my long overdue post with our vacation photos. I am just going to warn you now, I think this might be a long one....
We went back up to Glenwood for our vacation this year following the Anderson family reunion. I think we've decided though, that Glenwood is bad luck for us and we'll be going elsewhere from now on.
However, despite quite a few um, mishaps... we had a great time!
We started out with the reunion the first weekend. The twins had gotten strep throat 2 days before we were supposed to leave, but they had 48 hours of antibiotics in them, and were feeling much better so we decided to leave on friday as planned. We got to the campground in the afternoon and met up with Grammy at the campground park.
We had just barely gotten there when Malichi started saying his throat hurt, and he ended up with a fever. Aaron took him back to the hotel for the rest of the day while me, Kinzie and the twins stayed at the campground.
My poor boy, feeling too sick to play.
By saturday morning, we had called our doctors back home and all 6 of us were on antibiotics for strep. :(
By sunday though, we were all feeling pretty good with 24 hours of antibiotics, and the kids were all able to participate in the kids' games at the reunion.
Scout was so proud of her candy bracelet. She went around showing it off to everyone!
We had checked in to the cabin Saturday afternoon and Sunday after the reunion we were ready to start our vacation!
Nate had this really great idea that we should all pitch in some money and fly Tiffany home for vacation! We were all excited about it, and everyone wanted to pitch in! Vacation is just not the same without her! So Saturday night Mom and I found a flight, and called Tiff. The conversation was priceless.
We asked her what she had going on during the week.
She said "nothing".
So we said, "we are flying you home for vacation".
She laughed and said "ok send me a ticket", jokingly.
We told her we weren't joking and we were flying her home tomorrow.
She kept asking "are you serious, are you joking?" and when she realized we were totally serious she starting bawling!
So on Sunday Rachel picked her up from the airport and brought her up to the cabin. It was so great to have here there!
Monday Kinzie turned SIX! We had the cabin decorated for her when she woke up with a banner and balloons. We let her pick what she wanted to do for her birthday and she chose getting her hair and nails done. It was between that and going to see "Ramona and Beezus" at the theater.
We left the other 3 kids at the cabin with my family, and Aaron and I took Kinzie out just the 3 of us. We went out for lunch first and then took her to get her hair and nails done. She loved being pampered, and it was great to be able to just focus on her!
After we got done at the salon, we stopped to take some pictures of our sweet 6 year old! She looks so grown up in this picture. I can't believe my baby is 6!
After supper that night we had cake and Kinzie opened up her gifts. I was especially excited this year for her to open her gifts.
Kinzie lost her special purple blankie that had her name on probably 3 years ago. It was her favorite blankie, and ever since she lost it, she has been asking me about it. "Mommy, will you find my purple blankie"? "Mommy, I miss my purple blankie". She probably brought it up a few times a month!
Ever since we lost it, I have been looking EVERYWHERE for one like it. The place it is from no longer sells purple ones. We bought her a pink one a while back, but it is just not the same to her. So every so often I would search for one. Well back in May I finally found one that would be almost exactly the same! So I ordered it and saved it for her birthday!
Kinzie was so excited when she opened it.
Earlier that night she rode home from dinner with Grammy, and she had her pink blankie with her, so Grammy asked her "Is that your favorite blankie"?. So she was telling her about how she lost her favorite purple blankie, and that we looked everywhere for it, and how maybe we should paint her pink blankie purple. She says "Hey, there's a star, let's make a wish! I wish for my purple blankie"! So Grammy and Malichi wished for Kinzie to get her purple blankie back too.
She was so cute telling us how her wish came true after she opened up her blankie! That whole week she did not let that blanket out of site!
Tuesday the kids did some tubing behind Nate's boat, but I didn't get any photos. I stayed back with the twins. Too bad I didn't know at the time that would be the only time they got to tube on vacation! I did go out later and take some pictures of Rachel and Steve tubing. Rachel is hilarious to watch!
Tuesday night we had a campfire and all was going well...
...until Grammy tripped in the dark trying to grab onto a railing that wasn't there. She fell down probably 3 or 4 stairs and as soon as we got to her we knew she broke her wrist. It was completely crooked. We got her up and Tim, Tiffany, and I took her to the E.R. right away. (3rd year going to a Glenwood cabin, and I think 4th ER/Urgent Care trip over the 3 years....can a town be bad luck?)
She had shattered her wrist, had a big goose egg on her cheek, and bruised her thigh and face.
She was so calm about it all, and kept insisting she was ok. She ended up needing surgery to put pins in her wrist, but they said they couldn't do the surgery until the following week once the swelling went down. She was such a trooper and wanted to stay up at the cabin for the rest of the week anyway. They wrapped her wrist, and send her back with some good pain meds.
We spent the next few days fishing, going to the beach, going to the Glenwood fair, hanging out on the pontoon we rented, relaxing in the cabin, and taking good care of Grammy.
Thursday night we had some really bad storms. Joan's aunt had passed away so they were gong to leave Thor with us on Friday and drive down to Iowa for her funeral, and come back friday night. Well, friday morning it was still storming, and Nate went down to check on his boat at the dock. He got down there to find it sunk.
They ended up staying back at the cabin to take care of his boat. We took 5 gallon buckets down to the lake and starting bailing out the water. We did manage to get the water out and get the boat pushed up onto the shore. Nate's boat was ruined though. I felt terrible. He had just put a lot of money and time into it to have it fixed so we would all be able to use it while on vacation!
Maybe that wasn't Glenwood bad luck at all, maybe it was the fact that it was Friday the 13th!
After dealing with all the boat drama, we celebrated Jaden's 7th Birthday Friday night!
And the remainder of the weekend we did some more swimming, pontooning, and relaxing. We joked about needing a vacation from our vacation. But we really did have a good time even though it seemed like it was one bad thing after another. That is something I love about my family, we make the best of everything!
The only thing that could have made our vacation better was if Kelly would have been there. We all missed her a lot.
