Trip to Milwaukee

We did a HUGE roadtrip this past weekend. We drove from Shakopee to Milwaukee to visit Auntie Wanda and Uncle Sean. We had prepared for a long time for the car trip, not knowing how it would be handled. Cailin does fine in the car. Pop a movie in the DVD player and she's set for days. She only needs to stop and use the restroom and would happily snack in the car while watching movies - she's the easy one.
Masher (Andrew) on the other hand, gets his fill at about 1 1/2 -2 hours of driving, then he's DONE! He'll grab at the straps on his car seat and yell (at the top of his lungs) "GET OUT MAMA!" when he's done. So I had done massive research on 'car trips with toddlers', asking friend, strangers - etc for ideas. But the good news is everything went great on the car ride. We had gotten an idea to get several small toys/presents and wrap them, so that every 20-30 minutes you can give the kids something new to open. They absolutely loved it. Some of the items were very small, candy bar, juice box - some were bigger - a Leap Pad or new movie. Either way, the monsters loved it and the car ride there and back )(362 miles each way) was very uneventful!

We had a blast hanging with Auntie Wanda and Uncle Sean. We played at their house, took walks, went to the playground (we even spent time on the volleyball court teaching the kidlins a thing or two about blocking and hitting), visited the Milwaukee Zoo and just hung out by the campfire, roasted s'mores - etc. We had fun. It was nice to spend so much time with Wanda and Sean.
We are looking forward to another trip out to see them.
As soon as we arrived home, we were unpacking and Cailin asked if we could go back to stay today.....maybe not today, but soon I said.
:)

The arrival of his 'Highness..."

His Highness, the Royal Michael Matthew Tichy (Karen's brother's son) arrived with his mom and dad for a week-long visit at the end of August. It's funny, but that's what his parents call him, 'his Highness'. And he tries to live up to the name.

All kidding aside, John, Melissa and Michael came for a visit. It was great to see them all, as it had been a year since we saw them last.

They stayed up in the cities for the first part of the trip, then they traveled down to Nelson to stay near Oma for a few days. We visited the Tichlins at their hotel in Edina and visited the indoor play area - Edinborough. It wasn't very busy (very nice) and we got to play all morning. We also played a little in their hotel room as well, then had lunch. We also spent time at our house, showing Michael our collection of toys that we have accumulated over the years. Cailin and Andrew were happy to share their toys and 'show' him how to use everything.

So we took to the camper down for the latter part of the week and were able to spend additional time with them down there at oma's place. We took our camper and hooked up to Mom's red barn for electricity. John, Melissa and Michael stayed at a condo in Wabasha for the week (since mom has two foreign exchange students staying with her for the school year).

We all had fun playing together. The kids got a long great. We were thrilled (probably less thrilled than Michael's parents) to show Michael a few 'new' things that hopefully will remind him of his Minnesota cousins, such as fruit loops cereal, hot dogs and toys out the ying yang.
Michael has grown so much and the kids played well together.

Andrew had big fun driving Oma's tractor around the yard. We also played in the pool quite a bit and managed to splash almost every bit of water OUT of the pool by playing a jumping game called 'chop, chop, timber', where they would stand for the chop, chop part and jump up in the air and kersplash into the pool for the timber part (from swim lessons...). Oh, what fun!
Cailin was excited to float in the pool. Masher enjoyed, well mashing in the pool.

Kamp Dels

We've done a few more camping trips as we had hoped with our new camper. One such trip was to Kamp Dels in Waterville, MN. This wasn't quite the type of camping experience I remember from when I was a kid. This place was huge! It had a petting zoo, mini-golf, lake, boat rides, pony rides, a large pool with diving board and a water park as well as several playgrounds, big and small. We decided to try and hit it when there were fewer people - Monday through Thursday. It was a nice deal, we'd do that again for sure! As we arrived on Sunday, it was craaaazy nuts. But then it quieted down, it was still busy, but much less crazy. Cailin loved the water park. Andrew not so sure about the water park, but loved jumping into mom or dad's arms into the pool. Then poor Andrew, as if on command, got double ear infections (including a trip to the Waseca Medical Center - Urgent Care), then a trip to THE Walmart in the area (everyone knew WE were from outta town...) to get our prescription filled. He was pretty crabby for the last few days, poor guy. He and mom hung out a lot in the camper, while daddy and Cailin hung out with the friends we went with, Luke, Sarah, Caleb and Dawson (our friends from across the street). All in all, it was a great trip, we had a ton of fun, and are already planning our trip for next year.

Cailin and Caleb hung out in the in hammock, and wanted to play in the campers (theirs as well as ours). They wanted to watch movies, so we had to remind them of all the fun stuff to do.

Plus, the best thing it was only about 40 minutes from our house! That was sweet!