Driving, Update, and More

We stopped Sun. night and got a hotel in Virginia, north of Richmond. But let me just back up a bit and offer a little bit of advice. Ch and the kids had fun playing "I Spy" with all the "South of the Border" billboard signs they saw along the way. I kept myself busy playing the referee. Boy, were there a lot of them! It was a nice game to keep them busy for quite a while, which definitely helped to take the edge off their boredom. Turns out, this place, South of the Border, must be nothing more than an old, washed-up tourist attraction. It must have been a big hit back in the day, though. I wonder how many years ago that was? Well, when we got to "South of the Border", we pulled into a little Mexican Restaurant for supper. The food was totally NASTY. We ate it because there wasn't anywhere else to eat, and given our food difficulties, we really had no choice. But it really burned me up when we ate at Chevy's Mexican Restaurant the next evening, and food that was 10 times better, actually only cost $1.00 more. A great lesson explaining supply and demand. Your official advice: Count all the South of the Border billboard signs you want, but DON'T, under any circumstances, stop there!

Truly, though, on Monday night, Chevy's had a wonderful gluten-free menu, and the manager really went all-out exploring our dietary challenges, and finding something we could eat. It was delightful to get a little TLC from a restaurant staff that cared a little bit about their customers. We may just go back again while we're here!


The kids were pleasantly surprised to find out about the free face painting on Monday nights. We couldn't have planned it better! Our table was near the face painting, and B lost no time in jumping up in the lady's chair to have her face done when she saw the chair was empty. She's really coming out of her shyness. It's so cute. Man, she's growing up fast! And once the boys saw their little sister getting her face done, they couldn't resist. Here are the results. Luckily, the stuff washed right off, so we didn't have to walk around D.C. the next day with smudgy face paint all over their faces! (More advice: the face painting-lady warned against green paint. I guess it stains pretty bad. I wonder if that's all face paint brands, or just what she was using?)