The cousin is coming, the cousin is coming!!

Uncle John, Auntie Melissa and Cousin Michael made a recent visit to the frozen tundra. They live in DC, and come to visit every year around this time, so we were all thrilled and filled with anticipation awaiting their arrival. They stayed in the cities for a few days and came to our house - we played with toys and more toys, had a fire (on purpose) in our backyard and made s'mores which I think might have been the first time for Michael. We went to their hotel and all went swimming and played in their room with, you guessed it - more toys....

This is during the big 'smore' event. Michael wasn't as interested in chocolate or marshmellows as our kids were...

Then they headed down to Nelson to stay with Oma. We followed on Wednesday of that week and stayed until just after they left on Saturday.

This picture was taken in the morning looking down towards Wabasha - usually you can see the bridge over the Mississippi and the city of Wabasha - but the clouds had the city all socked in. It was a really cool site.

We went to the Eagle Center in Wabasha - it was way cool! They have six live eagles there, plus awesome displays and not to mention the great view of the Mississippi River.

The kids put their heads in this eagle display - it lasted about 5 seconds.....

The view of the river was pretty fantastic too.

We also headed to the toy store in Kellogg for carousel rides and to play.

Cailin and Michael spent a lot of time together. Andrew would sort of float in and out, but overall, would do his own thing. Cailin would try and tell Michael what to do and Michael would try and tell Cailin what to do - it was a perfect set up.

We went to Alma to climb the big, big bridge over the railroad tracks. The kids wanted to see a train go by, and they waited and waited. They waited more patiently than the adults did until finally we pulled them away to head back for dinner with friends that were expected to visit.

The kids waited and watched. We were assured that there would be a train because we had heard that there are like 37 trains that pass under this bridge every day. So we figured the odds were with us that if were here for an 1/2 hour, that we'd see a train. The only train we saw was one parked on the side of tracks in a siding. The big topic of discussion with the kids then was "why is that train parked there? is it broken?"
We said our goodbyes and the kids were very sad to see their buddy Michael leave. Andrew kept asking "mommy, when do we get to see Michael again?". We told him we hoped really soon!

Movie Night

So it rained buckets and buckets last night (which is good because we really, really need it) - I think our rain gauge said over 4" last night alone. We had 1 1/2" the day before, so we've been inside a little bit over the past few days. Today is incredibly humid, so we spent some of the day outside running through the sprinkler but otherwise, we did inside stuff. Went to the store to rumage around and stayed inside playing games otherwise.
One of the kids' favorite thing to do is to stay up late and have "movie night". tonight's featured film was "Finding Nemo" and oldie but a goodie. We had popcorn and all and the kids love when we fold down the futon downstairs in the family room so they can lounge around.
Now, it's bedtime for everyone......including me...Hey, these kids wear me out!!

:)

Vacation Bible School

As soon as we got back into town from our camping trip - Cailin started her Vacation Bible School - VBS. It was held just up the street from our house at a church called Brookwood. Our friends, Sarah and Luke invited Cailin to join their oldest son, Caleb since he was also attending.

It was a long night for Cailin, since it went from 6-8:30pm. She's used to climbing into bed around 8pm and after a long weekend of camping and staying up late and playing through naps, we were a little tired by the week's end, that's for sure.

They did the theme of "Crocodile Dock" for VBS. And on the last night, the parents and family members were invited to a presentation that the kids prepared for them. Cailin loved her teacher, Lisa. The presentation included discussion about what they learned, about the mission projects they were raising money for and they performed some of the songs (with actions) for the parents that they had been practicing all week. It was fantastic and very organized. Everyone did a spectacular job! And Cailin had a blast as well....

More camping

This was our attempt to get a decent picture of the two kids together. That is not such an easy task. One of the two of them has to be a ham and it's usually Cailin and by the time we get her settled down, Andrew is usually quite bored and ready to bail......

We tried out another camping destination. We went to a place called Kiesler's - it's in Waseca, MN - yes big old Waseca. It's actually a really cute little town, not too far from our house.

They have a really nice pool with slides and playground equipment and we all brought our bikes and were able to take a few nice rides as well.

Cailin had just returned from one of our visits to the pool. She was purple as a popsicle since she would stay in there as long as possible. She is quite a fish!!!

