Cooler Weather

Now that summer is in full swing down her in Texas, we went up to Wisconsin to enjoy their cooler weather. DFW was quite a mess, with construction work on the roads causing us to circle around the airport before we could get to the remote parking. 

 The two hour plane flight to Wisconsin ended up taking 5 hours. As we were on our decent into Milwaukee, thunderheads rolled in, which meant the plane was diverted to O'Hare. Around the time we landed in Chicago, the Milwaukee airport was ready to receive planes again, but our plane needed to refuel. By the time our plane was tanked up, the bad weather from Milwaukee had made its way down to Chicago, so we were grounded on the runway waiting for the weather to clear again. It was a long flight but the kids did well considering the circumstances.

 After a day recovery in Kenosha, we all jumped into the car and my Aunt drove us up to north Wisconsin to my parents summer cottage. They had picked out a room specifically for her and called it "Sara Beth's room" and put some fairy stickers over all the walls. Sara Beth loved it. Hudson slept in our room, but he loved the ability to wake up at 3am with the knowledge that we will pick him up so he doesn't wake the rest of the house.

 My dad has an aluminum fishing boat which we took out on lake Michigan a couple times. Initially, he was concerned that Sara Beth wouldn't like the waves once we got out of the harbor, but as you can see, she had a great time with the "big waves."

 We all went on a tour of a tug boat. Heather felt that the 3-story vessel with close quarters was a horrible combination of her fear of heights and tight enclosed spaces, but Sara Beth had a great time exploring it.

 We even got a quick family picture by a propeller near the tug.

 Sara Beth had been looking forward to going to the beach. Last time we were up in Wisconsin, the water was really cold, but that didn't stop her from wanting to go in.

 This time, the water was only slightly cool, so I went in with her once she was done collecting shells at the beach.

 We also took a trip up to Door County to see some of the sights, though we were constrained on how far we could go without encroaching on nap time for the kids. We got to explore Cave Point. While there, a dragonfly landed on my finger long enough for me to show it to Hudson and Sara Beth.

 We also found some tunnels through the rocks near the shore...

 Which Sara Beth eagerly climbed through. She even convinced Heather to come through one of them with her.

 Since my 31st birthday was right before the trip and Sara Beth's 4th birthday was during the trip, my parents threw a party for the both of us. I got a pair of shirts: one for me and one for Hudson.

 On the birthday cake, they put all my candles on one side, and Sara Beth's on the other. Sara Beth became a little concerned as my candle flames merged into a large foot tall flame that ended up setting off the smoke detector.

 On the way back down to my aunt's house, we stopped to look at some Indian burial mounds and walk down a nature trail. The trail was beautiful and we enjoyed the lack of triple digit temperatures.

 Hudson had been figuring out that he can make really loud screaming noises. It wasn't that big of a deal while walking outside, but we began to worry if he would continue to use this newfound skill on the flight back to Dallas.

 Sara Beth had a great time reading some books with Aunt Sue. And playing with the cowboy hat that Aunt Sue had. And playing with the stuffed animal sheep that she had too.

 We went to visit my Great Great Aunt Teddy. Sara Beth loved the chocolate milk that she got to drink over there. Hudson loved all the chocolate flavored graham crackers that he got to snack on.

 By the end of the trip, we were looking forward to being able to come home and sleep in our own beds and have the kids sleep in their own beds in a separate bedroom from ours. Hudson loved being able to crawl around on the floor in a totally baby proof house, where he could get into unsupervised mischief, though when he ended up pulling the stroller and horse on top of himself, he needed a little help to get free again.