Cousin Swap & Odd Ball

Our 17 1/2 hour trip home was on MJ's birthday. That is why she got to open her presents before vacation. While at grandmas we had her dessert and sang to her. I can't believe she is 13! We have an official teenager in the house! 

One of Lil's gifts came in the mail late. It's a pop socket for the back of her phone. She really likes wolves, and yin yangs. This combines them both and she loves it. 

It's good to be home with our toys again. Buddy Boy and Ms M decided to spend some of their money on some Rollerblades. Now four of them have them. The littles can Rollerblade better than their older sisters. They practice a lot more. 

The only thing that grew in our garden this year was weeds and zucchini. And we have plenty of both. So the kids helped me make some zucchini bread. We love that stuff! 

Meet Ron, aka Ronald. This is Lil's special toy. She loves Ron. One of the kids got Ron stuck on our neighbors roof. So I went over with a rake to get him down. After a few swipes this is how he was stuck. I had to laugh. Just hanging there by two paws. Hehe. 

This is RB and I digging holes for our new deck. Our good friend has been coming over for an hour or two every few days and helping us build it. 

We weren't sure if the cousin swap was going to happen this year and luckily it did. MJ and Lil had so much fun with their cousin! They did so much: a hike, swimming, the jump zone, a laser tag game area, Pickleball, and I'm sure I'm missing something. They loved it! Then they came here and didn't really do anything. I felt bad but we played a game and then they just wanted to play and hang out. So we let them. 

While they were gone for some of the days we had two extras. We had some dear friends move and their girls were good friends with my kids. So for Ms M's b-day she wanted her friends to come and stay with us. So they got too! They had so much fun playing, and playing, and seeing fireworks (twice), and did I mention they played! They had a great time! 

MJ and Lil left and was replaced by Mayo (MJ's nickname given to her by the Em-A-Nator) and another Lil. :) 

City days fireworks. 

RB and I have never been to the cannery. It was four hours of hard work. Not hard physically, but hard because it was mundane, and monotonous. I got to work with two wonderful sisters and had great conversations with them. That helped pass the time. I added green beans, or took out beans from the cans and weighed them again. Once they met the weight limit I put it back on the line. RB was outside and couldn't hear or talk to anyone. It is loud out there. So it was a longer time for him. He made sure no leaves or twigs were on the line and he pulled them off if they were. Then he swept. When we left at 8:30 they had already canned 84,000 cans of green beans! They were hoping for a 100,000 can day. That is cans of beans going to help people that are struggling financially, or are in a natural disaster and need food. So much good is coming from those canneries! The churches welfare program is AMAZING! After we finished our shift we were starving. So we came here so RB could enjoy the crab-fest! 

Vacation Day 6-8, & The Trip Home

Us ready to leave Galena and get on with the rest of our vacation. Each town had a water tower, that we called golf balls. It's how we knew we were in a new city. 

Our last stop on our vacation was to The Dells, WI at the Wilderness Resort. We spend three nights here swimming, seeing an old friend, and yes eating yummy food. :) 

 

Our view from our windows. These are just two of the six water parks. Each of the three hotels had an inside and an outside park that you could go to any of them. The kids really liked the wave pool. RB liked the water slide ones with the blue mats. 

I'm so glad our friend was able to come and spend a night and day with us! We miss her tons! We ate at Monks and that was DELICIOUS! I hope to be able to eat there again one day. Our waiter was fantastic too. He knew RB and I were going to split each thing we got and so he just served it on separate plates for us. Then when Ms M spilled water everywhere he immediately got towels and was not upset at all. Yummy food and good service equals a happy family. 

On our first day there we were eating at the buffet. MJ was brushing her hair and she asked what the hard bump was on the back of her head. I looked and sure enough it was a tick! We did not have tweezers or Vaseline and so we had to ask the front desk for help. They called an EMT guy, who came with the hotel manager, and then a security guard showed up too. It took them about 10 min. to get him out, but they did. They were so good to MJ, who yes was freaking out just a little bit. The manager said, "We haven't had that many ticks this year." To which RB responded, "Look how lucky you are to get one of them this year." MJ was not impressed with her daddy. :) After we got it out we looked at the gift shop and MJ found a huge stuffed pineapple. So she seemed comforted after that! 

RB wanted to try this waffle bar place. All sandwiches were made out of waffles and we got each one with ice-cream on it. It was pretty good. Kind of expensive though and I'm not sure we would go back. But it was a cool experience to have. 

While driving around the Dells we saw many water parks, and many crazy buildings. They like themes that is for sure. 

After three days in The Dells it was time to come home. We completely wore out our kids and they did a lot of sleeping. We also listened to a lot of Harry Potter #5. We were hoping to make it to Nebraska to stay the night before continuing on the next day. After looking at GPS, we decided that we could just keep driving and make it to my parents home. We got an hour back which helped too. We had a dinner with my sister and took a little break before heading the rest of the way and making it to my parents about 10:30pm. 17 1/2 hours in one day! It was a long drive but the day was wasted anyways so we might as well just keep going as far as we could!

        

Our vacation felt like two. The church sites as one, and The Dells as another. It was a lot of traveling, but we had a great time and many great memories were made! 

Vacation Day 5

Day 5 was a rest day. We stayed at the hotel, swam, found a good place to eat, and chilled. Our room had a jetted tub and the kids loved that. Downtown Galena was pretty cool. All the shops so close to each other. We walked the street for a bit. It was cool.