Family

My parents moved to North Carolina (both from Michigan) over 40 years ago. I have never known what it was like to live in close proximity to extended family, it's only ever been my parents, my sister and me. 

Over the years we would visit at holidays or in the summer, but with a 10+ hour drive, visits were few and far between. Distance just makes things hard and that is still quite true. It has been over 4 years since I have seen any of my extended family. While I was a bit apprehensive about how the girls would do on such a big car trip, I'm glad we made the effort and found the time to go this past week not only because my big two don't remember meeting their great grandparents, but also because this was Kayla's first time meeting them ever. 

Here we are with my Grandpa Weiss-- Oma's dad. 

And with my Grandma Slivensky-- Opa's mom. 

What a great week it was catching up with everyone-- aunts, uncles, cousins, and of course the grandparents. And even better, my girls got to spend TONS of time with their Oma and they most certainly enjoyed that! 

5 hours is a long distance to be separated from her and Opa but I'm sure glad they make the huge effort to see and love on me and the girls as often as possible! We are blessed to have such spectacular family-- and friends. 

And to all of you... thanks for traveling along with us this week, it's been exhausting but we have had a BLAST! Now... to make that last 5 hour drive home to the beach and see my hubby and baby #4. I'm ready to be home with my immediate people. 

To Lansing

On Thursday we made the hour trip from Frankenmuth down to Lansing where my Grandma Slivensky lives-- the great grandkids call her GG. While we were there my girls had fun visiting with her and playing in her basement as well as her upstairs which the girls call her attic.

In the basement the girls found Great Grandpa Warren's hard hats from his days of working at the Board of Water and Light. They loved trying them on. Grandpa Warren died a few months before Audrey was born and Madeline was only two, but they have heard a lot about him over the years, so this picture was pretty special. 

On Friday, it was a gorgeous day so GG took us to Potter Park Zoo. Not sure any of you remember our family trip to the NC Zoo last July-- where our skin all but melted off because it was so hot. But I swore off zoos in the summertime. BUT... this didn't count... because it was only 73 degrees!!

The girls loved seeing the animals that were cooperative enough to be out in their habitats instead of inside. They got to ride a camel and our favorite part was definitely feeding the birds in the aviary. It was so cool that the birds would fly right over to our seeds sticks and land on you to eat.

The peacocks freely roamed the zoo, so the girls had fun chasing them around although I'm sure the birds weren't all that amused. 

We had a few other relatives stop in to visit on Friday night for dinner, so it was good to see them as well. Here is Kayla with her Great Aunt Mary. 

It was a whirlwind trip but we are so glad we got to stop in and see GG for a few days, she spoiled the girls rotten and the girls will definitely remember their trip to see her this time. 

Change of Plans

Well, I had every intention of taking the girls to the BIG indoor waterpark, Splash Village, today. That is until Audrey woke me up in the middle of the night and her eye was glued shut. Yup, out of the blue with no warning... she had pink eye. With a few calls to the insurance company, we were on our way to urgent care to get that treated and taken care of.

All was good and fine until Audrey heard what I knew was coming--- no swimming for a day or two. She was pretty upset about it as were Madeline and Kayla, and I don't blame them. But life goes on and we still had plenty of things to do in and around town. With a little bribery of "I'll buy you something in town today" they quickly got over their disappointment.

Walking through the creeks at River Place as we shopped...

The fudge and taffy shops where they could watch them make it was a HUGE hit! 

The Cheese Haus-- always good for a photo opportunity... 

THE Zehnder's chicken out in front of the restaurant... 

And a broken glockenspiel on the ONE day of the year we wanted to go see it. (They had it somewhat repaired in the late afternoon, and I quickly remembered why it wasn't that big of deal... it's a little boring and a bit creepy if you listen to the story it tells.) BUT, we saw it... so check that off the list! 

It was a busy day out and about in town and by the time the girls picked out their one thing to buy, we were done and hot and ready to go back for a rest before dinner. 

We enjoyed dinner out with everyone, and Kayla has definitely jumped right in there and made herself quite at home. It is the first time she's met everyone, but she never misses a beat, and this is just one of her new buddies, Great Uncle Terry. Who she lovingly refers to as "that man" and "your daddy" when talking to my Aunt Ruthie. Like always, she's pretty hilarious. 

