September in Photos

I have to look back at my photos to figure out where this month went.  Where did it go?!

We moved a few miles down the road to a newer house.  Hopefully the windows won't leak here and M's room won't be freezing!

I had a bunch of these linen napkins that were my Grandmother's.  They were stained and yellowed, but I did an Oxi-Clean test and they didn't fall apart in the soak, so now we are actually using linen cloth napkins.  Yes, we are crazy, and yes we also eat on our wedding china every day.

I took this picture to send to my Mom and show her that the stains came out.

We spent the last few warm days over on Hayden Lake while all the poor big kids were stuck in school.  This beach is heavenly when it isn't crowded!

It's not Florida sand, but it will do!

Daddy is Britney Spears.

This was funny at the time, but now he only wants to sit up front when we get in the car...

For college football season, we root for the Gators, even though we don't actually watch the games.  My brother and SIL are die hard Gator fans even though neither of them went to school there.  My Mom and all her siblings went there so we grew up going to Gator games every year.  I have great memories of walking into the stadium and sweating it out with the rest of Gator nation during the hot Florida fall.  Dan is actually in UF's MBA program, so that keeps him in good graces with the rest of the family. =)

We are already getting a lot of use out of our jackets!

My wonderful Mom came to visit M and me for a few days while D took a trip to India.  M loved playing "hide and seek" in the woods with her!  D had to travel 36 hours just to get to India, and even more on the way back.  He did not find his inner guru, but we are so glad to have him home!

Playing hide and seek with Grammie D

 

What I'm looking forward to in October:

The possibility of a Catholic Mom Group starting up in our area!

Hopefully running a 10k and/or 5k, it looks like there are a few in the next couple of weeks in our area!

Finishing our paperwork to begin working with a new adoption agency!  We are still working with our private attorney, but are trying to spread the word that we are called to adopt again.

What are you looking forward to next month?

 

Glacier National Park: Driving the Going-to-the-Sun Road

Here's a quick post to finish up our recap of our time at Glacier National Park in Montana.

We woke up early and Dan made a delicious pancake and sausage breakfast!  M thought waking up in a tent was the funniest thing, so he was just laughing like a maniac and bouncing on the airbed, basically waking up the entire campground.  (They must have loved us!).

Breakfast time!  It was around 50 degrees when we woke up!

 We spent the majority of the day driving the Going-to-the-Sun Road.  It is a gorgeous drive, and definitely the thing to do if you don't have a lot of time to visit the park.  There is so much more to see, but it is the most accessible way to see some beautiful vistas and make short stops/do short hikes. 

We drove from west to east, stopping a few times, and then turned around going back West towards our campsite.  On our return trip, we did some hiking on Logan's Pass (basically where everyone else is hiking, it is super crowded there!) and got some good pics in the snow. 

Lake St. Mary, on the east side of Glacier

Logan Pass - the highest point on the GTTS Road!  There were mountain goats up here and yes, we had a snowball fight!

We did a little more hiking near The Loop (a hairpin turn on the GTTS Road), but it was hot out and I was getting nervous about bears so we weren't out too long. 

Starting our hike near The Loop.  D is part mountain goat so he does not need hiking boats or even running shoes, he just hikes in cheapo flip flops.

We eventually made our way back to camp for some relax and play time and walking around the Avalanche Creek area.

Reading some Emily Giffin chick-lit in the tent.

The campground had a "free or borrow" table of books at the ranger's campsite.  There were a bunch of books that you could either just take or borrow!  I have never seen anything like that (of course, I've never been to a campground before either) but I thought it was awesome.  Hotels should do this!  I picked up a good, fast read by Emily Giffin, "Where We Belong."  I was drawn to it because it was partially from the viewpoint of an adopted girl and Emily Giffin books are my go-to guilty pleasure. 

All in all, this was a wonderful, fun day.

Minnesota Nice

Dan grew up spending his summers on Lake Blanche in Minnesota.  Now we try to make it there at least once a summer.  It is a beautiful, peaceful lake and we were lucky enough to get there during the same week as all of our extended family.  There is a lot of family history connected to Blanche so it is a very special place!

Sometimes when we go the weather is 90 degrees and you hardly ever get out of the lake.  This year it was nice and cool, perfect weather for sitting on the deck and curling up with a good book, or watching your little guy toddle around on the beach playing in the sand.  We went for boat rides ("cocktail cruises"), a hike in Glendalough State Park, had a lot of fun playing with our niece and nephew and visited with the extended family.  Dan got to get his fishing in, we ate our share of walleye, and we got to have lunch at my favorite spot, Zorbaz on Ottertail.  We didn't ski this year, which was probably a good idea because every year we end up so sore from trying to drop one ski, haha!  All in all, it was another great visit to a special place!

Grandma borrowed this roller coaster from the neighbors.  Can you tell he loved it?!

Water baby!

Hiking in Glendalough

Florida = Family

M and I flew to Florida for almost two weeks this summer.  We missed D like crazy, but it was a wonderful time to get to visit with our Florida family!

The sounds of crashing waves reminded him too much of his sleep sheep - he fell asleep in my arms!

I just love the beach.  It is the perfect family vacation!  We got to spend a whole week at the beach with my parents, my siblings and their families.  It was wonderful cousin time for the little guys and we ended the week celebrating my sisters' 30th birthdays.  M loved playing in the sand and along the shoreline and watching his bigger cousins play in the water.  We had great story time with the littles, walked to get ice cream, and I got to go on runs with my sisters.  I am so thankful for this time together and all of the memories that we made! 

We had 11 people in our group (and that is not even the whole family!) and we even managed to eat out a couple of times with NO meltdowns!  We had a good routine of exercise time, morning beach time, lunch, naptime/reading time for the adults/lego time for the big kids, afternoon beach/play time and then dinner time.  We also all became addicted to American Ninja Warrior and Duck Dynasty.  I loved getting to spend this time with my parents, siblings and nephews, and will never forget what a wonderful week it was.

See You Later, Summer! We Love You!

We've been having so much fun that I've completely neglected this blog!  Is there anyone out there reading this?  (Crickets.....=))

We have been so VERY blessed this summer.  Two glorious weeks in Florida, one wonderful week in Minnesota, and a whole load of fun at home this summer. 

We relaxed this weekend since both D and I are recovering from colds/sickness and it was a bit of a drizzly day today.  We're thankful to have D home for a 3 day weekend, and hope you had a great one too! 

Photos and recaps of all of our travels to come, but just wanted to stop in and say HI!  How was your summer?  How did you spend your Labor Day?