Welcome to New Orleans!

We will spend the next few days in New Orleans.....hopefully eating beignets and creating wonderful memories. Our first stop of course was the hotel-look at the view:

The tree outside of our window was covered in necklaces like most trees in the area. It have a whimsical care free feeling to the entire trip-so much so that we went out for treats well after 11 with our child in tow!

She did not mind the late night adventure and even found a great mask to keep "fancy" during our late night stroll. The next morning we spend exploring some of the historic sights and parks in the area.

Everything is so bright and colorful. Each building just oozes history and southern charm. Later this week we will be going on a creole cruise and exploring the mardi gras factory. I believe this will be a vacation full of color and wonder!

12 states down!

I cannot believe we have been to 12 states in just 3 years. This month we will continue to work on visiting Mississippi, Louisianan, Minnesota, and maybe West Virginia.  It is hard to imagine that we have 10 summers left with our little girl and such a big goal-here is to another adventure next week!

Great busy tool for the car

We spend a crazy amount of time in the car which means I am always looking for ways to keep the little busy.  I recently saw a fun puzzle project idea-you hot glue magnets on the back of puzzle pieces and use a cookie tray to keep all the pieces in one place in the car like this:

We tried it this last trip and it did not work out so well. I tried it with the thin puzzle pieces and they seemed to curl and crack. I think this is a wonderful idea if you had thicker pieces and maybe used something other than hot glue. Have any of you tried it? We will try it one more time as I think having puzzles in the car would be time well spent!

Battleship USS Alabama

As we continue our journey to all 50 states we decided to visit Alabama this week. The top stop on our trip was the USS Alabama . During each trip we try to pick something not only fun but educational. This was going to be our history portion of the trip. We began at the monument at the beginning of the park to prep our daughter about what we use the ships for and the importance of each room.

It was nice to see all of the flags and explain a bit about our history in a way she could appreciate the "big boat" we were about to board.  My favorite part of the tour of the ship was the clearly labeled color lines. We could pick our path and work at our own leisure instead of being rushed on a group tour.  We were there on a rainy, cold day so there were only two families on the entire ship which made for a nice family experience.

Each room was very detailed and really brought the ship to life. We were not only able to explain in words what it was like but our daughter was able to get a picture of what it actually looked like on the ship. She was surprised by the lack of space especially since the ship seemed so big on the outside.  All in all I would say it is a great place to stop for a day with the family. If you work at your child's pace you should easily be able to get through the entire ship. There are many levels to climb which may be difficult for some but there is plenty to see on the main floor.