Our campsites always look a little crazy since we bring almost everything we own it seems like. So the kids have their bikes, and toys and we have our bikes, chairs and lots of games and such, so our campsite (especially when we have been swimming like in these pictures) looks a little messy to say the least....
We had a couple of rain storms, but thankfully they were overnight and not at all severe - so we were able to be inside for those. The day time was nice. the first day was a bit cool, but that didn't stop the mashers from wanting to hit the pool. We spent a lot of time playing in the pool, playing at the playgrounds and playing in the volleyball pits - they had the best sand in their volleyball area! The kids brought sand toys (or I should say I brought sand toys for the kids) and the adults got to play a little volleyball - pepper a bit.... It was fun.

The evenings were spent by the campfire having beer and chatting with our friends, Luke and Sarah. It was a great time!

Cousin Doey

We 'affectionately' call our cousin Doey - his real name is Joey, but it's a carryover from his childhood, that just sort of stuck. Doey graduated this past spring and is soon heading off to the University of Wisconsin Madison. Doey came over to spend the night with us this past weekend and the kids were very excited to spend time with him.

Doey is very great with the kids and the kids enjoyed every minute of his time at our house. We're already trying to plan a stop in Madison to visit Doey in his new digs.
It was a warm weekend, so we set the pool up and played for awhile. Doey and Drew had fun playing in the water - they'd take turns pouring water over each other's heads. Drew handled that well - I was surprised. They were laughing big time.

So this is how the routine went down. Andrew would say "doey, can I pour water on your head? and Doey would say "sure Drew - go ahead" and Andrew would pour the water on his head, and squeal with delight. Then Doey would pour some on Andrew's head, then Drew would momentarily stop, and we were wondering if he'd cry or laugh - sure enough, he'd wipe his eyes and laugh, then they'd repeat the whole process - over and over and over and over and over - ok you get the picture.

Cailin is still in a phase where she doesn't want to pose for the camera, so we usually get this flat look when she sees the camera come out. Funny, she used to be quite a ham, I'm guessing this phase of non-compliance for the camera is only temporary - hopefully. She has a very cute smile!

Cailin was sort of a little Popsicle by the end of the day - it was now close to 7pm, almost time for tubs (hard to imagine, since she was wet pretty much all day) but a good chance to warm up. So we snuggled on the swing set for a little while before heading in for the day.
And of course, Lion and Panda had to snuggle as well.

Joey or sorry Doey stayed long enough to read the kids their bedtime stories and the kids were sad to have the weekend end as well as sad to have their cousin Doey leave. We will sure miss him when he's away and will look forward to another visit with him soon!

Weekend in Wisconsin

We traveled to Willow River State Park, just outside of Hudson WI for a camping weekend. We hadn't been there before and wanted to try out a new location. This park is very highly recommended so we thought it would be nice to check it out for the weekend.
The campground is located on a river that has a large waterfall on one end (the north side of the park) and a dam on the other end. The dam creates Little Falls Lake, which is a motorized-free lake. It was very quiet in the park with tons of tree cover. Since it's a state park, there is no hunting allowed and there is a lot of wildlife. We saw several dozen deer while we stayed, racoons, squirels, wild turkeys, more deer, tons of birds - etc.

On our first day, we tracked down the park's two playgrounds and tested those out. We played in the lake with our toes. It was only in the high 60s the first day - odd for July, but it was very nice otherwise. Then we drove to a hike in spot for the falls. It's more of a rustic state park, so there is a lot of hiking and non-paved trails, which was fine for us. We hiked down a large hill to get to the bottom of the falls. The falls were magnificient, beautiful! The kids were even impressed.

We also checked out the dam. They have a narrow walkway, not quite big enough for two to pass. But that leads out to a large viewing area. Kind of scary, because you are so high up, but the kids liked it. There were a lot of people fishing, although we forgot our poles, we watched others catch lots of fish.
The kids (below) checking out the water as it came out of the dam.

Lion (of course) had to join us - he was FILTHY by the time we got home, well actually he was filthy before we left, but even more dirty when we got home....

We had campfires and smores and played in our camping site. The site was very nice, lots of tree cover, so you needed some confidence to back a camper in, but we did fine (or I should say, Mike did just fine....)
The kids had a blast. Andrew likes to say "Mommy take my picture.....CHEESE". Whereas Cailin HATES having her picture taken - we have several of her refusing to smile or making the cheesy smiley face. This one, she was agreeable.

