We decided to make the long 8 hour trek to Nebraska since Patrick had a long weekend (Thank you President's Day), and we wanted to take this opportunity to introduce Dakota to my extended family! We were a little worried about what a road trip would look like, but we were up for the challenge. Dakota is a great napper right now so we knew we had that going for us. We decided to leave early Friday morning whenever Dakota woke up for her early morning feeding. 4:00 am was Dakota's hour of choice. She did surprisingly well and slept between each of her feedings. We almost made it home with only stopping twice, but we had to make an emergency milk stop at the Seward exit just 10 miles from home after realizing that singing at the top of our lungs couldn't distract her any longer. I have realized that I can only drive so long with a screaming baby in the back, it makes my blood pressure rise significantly. It was fun to hear Patrick in the back with Dakota entertaining her (and me) with his silly voices and songs. The trip there and back was quite painless, but we realized that we just can't ever be in a hurry with a baby.
We had a fun filled weekend. The Eberspacher family came over Saturday afternoon and the Yeackley side came over on Sunday. It was fun to be able to show our little Dakota off. We also enjoyed getting a lot of oohs and ahhs during church. My favorite part was just getting to see Grandma, Grandpa, Aunt Lauren, Uncle Eric, and Cousin Nora interact with Dakota. It was fun because just within the last week Dakota started making more eye contact and smiling. We got a lot of smiles out of her throughout the weekend. Nora is working on being gentle with Dakota. I laughed so hard when Nora gave the paci back to Dakota and just smashed it in her face (she was just trying to be helpful) or when she wanted to share her little toys with Dakota and dropped them on her. My favorite thing was when Nora held Dakota's hand. I know that they are going to be great friends. I can't wait until they can actually play together. Dakota just has some catching up to do. :)