After dinner it was back to Uncle Terry and Aunt Ruthie's house where the girls played ball, got into Ruthie's dress up purses for a fashion show, and caught lightning bugs at dark. They have SO enjoyed being at their house and we are so grateful for letting us stay. 

Oh, and don't let me forget all the fun with my cousin Randi! Her two kids are a bit older than mine but they are off at camp this week-- so she has come down and played with the girls at night. Their favorite thing to do with her, Snapchat photos... here are the favorites... but really, they all were hilarious.

We leave tomorrow morning and although it has been great seeing everyone, it has just been too short of a visit. I know for sure it wouldn't take much to convince the girls to make the long drive again for a longer stay and indeed that may just be what we need to do. 

Being Tourists

As a kid I remember our visits to Frankenmuth quite well! Besides visiting all the extended family, my sister and I had a blast at all the local touristy spots, so I couldn't wait to take the girls so many of the same places on this visit. 

We started our morning a little later than expected-- we are staying with my Uncle Terry and Aunt Ruthie and they have black out curtains in their guest rooms. AMAZING! My early birds slept until 8:30-- unheard of!!

First stop... BRONNER'S! They claim to be the world's largest Christmas store and anyone who has been there would agree. The girls were amazed by the outdoor displays, the indoor displays and of course just the massive amounts of ornaments of all kinds. They had plenty of time to look as I had picked out ornaments for Kayla and Little Sunshine to be personalized for our Christmas tree to match one's that Madeline and Audrey have had since they were babies. Bronner's is a family tradition. (Any Days of Our Lives fans out there?!? Think of Tom and Alice Horton hanging their name ornaments each year. LOL!) 

We hit up Zehnder's-- also world known for their chicken-- for lunch. We then went back to pick up Oma as she was going to pretzel making class with us! Don't the pretzel glasses and hairnets make their outfits?

The girls love that the staff at the different stores and hotels wear lederhosen-- so we of course got a picture made with the pretzel guru in her full outfit too. 

And the best part of class-- eating your homemade pretzels! DELICIOUS! 

Next stop, the Bavarian Belle for a ride up the Cass River. My mom swears that we've done this before, but I sure don't remember it. Nonetheless, the girls had a great time going under the covered bridge, feeding the ducks popcorn, and hearing a little more about Franknemuth upon a real Mississippi flat bottom boat while I was just grateful to put my feet up for a few and sit in the shade! 

We still had time to venture across the covered bridge, see the peacocks, and shop in a few of the cute stores. Our favorite shop by far was the fairy garden store. My girls have fairy gardens at our house and at Oma and Opa's-- so they were thrilled to see this whole scene outside the shop and it gave them great ideas for expansion. Be ready Opa, they have some ideas for you when we get back home. 

Finally we ended up back at Grandpa Weiss' house for dinner. My girls were all exhausted so while the big two had no problem curling up on the couch and watching TV, Kayla had to keep busy because if she sat still longer than 10 seconds she knew she'd fall asleep. Here she is comparing her tiny hands to her Great Grandpa's huge German hands...

And coloring in her new book with Great Grandma Etta... 

By the time we got back, they were done and asleep by 9pm. I did a fine job making sure they were plain wore out! And we still have more to do tomorrow. They have our long trip back to sleep and rest, right?! Just so much fun to still be had.

Road Trip 2016

Mark is off in Arkansas at his yearly national conference and the girls and I are off on Road Trip 2016. We haven't been up to Michigan to visit all the extended family since 2012 (!!!) and none of the family has ever met Kayla-- so we decided it was time. We left Southport on Friday and made the 5 hour trip to Hickory to pick up Oma and then have a short layover.

After a weekend of relaxing fun we departed this morning at 3am for our approximate 12 hour drive. The girls were sound asleep for the first 4 hours which helped make the trip go a bit faster for them.

These girls were awesome. We packed all sorts of stuff for them to do, and they did amazingly well. We stopped for breakfast and one other potty break-- and made it to Frankenmuth in 11.5 hours! That is what I'm talking about... we have trained them right!!

