Hello to all,
We hope that you had a good Memorial Day weekend. Ours was great. Weather-wise, it felt more like the 4th of July than Memorial Day. It was jam-packed with fun for the kids and us.
We took the chance to get away to Michigan for the weekend. Kari's surgery is this Wednesday so we were all looking for a good distraction. Plus after a week of final prep for surgery, a broken pipe complete with flood on our first floor and a strange 3:00 AM visit from a critter in our dryer vent, we needed to get out of town.
Kari's family has a home in Saugatuck, MI. From our place in Oak Park, The Lodge is an easy 2 1/4 hour drive. We left Thursday night, strategically timing our departure to guarantee that we only had to drop the sleeping kids in their beds in their rooms when we pulled into the garage.
Friday started with breakfast and running around the yard. James found a handful of large, fuzzy caterpillars and took to caring for them in the wagon in the garage. For some reason, they were content to hang out in the wagon and we were all surprised when they started eating the leaves that James brought to them.
After James' fuzzy friends were squared away, we went into town to play at the park in downtown Saugatuck. Any chance the kids can get to run and play, they seize. James made friends with some older triplet girls and they chased each other around the park. James certainly likes the ladies.
Here's Katie being generally cute and photogenic.
James became fascinated with the monkey bars and wanted nothing more than to master them. His new triplet, girl friends were all over the monkey bars but James won't admit that is why he wanted to learn.
After that, we took Katie back to the Lodge for a nap. James and I went off to climb Mt. Baldy as an adventure. Saugatuck has an interesting Cold-War relic smack-dab in the center of everything. There is a large sand dune between the main beach and the downtown area called Mt. Baldhead, or Baldy as the locals affectionately refer to it. At the top of the dune is what used to be an early-warning RADAR station, designed to protect us Chicagoans from long-range Soviet tactical bombers. Needless to say, it sits idle now. They mainly keep it for kitch value and to decorate around Christmas.
The white ping-pong ball above the tree line is the old RADAR dome.
To get to the top, there are 304 stairs that you need to climb. James and I counted each and every one. He did a great job going up, hiking through the woods and dunes. He also made it down all by himself with only one stop to snack on some fruit snacks for energy.
Here he is on the way up.
Here's the view from the top.
When we started on our hike from the top. James told me to take a picture of the map. He said that we could look at on my camera just in case we got lost.
Here is James on our descent down the dune on the back side that faces Lake Michigan.
After we hiked down the lake-side of the dune, we took another path back through the woods, never having to refer to the map carefully stored in the memory card in my camera. 304 stairs down to get to the car and back to the Lodge.
Saturday morning brought breakfast, more playing in the yard, tending to the caterpillars and the idea to teach James to ride his bike without his training wheels. After a little maintenance, James and his Papa Bede took off the training wheels, and the lessons began.
The first few runs on Saturday went okay. Here are the highlights. (since we were riding bikes, we couldn't keep Katie out of the action.)
We gave up after a little while but picked up it again Sunday morning. After a little more practicing, he took right to it. Check it out...
...and...
That didn't take long.
After we watched James spin circles through the cul-de-sac, we packed the kids in the car and headed off to my sister and brother-in-law's house about an hour away. They have a place with access to Scott Lake. It is a clean lake, without a lot of boat traffic. It was great pre-kids when we all used to ski and tube. Post-kids it is just as nice. We took a picnic lunch out on their pontoon boat and cruised the lake.
James had a chance to show Uncle Marc how to drive.
We then donned our life jackets and heaved over the anchor so that we could lounge in the water. James really liked this but he was freaked out when the waves came over him from the other boat traffic.
Little Miss Katie was a completely different story. We had to physically retrain her from jumping in the water while everyone else was getting in. She kept saying "I jump in!" over and over until Kari took her in. Once she was there, she was unflappable. She gladly drank about a gallon of lake water and cheered on the waves. She proudly told everyone that "I am swimming", over, over and over.
After a long day of boating, playing at the beach and having all of the cousins hang out together, we packed two exhausted kids in the car and plopped them into their beds when we made it back to the Lodge.
We woke up early this morning to strong thunder storms. Remarkably, the kids slept through everything. After breakfast, we went outside after the rain broke to watch James ride his bike again. When he went to check on his caterpillars, James was excited to show us that they they had started to create cocoons in the wagon. We didn't see that one coming.
