Chris & Amanda: September 2013

Warning Long Post

It's been another fun summer yall! So beware that this is most likely going to be a long post. But it will be exciting!

For the Fourth of July we went to Little Amerrika and rode the roller coasters. I still haven't done the water bumper cars there, but Grandma Morse and Wesley were able to stand in line long enough for it. It was hot, but not as hot as some years we have been and this year the twins were old enough that they actually enjoyed the rides. This fire truck ride was their favorite and they had to ride at least six times!

Here is Grandma Morse, Chris and Wesley (his head is poking out on the left) on Wesley's favorite ride the twirl-a whirl.

Wesley's favorite animal is the Zebra, so it's fitting that you can find Chris, Grandma Morse and Wesley all riding one. We went on this ride after doing that twirl-a-whirl ride a few times in a row, and boy I was starting to feel it in my stomach after the merry-go-round. Who know that the merry-go-round would be too much spinning after a fast spinning ride! Don't worry everybody, I did not throw up.

Here is Kairi on the 4th of July in her new Hello Kitty holiday shirt. The twins call these shirts their holiday shirts whenever we pull them out. Side note: Our grass looks really green in this picture!

Here is Kate in her holiday shirt.

We had Aunt Michelle and Uncle Allen stop by for burgers, brats, chips and watermelon on the 4th.

Fast Forward a little bit and let me try to remember the name of this place....um...I forgot. It was someplace in Europe by the looks of it, a real Villa. We visited this place along with a beach one weekend.

The inside was pretty too. Too bad the funicular, the short tram ride we had really gone there for, was out of order. Shucks!

Chris, Kairi, Kate, Wesley

You can even see this cool water tower in the distance. I mean, we called it Rapunzel's tower and the kids thought it was awesome!

Here is the entrance floor to the Villa that the original family created by hand picking these rocks for 2-3 years from the nearby beach until they had enough. Talk about dedication to a project. If I had a project that took that long, I'd probably give up on it and use something else for my flooring!

This was the amazing house next to the Villa we visited. We decided that the neighbors really didn't want to be outdone, so these next two fancy pantsy houses were created.

Here you can see Wes man, Kairi, AmanDA, and Kate in front of the tower. And yes, you do have to shout the "da" in my name in order to say it correctly. Just ask my kids!

Zip through time again and you will come to Epicnic which is the annual company picnic lunch, games and shows that Chris's work puts on.

Here is someone crawling out of a blow up caterpillar.

And Chris came out alive too. Phew!

Wesley was six in line perhaps to the piñata and he waited a really long time for it to break. We were there probably a half hour or more before he gave up on anyone breaking it and went to go do something else. Michelle told me later that eventually the guys in charge just broke the thing themselves. We needed some more older kids to hit the beast. We came back later and were able to get some candy out of a broken bumblebee piñata that was left on a table. I supposed they had that one in case the first broke to fast, but it was nice to raid it after the fact so Wesley could get something for the hard work he did.

Here Wesley is riding a tractor. It was hard for him to actually steer and I had to keep correcting the wheel. :)

Here's a random picture of our backyard. I put tan bark under the trees so we wouldn't have to mow under them and try to avoid branches attacking us, I mean Chris. I haven't mown the lawn yet. And if you notice on the right near the fence I finally managed to destroy the gross dirt/compost pile that only grew weeds. I discovered some animal bones, gourds, string, toy cars etc in that pile.

Fast forward yet again! We went on a train trip to Minot, ND to visit the peeps out there. Here we are inside of the Amtrak train. In case you ever plan on riding by rail, here are a few things to note:

Do not plan to be on time. Plan to be a half hour to three hours late. If you get motion sickness don't ride the train for over 14 hours. You're kids will pull your hair while you're trying to sleep. Train bathroom stalls really were not designed to contain a parent and child inside of them comfortably, so hope your kids want to use the loo by themselves. Bring your own entertainment, but the more compact the better. The coat closet won't fit a backpack in there.

It was a neat experience to ride the train, something everyone should do once in a life time. I think we'll drive next time though. It was a little rough departing out of MD back to WI when the train didn't make it in until near 11pm and my kids usually go to bed at 7. But we did have fun. Here you can see the long view of our family area. The two seats there fold down to make a long adult bed, and another adult bed folds out of the wall above.

The seat on the right here folds down to make a child sized bed and another child sized bed folds down from the roof. Nice and cozy.

We got to eat a breakfast and a dinner on the train(s). Kate and Wesley have such great picture faces!

Kairi and Amanda ate the food too. Actually, Kairi got sick the second day of the train going on our trip and kindly passed the cold, sleepy, fever, sore throat sickness onto the rest of the family over the course of the week of our vacation. I think it hit us in this order: Kairi, Kate, Wesley, Chris, Grandpa, Amanda. Everyone had varying degrees of symptoms. I never got a fever, but I did get a sore throat and felt rather tired.

Here's the Amtrak train!

While we were in ND we got to visit some cousins. Here you can see Abby, Brie and Chelsea and Aunt Erin. This was when we attended an end of summer reading celebration for the library. It was a fun party with free food and prizes.

Wesley and Kate are bowling.

Kairi thought it was fun to ride this...snail?

Grandma Heit helped bowl too. You'll notice the jackets, because it was unusually cool for summer time while we were there.

Here is a small child sized Frisbee golf fame that Kairi, Wesley, Kate and Chris are playing.

Wesley really had fun climbing up bleachers. I think this was his first bleacher experience to be honest.

Hooray! You did it!

We went to another free food park celebration that commemorated Minot surviving the flood a year ago. Was that only a year ago?

The kids climbed through a bouncy house. Wesley must have gone through it sixteen times or more with Grandma Heit. Thanks for climbing grandma!

We stopped by the far side of the park to see some parked train cars.

We also attended Oak Park a few times, sorry no pictures, and visited the library, again no pictures, and visited Randy's work (loved their mix your flavor drink machine), and saw Rick and Erin's house and more.

Here is a great shot of Chris and Uncle Rick playing roller blade hockey in the backyard like they did when they were little kids. I think the court was larger when they were smaller.

I tried to score against Rick for a few minutes and considering I'd never held a hockey stick before, I think I didn't do too bad. :)

We went to Splashdown something or other and the kids all had a great time! I was impressed that my timid kids all went down the water slides, on a parents lap, multiple times.

On our way back home on Amtrak the kids got to go to the lounge and see a junior forest ranger exhibit thing. They held the stuffed animals.

Fast Forward

I got a kids meal cook book from Grandma Heit while we were out there and it came in handy one night when I had No Idea what to make for dinner. Dog pancakes!

Here is a "science" activity I did with the kids making oobleck or goop out of cornstarch and water. Wesley was scared to touch it at first until I shoved his hands in and then he played with it for a full hour!

Zip!

We went to Kids museum in Rockford for Labor Day I believe and this time we got to see the outside features we had not seen before. There was a dinosaur digging spot.

And there was a wooden park with a cave.

And there was a whole water ways system that we floated boats down.

Actually, Kate just held her boat most of the time and Wesley and I rearranged some white pvc tubes to shoot water out different ways. That wasn't pictured because it was rather wet.