Fantastic Holiday

Debbie, Dominic and I managed to get away for a wonderful holiday at the end of last week. We made plans near the start of the year to attempt a journey northward in the school holidays, and as the time approached we felt much excitement and trepidation. Dom had previously been to Lower Hutt and Wellington many times, up to Palmerston North once, but this trip was going to be a comparatively epic 7 hour journey up to Tauranga. Given that he had previously cried and been very upset in 2 of 3 longer car journies (the drive back from PN, and one trip back from LH when we got stuck in traffic for an extra 45 minutes) we were more than a little nervous about how the journey might go. On top of that, it was also his first time staying away from home (that I can remember, anyways). It went brilliantly. We left at 6.10pm Tuesday, and Dom was awake until about 6.45 or 7. Debbie sang to him, and he was pretty happy despite being in the car seat. He then slept for an hour or so, waking up near Bulls. We had a brief stop to feed Dom and use the scummiest public toilets ever to have fancy SF automatic doors, then got moving again. He was very happy to feed in the back of the car when we stopped, and look out of the windows at the headlights whizzing by. He was less keen on going back into his car seat, but after 20 minutes of serenading he drifted off to sleep for another hour and a bit. We had a similar stop in Hunterville, with nappy change, then managed to get through the desert road and Turangi before stopping when he woke up in Taupo. A last speedy dash through Rotorua and on to Tauranga saw us arrive just before 1am, completely exhausted but safely at our destination, with less than an hour of grumpy Dom in total for the trip! The holiday itself was lovely - Dom really likes being fussed over, and he got a lot of fusses from his grandad, grandma and uncle. We walked around the Mount, taking turns to carry Dom. We went shopping, but didn't end up paying for much thanks to generous parents. We were given a snazzy 3G phone which is video-calling capable thanks to my big brother, and we ate delicious food and had our car cleaned courtesy of my dad. He cooks a mean Chinese meal - in quantities that allow it to be the next day's breakfast and lunch :-) The drive back was even better, with Dom hardly grizzling at all. We left a little earlier, and so were home by midnight. And we now have a heat pump / air conditioning unit in our lounge, so we can be warm on crazy early winter mornings when Dom decides that 5am is play time. And, I have another week off! How lucky am I? Real lucky. Word.