Our drive back was longer than usual with heavy rain and construction traffic. Katie napped a little but they were both good for the most part.
We're back unpacking and cleaning up. We have a long week ahead of us. It was good to get away and we all needed this weekend.
We'll keep all of you up to date as Kari heads into surgery on Wednesday. She has her pre-op appointment on Tuesday. They will let her know the actual surgery time then.
Take care.
Jay
What a great weekend! Congratulations to James on his training-wheel free biking. What a pro! He's given me a little more inspiration to get Joel wheeling around the hood. And Katie was just too cute on her mini-bike. Way to go Katie!!!
James became fascinated with the monkey bars and wanted nothing more than to master them. His new triplet, girl friends were all over the monkey bars but James won't admit that is why he wanted to learn.
After that, we took Katie back to the Lodge for a nap. James and I went off to climb Mt. Baldy as an adventure. Saugatuck has an interesting Cold-War relic smack-dab in the center of everything. There is a large sand dune between the main beach and the downtown area called Mt. Baldhead, or Baldy as the locals affectionately refer to it. At the top of the dune is what used to be an early-warning RADAR station, designed to protect us Chicagoans from long-range Soviet tactical bombers. Needless to say, it sits idle now. They mainly keep it for kitch value and to decorate around Christmas.
The white ping-pong ball above the tree line is the old RADAR dome.
To get to the top, there are 304 stairs that you need to climb. James and I counted each and every one. He did a great job going up, hiking through the woods and dunes. He also made it down all by himself with only one stop to snack on some fruit snacks for energy.
Here he is on the way up.
Here's the view from the top.
When we started on our hike from the top. James told me to take a picture of the map. He said that we could look at on my camera just in case we got lost.
Here is James on our descent down the dune on the back side that faces Lake Michigan.
After we hiked down the lake-side of the dune, we took another path back through the woods, never having to refer to the map carefully stored in the memory card in my camera. 304 stairs down to get to the car and back to the Lodge.
Saturday morning brought breakfast, more playing in the yard, tending to the caterpillars and the idea to teach James to ride his bike without his training wheels. After a little maintenance, James and his Papa Bede took off the training wheels, and the lessons began.
The first few runs on Saturday went okay. Here are the highlights. (since we were riding bikes, we couldn't keep Katie out of the action.)
We gave up after a little while but picked up it again Sunday morning. After a little more practicing, he took right to it. Check it out...
...and...
That didn't take long.
After we watched James spin circles through the cul-de-sac, we packed the kids in the car and headed off to my sister and brother-in-law's house about an hour away. They have a place with access to Scott Lake. It is a clean lake, without a lot of boat traffic. It was great pre-kids when we all used to ski and tube. Post-kids it is just as nice. We took a picnic lunch out on their pontoon boat and cruised the lake.
James had a chance to show Uncle Marc how to drive.
We then donned our life jackets and heaved over the anchor so that we could lounge in the water. James really liked this but he was freaked out when the waves came over him from the other boat traffic.
Little Miss Katie was a completely different story. We had to physically retrain her from jumping in the water while everyone else was getting in. She kept saying "I jump in!" over and over until Kari took her in. Once she was there, she was unflappable. She gladly drank about a gallon of lake water and cheered on the waves. She proudly told everyone that "I am swimming", over, over and over.
After a long day of boating, playing at the beach and having all of the cousins hang out together, we packed two exhausted kids in the car and plopped them into their beds when we made it back to the Lodge.
We woke up early this morning to strong thunder storms. Remarkably, the kids slept through everything. After breakfast, we went outside after the rain broke to watch James ride his bike again. When he went to check on his caterpillars, James was excited to show us that they they had started to create cocoons in the wagon. We didn't see that one coming.
Our drive back was longer than usual with heavy rain and construction traffic. Katie napped a little but they were both good for the most part.
We're back unpacking and cleaning up. We have a long week ahead of us. It was good to get away and we all needed this weekend.
We'll keep all of you up to date as Kari heads into surgery on Wednesday. She has her pre-op appointment on Tuesday. They will let her know the actual surgery time then.
Take care.
Jay
1 comment:
What a great weekend! Congratulations to James on his training-wheel free biking. What a pro! He's given me a little more inspiration to get Joel wheeling around the hood. And Katie was just too cute on her mini-bike. Way to go Katie!!!
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