We are looking forard to heading back to WI for another trip soon!

4th of July Weekend

We spent the 4th of July weekend camping with our camper at Baylor Regional Park. The sweet thing is that is was very close to home and it's a small park, so it was really nice and clean and had plenty for all of us to do for the five days we were there!

They have two awesome kids playgrounds, a lake, an observatory, plus lots of trails and fishing as well. We brought the bikes and tooled around as well as checked out the surrounding towns. The kids spent a lot of time at the playgrounds as well as riding around a lot. We were sure to bring lots of outside activities to play with around the campsite and Cailin was especially excited to be able to stay up late one night with the grown ups. She wanted to see the bats come out and she did - she loves the fact that her dad doesn't like bats so much, so she had to point them out whenever we did see them. Funny girl!

Masher had to bring puppy and snoopy - of course. Here he brought them to the playground. He thought snoopy would enjoy the slides he said.

We had great weather and lots of fun! We even got to watch the fireworks (after mashers went to bed) from our camping spot above the trees. Pretty sweet!


Cailin went to the playground in her jammies one morning (no shocker I guess). Thankfully everyone (kids and adults) really enjoy our camping trips and love being outdoors!!

Andrew's Birthday

We celebrated Andrew's 3rd birthday - well one of several... He has had several birthdays, we'll try to condense it down..

We went to Ham Lake and met up with our two auntie's, uncles and then our cousins to spend the day swimming and playing. Andrew's big wish this year was to have a pinata. We had one left over from before that we had stored in our garage. We weren't sure if he knew that the pinata would be destroyed afterwards, but he had done at least one pinata at daycare and had seen the candy flying out - so we weren't sure how he'd feel when all was said and done. He had been eyeing the one in the garage and insisted that's what he wanted to do for his birthday. He did love it.

Everyone took turns taking a swing at the pinata - inbetween swimming of course. Andrew was a good sport and let everyone else try too. But he took some hardy swings when it was his turn.

He also loved swimming, which was odd, since last year, he was pretty cautious. He didn't go in too deep, and actually wore his life jacket for a while when he was playing. Cailin went in as much and as far out as we'd let her. She wore her life jacket too and wanted to copy the big kids who were jumping off the end of the dock. We didn't really let her do that, but she jumped off the side of the dock a lot. She is quite the fish and Andrew is building up his courage to be a good fish.

Someone I work with (karen) has a family member that likes to make fancy cakes, and since Andrew is deep into the movie "Cars" and Lightning McQueen - he was able to score us a McQueen cake. Very cool. I had shown a picture of the cake to Andrew before we brought it home and he was just obsessed with it!

This first picture is Andrew staring into the box where the cake was. When we first brought it home, he wanted to eat that soooooooooo much. Had a hard time waiting until it was 'time' to have cake.Here is the cake - that is Cailin's finger trying to grab a taste.. Yummy!

Cailin also got to go on her first boat ride with Uncle Dan and cousin Kayla (see below)and she loved it! Cailin also went fishing for the first time and then of course, caught her first fish. We weren't quick enough to get a shot of that one though. It was a very cute little sunfish (we let it go of course as quickly as possible). Luckily, daddy was willing to remove the fish she caught from the fishing pole. Not my favorite thing I guess. Andrew had received a fishing pole for his birthday and was willing to let Cailin use it and then watched very closely.
It was a very fun day and a great way to kick off the birthday 'season' for masher.

Joey's Graduation Party

Our cousin Joey graduated from Chaska High School and had his graduation party a couple of weekends ago. It was a beautiful day and he had a great turnout. Joey is off to the University of Wisconsin - Madison next year and wanted to do his party in a red and white theme (ala Madison colors). He's very excited.

It was a warm day, but we spent most of it outside playing games, running around, visiting with people, playing on the swingset -having a great time!!

Uncle Sean and Auntie Wanda drove up and spent the night with us. As soon as Andrew woke up (which was at 6:30am) he wanted to go down and give Uncle Sean a 'good morning' hug and kiss. The kids missed their Auntie and Uncle!
The kids loved playing and running around in the back yard.