Are We There Yet?

So smart and savvy Colleen of Shibley Smiles (that’s me). Decided to pack our Easter  weekend full of fun.  Sounds good so far right? However as my husband would remind me often, planning goes a long way. I have to say after our experience this past Saturday I seriously can not argue with his logic. I was invited to a promotional lunch at Burger King in Miami and a private screening of HOP afterwards.  The kids were extremely excited about the opportunity so I accepted. Whether they were excited about going to Burger King or the movies I will never know. Again sounds harmless so far right?

When I think of Miami I think of the Sun Life stadium which is just over 45 minutes from us so I figured Miami would be a little far but worth the trip for some family fun.  I waited until about 11pm Friday night to mapquest the location and found it was more like 1 hour and 45 minutes YIKES! Oh Well everything is planned (kinda, sorta, NOT) and the kids are excited so to Miami we will go.

In addition to the my three kids, and my mother-in-law I invited my nephew since he lives to the south of us anyway.  Saturday morning started out with a little bit of attitude from the boys regarding who was going to ride with who. With 7 of us we had to take two cars.  After that was settled we were on our way.  We headed south to take the FL Turnpike to our destination only to find out they had MOVED the entrance ramp to the turnpike.  YEP! Literally moved it to the other side of the road, which was the opposite side of the lane we were in. My husband had to do a u-turn at the light and get on the correct side of the road.  During the trip down to pick up my nephew my mother-in-law unknowingly ran a toll booth. We are still waiting for that fine to show up in the mail.

I forgot to mention we left about 15 minutes later then I wanted and were hoping to make up a little time. However when we got off the exit to get my nephew we came to a dead stop. Due to a lane closure the traffic was at a stop.  After we finally got him we headed back onto the turnpike.  My husband, knowing we had a Sunpass, steered the car into the Sunpass lane only to find out after he went through the toll that the Sunpass lane was for northbound traffic only.  I quickly called my mother-in-law and told her to go South and not follow us and we would catch up.  We took the next exit to turn around and it happened to be the Sawgrass Expressway.  So now we have to exit the Expressway to get back on in the opposite direction to exit to the turnpike and get back on to go South.  Did I mention we didn’t leave on time.

Ok we are finally going South on the turnpike and my mother-in-law calls regarding where she is suppose to go because she is about 8 miles a head of us.  I consulting my phone, because my non-planning tactic did not include printing out the directions, and told her to stay on the turnpike.  So I watch my GPS (on my iPhone) and I swear I following the directions and I notice our little blue dot veering off the directional path.  So I have to tell my husband who has smoke coming out of his ears and nose and is beet read (no not really but I wouldn’t have been surprised if it was) that we weren’t going the right way.

So I call my mother-in-law to tell her to pull of the next exit so we could regroup and she is now 9 miles ahead of us. Ummm…..so much for catching up to her.  We finally reach her exit and she follows us.  Now to be fair to me I was originally going to tell my car (as it has the SYNC in it and can give us directions) the location and let it guide us but forgot.  When I wanted to finally tap into that feature my husband was beyond rational thoughts so I decided it would be best to mapquest the location from my phone.

Needless to say after our eventful trip we arrived 15 minutes late which thankfully was not a problem and had a wonderful time. Surprisingly my husband was in a good mood and seemed to also enjoy himself.  Stay tuned for photos and info on our fun promotional event at Burger King to taste their new chicken tenders and our screening of the movie HOP. This post is already full of hot steam, wrong turns, and planning disasters.