We spent July 1-4 at our cottage in Wisconsin. The place is officially "open for business". So, the whole crew was there for the long weekend. I took the kids for a little hike to the beach and we had to stop along the way for a few pics. Jake is my little poser.
It was a really nice day at the beach with a fair amount of people there. The water wasn't too cold and the fish were leaving Megan's toes alone.
Jake was actually hoping that fish would come and nibble at his toes. He waited patiently while Papa looked on:
He gave up after a while and had some beach fun of his own.
Friday evening was pretty uneventful. We had a nice steak dinner with Mimi & Papa and the kids turned in at a reasonable hour. On Saturday morning, Darin and I got a chance to get out on the golf course (we usually don't play together that much....we should get a babysitter more often).
We played at Evergreen and I was putting like a champ! That's about all I had going for me, so I figured it was worth mentioning.
Darin worked on a few projects around the house. Jake helped. Here they are painting the kitchen island legs.
Lisa & Will and kids came up on Saturday afternoon. While they were getting settled, the rest of us headed out for a bit. Darin went shooting with his dad and Michele, the kids and I went to Williams Bay to meet up with Jenny and Flip on their new, fast boat. And, Darin and Larry ended up joining us on the boat for a bit as well.
And working the ropes....
The kids all had a nice reunion upon our return to the cottage. Aunt Jenny brought out gifts from her fancy European vacation. Matching dresses for the girls:
The boys got matching Corsica shirts, too. But for some reason they couldn't wait to get into their pajamas and make smores in the campfire.
Everyone likes a good campfire:
And, while we were out there, Darin lit some fireworks that he had left over from last year.
Sunday morning brought a little relaxation. It's always nice to get all 4 kids to sit together.
Lisa and I brought the kids back out onto the boat with the McFlips while the guys ran errands and did some more house chores.
And then we headed back for an All-American dinner:
We were going to go out to see fireworks, but then changed the plan that afternoon when we all ran out of motivation. Flip went out to buy fireworks and set up a musical playlist to go along with his show. Our little crew was entertained:
We headed back to Chicago on Monday afternoon and the kids napped all the way home. Our neighbors had an impromptu BBQ, so we joined them and then played a little Running Bases in the alley:
That night, we walked over to the forest preserve clearing near our house and watched an amateur "almost professional" fireworks show. It's amazing how many people came out to watch this unofficial display. And, I can't imagine what they must have spent on that. There were a ton of kids at the Smith's house and someone brought out sparklers (and freeze pops). But, after about 40 minutes, the police shut it down. It was probably a good thing, because we were able to get the kids to bed at a decent hour.
T
All in all, it was a fun-filled, relaxing, exhausting and all-around good weekend.
Monday, July 25, 2011
4th of July Weekend
Wednesday, July 13, 2011
Father's Day 2011
We didn't do much for most of the day on Father's Day. That afternoon, Lisa and Will invited us over for dinner. It turned into a nice evening of visiting, bocce ball and good food.
More cottage
Darin let the kids drive the pontoon boat. They thought they were so cool.
We don't always light a campfire when we go there. The kids had been looking forward to smores, so I made them some at home over the stove. Note to self - the marshmallows cook MUCH faster over a gas flame on the stove top.
That'll probably be the last time we make indoor smores. They're just as happy to eat a plain marshmallow.
Birthday Boy!
My baby is 5. Geesh, he's like a big guy now. On his birthday, our family celebrated with cupcakes and presents (Ben 10 action figures). Then, a couple of days later, we had a kid party with a bouncy house. Of course, it rained. Fortunately, it wasn't raining all that hard during the party, so I sent the kids out to jump in the rain. Hey, there was a top on the bouncy house!
I let them come inside for cake. Jake picked this one out.
There's something about a bouncy house that makes everyone happy. Even these two siblings got along that day:
And, after the guests cleared out, Jake got a chance to play with Damien in their super hero costumes.
He seemed to have a pretty great time.
Program Day
Jake's last day at St. Cornelius was a little sad for me. He has some friends that he really loves and his teachers were really great. He'll be transferring to Queen of All Saints this fall and I feel a little bad. It's a good thing he's still so little (and very social) - he'll be just fine. This is Miss Riley - who he's been with for the last two years.
Girl Scout Camping
In early June, we took our troop camping. This was a big deal since one of the leaders has to go through 3 training modules to be able to do this. To the average person, this means giving up a weekend of their time to get trained. We were lucky to have Linda - who was interested in getting these girls to camp. Now, she'll have to be a leader for the remainder of our scout years because no one else will want to go through the training! This first pic is from the bridge that separates the parking area from the camp.
Linda made us a peach cobbler without an oven. She created her own little box oven out of an egg crate and heated coals and came out with this fantastic dessert:
We split the girls up into teams and gave them a mom leader. Then, we sent them off on a nature scavenger hunt. They each came up with their team name. This one happened to be "Team Fuzzy Bunnies":
Our trained leader got our campfire going:
And we made Smores!
I tried to get a photo of each girl with her mom. Here's our pic:
Here's my gal, roasting her marshmallow to a golden color.
After a raucous round of flashlight tag, we tried to settle them for bed. Here's Megan, with her best buddy, Margaret.
They actually slept pretty well....considering we had 29 people in our cabin (15 kids & 14 moms). Here's the cabin.
Here's our whole group of gals out on a hike after our big breakfast of bagels, donuts, fresh fruit, yogurt, and coffee for the moms.
We got to a spot on the trail that was really overgrown and pretty wet, so we turned around and I took this photo (I just liked this one):
And then a final shot of me and Megan on the trail in our unplanned matching shirts:
All in all, we had a great time and will definitely do it again!
Megan's Stuff
When it was near the end of the school year, I chaperoned Megan's class field trip to the Children's Museum. This was my group of 5 kids and they were awesome. Megan's teacher went easy on me and gave me a very well-behaved group. After the field trip, Megan gave me this note.
Side 1:
Side 2:
And, since I'm on the subject of Megan, here are a few pics from some of our girl scout activities this year. We went ice skating in March:
And in May, the 5th grade troop hosted a fancy tea party to help us earn the "Sister to Every Girl Scout" patch. It was a big group (this photo made the local paper, too):
And they also made a really cool craft. This is a flower pen:
