I don't know if I'm crazy, brave or stupid

In about an hour, I'm packing both kids into the car and driving to Ottawa to visit my sister and brother-in-law. And I'm doing it without Ryan.

So that means I have to pay attention to driving and keep the kids happy as well.

I'm leaving at about 1 p.m., in hopes that they'll both nap for part of the time. Although Alex through me for a loop this morning and is currently taking a second morning nap. So much for her going to sleep at 1ish. But Austin is at the sitter's right now, so I'm fairly confident that she's doing a good job of tiring him out for me. In a few minutes I'll wake Alex up so she can have some lunch and we can play for a bit before it's time to get in the car for the four to six hour drive.

For this trip, I'm throwing all my rules out the window. Austin will be allowed to snack on whatever he wants -- so yes, I've packed treats -- and I loaded some kids shows onto the ipod and hooked it up to crappy little speakers so that he can watch TV for part of the time. Ryan and I are both very anti-DVD players in the car, but for this trip, I've made the exception.

I'm just hoping that Alex stays content for most of the trip. She's harder to entertain while driving, because she doesn't watch TV, doesn't snack on anything except mum-mums (and those can get boring) and she's rear facing so it's hard to hand her things to play with.

She'll have her soother whenever she wants -- and I'm keeping extras up front with me for when she rips it off the string and tosses it on the floor where I can't reach. And, as I said, hopefully, she'll sleep for awhile.

And, hence the four to six hour time frame, we'll likely stop at a roadside McDonalds somewhere so Austin can run around and Alex can have a bottle.

So here's hoping. I'll let you know next week if this was a brave idea or a stupid one.