road tripping it to Normal, Illinois.

(I'm going to devote a post to the job market journey, but wanted to document the two road trips we got to take as a family.  The first was to Normal, Illinois.  Funny to think that this is going to be our "home town" next year!)

Normal is about 2h45min from St. Louis so it was a pretty quick trip, which was nice.  It is definitely corn country in that area.  Most of the stalks had already been cut down, but it was fun to drive by a few of the remaining cornfields.

Our first stop, as suggested by the Gublers, was Avanti's for their famous gondola sandwiches.  They were really yummy!  We stayed at the Double Tree Inn in Bloomington.  We were big fans of the warm chocolate chip cookies upon arrival :0), not to mention the big comfy beds and the indoor pool.

Unfortunately this particular interview was pretty time intensive so after Bry took the kiddos swimming he got dressed and headed out to dinner.  It was FREEZING cold and I was not in the mood to drag all four of us into a restaurant, so we loaded in the van to drive across the parking lot and go through the Panera drive through ;0)  We watched a lot of HGTV and Food Network and chilled in the hotel room.  Bedtime was interesting with all 5 of us in the same room.

Friday we went down to the hotel restaurant for breakfast.  The hostess there (Nancy?) was SO kind to hold Elijah and keep an eye on Alex while I got food for the kiddos.  I couldn't have done it without her help!  Afterwards, we headed over to meet some new friends (Daniel is faculty at ISU and his wife Erin offered to tell us about Bloomington Normal and ISU) and spent the day there with them in their beautiful home.  It was SUPER sweet of them to accommodate the four of us since they have 5 (at the time, soon-to-be 6) kids of their own.  It made me laugh to think of Bry, dressed up and in a professional setting interviewing over breakfast with Daniel...and I'm chilling at home with his family.  Daniel came home and was really nice to let me ask him a bunch a questions about the town and the job in general.  That night I braved going out to eat (me + 3 kiddos) and went to Meat Heads.

Saturday before heading home, we went on a Real Estate tour.  It cracked me up how similar house hunting was to dating.  The first house I thought was amazing, the second was even better and so on.  By the last house I thought we'd found the one, but now thinking back on it I think I'd actually like something different.  Good thing we're going through this process ;0)  It'll be good to see a lot of houses before we buy so we make sure we're getting what we really want.