Wednesday, August 19, 2009

Michigan Trip

Well, we survived the road trip to Michigan this past week! I must say, the driving went WAY better than we expected. We left Thurs. around 6 a.m. and thought for sure the girls would fall back asleep...yeah, not gonna happen! They slept maybe a total of 45 minutes all the way to Chicago. We stayed in our old town of Geneva for the afternoon/night. We had a great time at the city pool, park, and of course enjoyed Portillos for dinner. Ahhh, how wonderful! The girls did a great job sleeping in their own double beds too in an adjoining room in the hotel. We got up early on Fri. and drove to MI.

We spent most of Friday playing with our cousins at their house. They just put up a huge new playground and had a brand new John Deere riding toy for the kids. Lots of hours of fun spent there. Well, except until Kate got run over by cousin Trennen! The kids got a little excited to start driving and forgot to wait until everyone was in the car. Looking back it was pretty funny to see but at the time it was very scary to see this tractor that holds up to 140 lbs going over Kate's leg, tummy and up her arm! Saturday we spent the afternoon there too (and boy was it hot out!). The only issue was the two beagle dogs they have. Unfortunately because of the girls' incident with the big black dog, they are very afraid of dogs and that caused some trauma around the two little puppies. We made some progress but still have a long way to go! Any suggestions, please provide!!!

Saturday night we baptized cousin Preston. The girls had such a great time holding him, especially Kate. She couldn't stop kissing his forehead. And Annie couldn't stop kissing his feet! What great cousins they are going to be to him! Then on Sunday we spent some time visiting Kristin and Chris' HoneyBaked Ham store. We got to make our own sandwiches in the kitchen and learned that we probably wouldn't get paid much if that was what we did for a living ;) I think we are lucky we don't live around there or we would be eating their food a lot!!! Kris and I got some girl time and went to the outlet mall for a few hours so that was nice. And then we got to spend some adult kid cousin time over at our Aunt's house playing video games on Sun. night.

Mon we got up and left at 8:00 a.m. and decided to drive through the UP rather than through Chicago. What a nice change of pace! We all really loved it. The girls were doing so great that we decided to drive through all the way home! 15 hours later (and a stop for lunch, dinner and The Mystery Spot) we made it home at 11:15 p.m. I can honestly say that the girls did not complain once on the way home!!! We watched Cheaper by the Dozen 2 more times than I would like to remember and spent hours playing with Silly Putty (which we keep finding all over the car)!

We had a great visit with our family and wish we could spend more time with them. We also learned this weekend that we will probably move the girls into the same room soon as they both really enjoyed sleeping on single beds in the same room! What little buds they have become! We look forward to seeing everyone again for Christmas as we will be making the trek back in a few months!

Monday, August 10, 2009

Friendly BBQ

This past weekend we finally got all the high school girls and husbands together for a BBQ over at Liz's house. It was so great to see everyone again. The girls had a great time playing with Sierra, Alex, and Colton. I think they could have stayed there forever playing in playhouse in the backyard. Man, I wish we had one of those to keep them entertained! Unfortunately Kate started to cough and get a scratchy voice when we got home that night. It is a good thing Brian decided to take her to urgent care on Sunday as they informed us she had pneumonia and of course...two ear infections starting again. UGH! We are definitely calling the ENT back if she gets one more infection as this has been the 5th one in the last 3 months. Not fair for the little peanut. Luckily her pneumonia doesn't seem to be too bad as she is acting really well for the most part and isn't short of breath or wheezing at all. We were shocked actually with the diagnosis. Hopefully her meds will kick this out of her system as we are supposed to drive to MI this weekend for a family visit and baptism of little Preston. Crossing our fingers she feels better over the next two days!

Annie enjoying the pool at the BBQ
The girls driving the jeep. Kate said she wants to be a driver when she grows up. She said she can drive cars, boats, planes, buses...anything she wants!

Painting on Sunday morning at 8:00 a.m.! Had to find a way to keep them busy that early in the morning while Dad slept in!

Firehouse Fun!

Well, this post is a little late but as the saying goes...Better Late than Never! Two Sundays ago, the girls had a great day! While Dad enjoyed a nice 4-hrmotorcycle ride with my dad and step-mom, Kate, Annie and I got to spend some time at the Wayzata Fire House Picnic. My mom's boyfriend Scott is a volunteer firefighter for Wayzata so we were invited to their family picnic. Not only did the girls get to go in two fun jumpers, but we also got to go on a 15-min. ride ON TOP of a firetruck throughout Wayzata! Kate was all smiles but Annie was pretty stone-faced until the end when she then decided she wanted more. We had a great time! Then we went out to visit Bapa David and Grandma Nancy. We got to play outside for a long time, see their new dirt bike that they bought for the girls (ummm, nice try...just an excuse for them to buy a fun new toy!), sit in Bapa's boat and pretend fish and then go out for dinner. A busy but very fun day!



On top of the firetruck...Kate smiling, Annie not so sure!
Annie and Grandma playing in the grass.
Kate fishing!
Good hit Kate!The girls "riding" the new dirt bike!