Road Trip Food

I LOVE road trips but I absolutely hate the way I feel when I have to eat a bunch of junk on the road! It always tastes so good at the time but leaves me feeling like absolute poo for several days after the fact. On our most recent road trip to Ohio, I decided to pack all of our meals/snacks in order to save money and avoid eating processed junk.

Now those of you who know Jon and I know that we eat a lot... I mean, A LOT. We are not the kind of people who can get by on just a bunch of snacks. We need meat. We need substance.  And I think I successfully provided these things on the trip.

Here's what I packed:

Cooler Items:
Pasta and bean salad
4 cold cooked steaks
Gallon of milk

Homemade Dressing
Greens (portioned into sandwich bags)
Sliced cheddar cheese
Nectarines

Sliced cucumbers in vinegar and spices

Iced Coffee

Non-Cooler Items:
Organic Morning O's (Whole Foods' version of Cheerios)
Triscuits
Raisins
Trail Mix
Cookies
Bottled Water

Plastic Cups
Plastic Forks

Plastic Spoons

For the pasta salad I just combined whole wheat macaroni pasta with cucumbers, green bell pepper, kidney beans, navy beans, onion, garlic, lemon juice, olive oil, red wine vinegar and some herbs. We just ate it out of plastic cups with forks. It was really good and also very hearty.

For the cucumbers I just sliced them and placed them in tightly sealed mason jars with peppercorns, salt, apple cider vinegar and some water.

In order to save cooler space I packed the greens in sandwich bags. When we wanted to eat them we just poured on some dressing and ate it directly out of the bag.  I made a simple dressing with raw apple cider vinegar, olive oil, garlic, dijon mustard, salt, pepper and a bay leaf.

Everything else is pretty self-explanatory.  We were able to fit everything into a 48 qt. cooler and a paper grocery bag. It really saved us a lot of time and money on the road, and kept all of us full for the duration of the trip.  We even had leftovers when we got home!  This is the first time we have been able to eat ONLY what I packed for an entire trip, usually we end up hungry and have to buy something along the way.  I will definitely be repeating some of these things for our next road trip!

O-H-I-O

So we drove up to Ohio this past weekend to visit my grandparents.  Kaitlyn has never met either of my grandparents so it was great to visit with them and introduce them to their great-granddaughter.  We had a great time but it was a pretty exhausting trip.

 The drive on Friday wasn't awful, it took about 9 hours with several stops.  Kaitlyn didn't sleep much in the car so we had to give her some opportunities to stretch her legs.

Luckily we didn't ever have to stop for food.  I prepared and packed lots of food to take along so we wouldn't have to spend money and also to avoid eating a bunch of junk on the road.  I will probably do a post on what all I packed because it ended up working out really well, we definitely didn't go hungry.

The drive up was pretty smooth, didn't hit much traffic until the very end.  There was a big Jazz festival going on in Columbus and our hotel was right in the heart of  downtown.  By the time we finally made it to the hotel it was about 1am.  Of course Kaitlyn was wide awake when we got to our room and jumped and played on the bed for about an hour before we finally put her down.

The next morning we headed to grandpa's house for a visit.  Kaitlyn is his first great-grandchild so he was pretty excited to see her.  She was a little scared at first seeing a new face but she definitely warmed up to him by the end.  She also got to meet my Aunt Chris, Uncle Jim, and my cousin Camilla who came by to visit while we were in town.  Of course she was showered by all with lots of awesome gifts and treats.  I think she had a pretty good time.

We left Columbus around 11 and headed to Shelby which is about an hour and a half away.  My grandma lives on a huge farm, it used to be one of my favorite places to visit as a kid. I spent countless summers running around, riding horses and climbing trees on the farm. 

 Kaitlyn had a great time meeting grandma and my aunt Heidi and running around outside.  It was a really nice, mild day so we just sat outside on the porch and talked for awhile.

While I wish we could have stayed longer I'm glad we made the trip.  Though I'm not gonna lie, the drive back was BRUTAL.  Kaitlyn pretty much refused to sleep, I think she was just tired of being strapped down in that car seat for so long.  I can't blame her, I wanted to cry too at some points on that never-ending journey home.  One thing you just have to accept when you have kids is that things just take longer.  I guess you just have to learn to go with the flow!