Creative Chaos--Creative Arts Family Vacation--Part Deux

This post is part of CREATIVE CHAOS over on Carlos' site.

So, part of the challenge of taking three kids ( 15, 13 and 11) on a family vacation is both mental and physical.   Mental in keeping them occupied for the long hours in the car (yes, they have their Ipods and their Nintendo's, but inevitably someone will say "I'm bored) and physical--we have a small Honda Civic to travel in (since our large suburban is 11 years old and with more miles on it than the Great Wall of China).  These we were our challenges last week.

Solutions:

1.  Solving the  "who sits in the middle seat" questions--take a deck of cards. Having them draw a card and "low card" out was the solution to the fighting.  On each of the 

following stops--the two winners re-drew for the next section of riding and finally the ultimate winner would have the last ride. (It worked out evenly--each kid had to sit in the middle twice)

2.  We did a creative exercise each time we were in the car. They came from the book CAFFEINE FOR THE CREATIVE MIND

• Make up a story about an object you see on the road-how did it get there?  We made up a story about the town of HAPPY, Texas.  It was hilarious.  The subsequent story was about the riderless tractor going down the road on the back of the trailer.  Each person had to add to the story.  You wouldn't believe how fast 200 miles ticked off the clock while we laughed at everyone's addition to the story.
  
• List items that we would want in our dream house.  Diane wanted a floor that sweeps itself; Daniel wanted a house in the clouds; Mattie wanted a All Season-All Sports court that could convert from Tennis to Basketball with a push of a button; Taylor wanted....I forgot what Taylor wanted; I wanted a PEI WEI and Salt Grass Steakhouse in my kitchen
• Making up new road signs to communicate in any language-"NO FEEDING THE SQUIRRELS; CLOTHING OPTIONAL and others.  It was hilarious and it led to a discussion of different road signs we were seeing along I-40 in New Mexico ( I never really considered the design of road signs.
• Clapping in rhythm--each one had to add a new rythm to a steady beat... hmm sounds like Children's Choir training at seminary.
• We had to make up our own species of Fish-including the color, shape, etc.   This one was a flop!

Other things we did:

Attended the Musical TEXAS in Palo Duro Canyon (now in it's 43 year)

Music on the square in Albuquerque ( a local band plays on Wed-Friday night).  We loved the bluegrass--the kids--not so much.

• Wood Fired Pizza for supper--the best yet since Italy
  
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• A family dinner at ... Denny's--I know it sounds stupid, but was one of the funniest nights as we at Breakfast for Dinner!
  

This was probably the most relaxing vacation since 2006 when we did our Austin, Trip. We had no real agenda or schedule--just an idea of what we wanted to do.

What creative things did you do on vacation this year?