The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly of Baton Rouge

Back in July, the Church announced dates for the Baton Rouge temple open house. Baton Rouge is about 4-4.5 hours away. I got excited because this is probably the closest temple for a long time to be renovated/dedicated anytime soon. Houston was just rededicated but they didn't hold an open house. They announced the McAllen Texas temple at General Conference but that could be years from now. So I was determined to take the big kids and go. Driving 9 hours round trip with Gemma didn't sound fun so Joseph said he'd stay home with her.

There were three main objectives for the trip:
1) Tour the temple
2) Be super cool/fun mom and let the kids plan the weekend
3) Have the weekend be memorable (hopefully accomplished by the first two objectives)

Well, we accomplished all three but it didn't quite go according to plan.

The plan was to pick up Ashton early from school on Friday and hit up Bucee's. That is a famous gas station in Texas that the kids love to stop at. Once again, being super cool mom, they could pick out a treat and drink at the gas station. Then we drove to McDonalds for dinner about three hours away. This met the "super cool mom" status as Tanner and Ashton picked it for dinner. We NEVER go there and they think it is a really cool place to have dinner. Plus, I splurged and got them their own ice cream instead of making them share like we normally do.

We've never seen the Bucee's mascot before so the kids thought this was cool.

We stopped for dinner and then headed out for the rest of the drive to Baton Rouge (about 1.5 hours). I found a hotel close to the temple that had an indoor pool so we could go swimming. Even though we were getting there late (around 8pm), I was once again "super cool mom" and agreed to take them swimming. Well, surprise, surprise, the indoor pool was NOT heated! And we've had a few cold days lately in the South so the pool was FREEZING! The kids barely touched it. To keep with the objective to be fun, I let them "swim" in the hotel room's bathtub with all their pool toys.

At this point in the night, Ashton has complained about her stomach hurting periodically. I figured it was from not eating a ton of dinner and eating ice cream. I didn't have anything to give her so we got ready for bed. I said we'd see how it was in the morning. About an hour later, the kids are fast asleep and Ashton just starts throwing up in the bed. It is everywhere- the bed, pillows, hair, pajamas, the floor, etc. I rush her to the bathroom and get her in the tub. Thankfully, Tanner sleeps throughout this whole process.

Before the mess of the night began, I did get this cute picture of Tanner sleeping. Kids are always cuter when they're sleeping.

I call down to the front desk to get more sheets and they say the sheets are locked up until the morning when housekeeping arrives. So I make the best use of the nice white towels in the hotel room. Ashton got cleaned up and crawled in my bed. Tanner was fast asleep in the other bed so I just covered the throw up and let him stay asleep on his side of the bed. Not the best parenting moment but I wasn't about to have both kids in my bed with Ashton throwing up all over everyone.

Ashton went back to sleep and I laid there waiting for the next throw up. I finally fell asleep and was in and out for the remainder of the night. The smoke alarms in the hotel went off at 6am and woke up everyone. The hotel quickly turned them off and the kids fell back asleep. Ashton woke up around 7am and threw up. This time, she got it in the bucket next to her bedside.

We all get up and assess the damages. I decide to take them to Walmart to pick up stomach bug essentials as well as what we'd need for the 4.5 hour drive home. At this point, I am now sick and throwing up in the room. Tanner is complaining of an upset stomach but hasn't actually thrown up yet. We watch TV and I try to decide if we can make it to the temple or if we should start the drive home. About an hour later, everyone is doing okay and we haven't thrown up again. We drive to the temple and decide that we won't touch or shake anyone's hands.

We accomplish goal #1 and tour the Baton Rouge Temple. The kids thoroughly enjoy it and I can tell they feel the Spirit inside. It's a very small temple, which was neat to see compared to the other temples I've been to.

My favorite picture of the weekend.

Ashton was done at this point and Tanner just wanted to climb on the statue. It was a quick picture and then rush to leave.

We then head back to Houston. I had planned to stop at a cool park and have a picnic lunch but at this point, all of us barely kept Gatorade down. I wasn't risking it. Everyone had a bucket with them for the car ride but no one threw up on the way home. The kids watched movies and took naps so the drive was quiet for me.

All objectives were met but I think the trip will be memorable because of illness not because of the super cool things we did. I'm grateful we made it to the temple and that everyone stayed healthy enough while we were there. Hopefully, the next temple open house trip goes much smoother than this and I can be a super fun mom again.