One of my favorite stops so far: a roadside snack shop in Rich Mountain, Arkansas where we stopped for a quick ice cream, and ended up staying for well over an hour just because it was fun and the lady sitting in the dining room (who oh, did she mention? used to TRAIN WILD BEARS as a hobby) couldn't stop giving Goldie kisses and the cook put on a full-on magic show with something called a hokum (?) stick.

I cannot tell you how wonderful it's been, just meeting people. We've been staying in chain hotels and eating in chain restaurants only when we absolutely have to because it feels like such an opportunity, the chance to just be a part of the life of wherever it is that we're spending a few hours, and each and every time the decision to get away from the Hampton Inns and Waffle Houses (delicious though those grits might be) has turned out to be a good one. Not because we've necessarily been finding the "best" food or the "nicest" places to stay, but because doing this lets us see a small slice of what's going on, whatever that is.

But let's talk about grilled cheese for a second.

First of all, let me show you where we are right now: sitting at the breakfast bar in a hotel in an Arkansas town called "Lonoke" that may very well have been the setting for The Shining. (The hotel is actually very nice in the morning, but last night, when we were wandering the hallways looking for our room: totally kept an eye out for Redrum.)

We didn't mean to be here, exactly (although it's a very pretty part of the world) - what happened was that we stopped just outside of Memphis for dinner (more on that later because oh my godddd), with the plan to just wing it and find a place to sleep on the outskirts of town...and then our kids both fell asleep. Instantly. And what I have learned from this trip so far is that if the kids need to nap, let 'em nap; if everyone feels like getting out of the car and running around in a parking lot, go ahead and do that, even if it makes you arrive somewhere an hour later than you'd hoped. Just go with it. The destinations are less important than the journey, you know?

And so we decided to get a head-start on the next day's drive while the kids were sleeping and find a place to stay somewhere in between Memphis and Arkansas National Park, and then discovered that these "places to stay"? They're like an hour away from each other around here. And all of them, inexplicably, are completely booked up (presumably by people like us who were all "oh I'll just find somewhere to sleep tonight"...and then realized that there would be nowhere else to sleep for two hundred miles so they better get a room like now).

OK, so yesterday - Day 1 of our road trip - was not the most exciting day, but we knew that going into it. First, I was pretty certain I was going to cry when we drove away from my parents, and: yes. A lot. (When you are sad and on a road trip, Java Chip Frappuccinos help. Just FYI.)

Our goal was to just get a bunch of miles under our belts right away both because we're not murderously tired of being in the car yet, and because we wanted to get to Virginia ASAP to maximize the time we could spend with Kendrick's sister and her family. The only place that we passed during the 8-hour drive that I would have liked to stop at was Atlantic City, but on the bright side, that little omission probably saved us about two hundred bucks at the blackjack table.

As good as our kids are in cars, this was one of the longest stretches of straight driving we've planned (most days are more like 3-4 hours), so I was a little nervous, but it went well, mostly because the point was just Get There Without Melting Down. Pretty much the most exciting thing that happened was that we stopped at Olive Garden (which was actually pretty exciting for me, because I have never been before in my life - and while that may may sound weird to those of you who aren't from NYC, it's important to know that in New York the only Olive Garden is located in Times Square and is insanely expensive and a terrible idea, given that there are zillions of much cheaper Italian food options approximately five yards away).

The big discovery at Olive Garden: they give your children stickers that - as one reader helpfully pointed out - strongly resemble sperm.