status from the week of our roadtrip.

"Road trip with a 9 month old; What were we thinking? Why didn't anyone stop us?!?"

The real purpose of the trip was for Sam's research for his disertation. He was going to check out the libraries and archives in Durham, North Carolina and Charleston, South Carolina. We thought we would make a family vacation out of the whole thing.

This "vacation" was kind of a disaster. I've waited some time after we got home to blog about it hoping I might have a more positive outlook on the whole thing after awhile. I'm afraid I cannot say I have a positive outlook on it at all. In fact, Sam and I hope we never forget just how challenging it was so that we never get the notion to try it ever again.

The trip was supposed to be 10 days in total. We ended up cutting it short and were back in our apartment 6 1/2 days after leaving.

We set out on a Thursday night. 8:00pm after Harper had gone to sleep. This was our genius plan so that we could just pack up the car, slip her into her car seat and drive the whole way with her asleep. It worked pretty well but we didn't get to our hotel in Durham until 3:00am. The drive included one stop for gas (for which she cried the entire time), a random traffic jam a little ways past D.C., and desperately trying to keep eachother awake without actually talking as to not wake up the babe. After checking in the hotel and unpacking we got to sleep around 3:30am and Harper woke up at 6:00am for the day per usual. Not the best idea to start out a vacation on 2 1/2 hours of sleep...

However, we have some great friends in Durham that we first met in Germany. Their daughter was just 3 months old when we met and she is now 4 and they now have a 1 year old son. So great to catch up with them, we did very kid friendly things including making time for naps. We ate some great food and had a lot of fun with the Lang's!

The first thing we did in Durham was go down town for breakfast (Monuts - a gourmet donut shop...AMAZING!) and then the farmer's market.

Then after nap time we went to walk around Duke's campus

Duke cathedral

Basketball building...so much smaller and inconspicuous than we imagined

And right on campus are the Duke gardens.

This is Penelope. If you followed the blog in Germany you would remember her amazing chubby cheeks :)

Penelope and me in Heidelberg 2009!

Harper needed another nap

Day 2 in Durham we went to the children's museum after church. They had lots of outside things to do.

Harper spent lots of time in the stroller against her wishes. The girl cries anytime she is buckled in anything. Stroller, car seat, high chair. It's lovely.

There was a huge mist area outside. Harper was pretty skeptical for awhile but she get used to it. 

Day 3 of the trip meant time to drive from Durham, NC to Charleston, SC.

We decided to be risky and drive during the day. It should have been a 5 hour trip but it turned into 7+.  Harper slept for about 1 1/2 hours of the entire trip and cried for about 4. The girl just hates to be strapped in. My mother tells me, "Most kids love car rides...they just watch out the window and fall asleep", we can only dream of such a child. 

We gave Harper a nice long break from the car seat at this crazy curious little tourist "town" called South of the Border. On hwy 95 as soon as you cross into South Carolina. It was one of the weirdest things we've seen. A brightly colored town with shops and resaurants and motels and mini zoo's and lots of giant statues. We got ice cream and walked around for a bit. I think Harper was even more mad when she had to get buckled again. We probably should have just kept driving but we were quite intrgued by all of the billboards along the highway.

They had their own water tower. It said S.O.B. As in, South of the Border, duh.

We let her crawl around in the gift shop before getting ice cream and hitting the road again. Is it rude to play with all of the toys in a store with no intention of buying anything?

Next stop, Charleston, SC. The beautful little coastal town we couldn't wait to explore. One can dream right? Next blog...