Our first stop was to see my Grandpa Weiss (Oma's dad) and while the girls did their best to sit still and visit-- they were tired of sitting still and I didn't blame them one bit. After a trip to the good old 7-11 for a Slurpee, we excused ourselves and took the hour before dinner to go explore the Castle Shops downtown. 

For those of you who don't know anything about Frankenmuth (the town my mom grew up in) the girls compared it to a Gingerbread Village. It is a cute little German tourist town with lots of shops and cute things to do, and trust me, we will do TONS in the next two day. But today we just did window shopping and exploring but the girls absolutely loved it-- just as I knew they would. 

We have two whole days of fun planned here before we head off to Lansing to see the Slivensky side of the family. Stay tuned, I'm sure you'll want to hear more about our adventures! 

POP!

Bubble wrap may very well be the most FAVORITE and cheapest thing my girls love to play with together in what they like to call their "POP" parties. 

And just so you don't miss out on the best part: 

For those of you that know our dogs well too... you can just imagine what poor Eleanor was doing in the middle of all this craziness!! 

Fun times-- try it-- it gets rid of a lot of built up stress and frustration. And this week I have needed it! Bubble wrap is AWESOME! 

Where in the World...

Anybody remember that show?? Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego?!

Well, I think I found her.

I love the new hat I found on clearance for her, but those glasses! GAH!

What A Week

Let's just say that my "built in" down week that I intentionally scheduled for the middle of the summer for my family way back in the spring-- was ANYTHING but a down week.

There were a lot of other little side things that happened to add to the chaos but the big news was that the owners of our rental house called to say they are putting the house up for sale. They didn't seem like they were going to move too fast about it, until we got a text Wednesday night that they were coming in from SC on Thursday afternoon to do a walk through and then the realtors were coming on Friday morning to do their walk through. Oh, okay. Sounds fun. AHHHHHH!!

We aren't slobs, but we have plenty of accumulated clutter-- and I HAVE FOUR KIDS!! So, what's a girl to do?! Divide and conquer. And so we did. And this was my BEST helper by far...

She loves to help clean and so she pushed the vacuum cleaner around for at least 30 minutes. I'm not sure if the carpet was actually any cleaner, but she was trying!

And so, the lockbox goes on the door and the sign goes in the yard next week-- and we'll see if we can sell another rental property that we live in. (If you've followed our blog over the years you'll know we have a pretty good track record selling other people's property-- just not our own!!)

All of you who are local-- send me your contacts for anyone who might have a rental coming available. We're most certainly looking again. Fun times!

Sister Dynamics

Dynamics obviously change among siblings the more you add in. I am always amazed by how God created all my girls so different in temperament yet they fit together so well. For the most part, Audrey is my easy going flexible girl. Which means she can happily play solo, be mature and do Madeline activities, be crazy and active with Kayla, or be the sweetest big sister you ever saw and love on Little Sunshine. But Monday when my peacemaker/go between-er Audrey was removed from the equation to spend the day/night with a friend, I wasn't sure what was going to happen.

And boy was I surprised at the library program when I saw this.

Madeline has high standards, she is a no nonsense girl so she gets easily frustrated by Kayla's wiggly and very active self! But when Kayla climbed up on Madeline's lap and Madeline hugged her tight instead of smacking her, my heart swelled a bit. They do love each other too, they just don't always have the opportunity to show it. 

Sweet sweet sisters! Most of the time... well... some of the time. 

Cow Day

We LOVE ChickFilA and since the girls were tiny we have always dressed up like cows on Cow Appreciation Day and gone for free lunch. Making paper costumes each year was fun but last year we were visiting Oma and Opa and were surprised with adorable cow skirts! Oma is the best. 

We added black tees, cowbell necklaces, cow ear headbands, and bandanas -- and they were adorable! And then we got to keep them for the next year! Do you know how exciting it was to pull out that bag yesterday morning and just get everyone dressed!?! We went through Little Sunshine's clothes looking for black and white and since I had a pair of ears and a bandana last year... she was all set too!!

We had trouble getting a picture with all four of them. A certain little person does not stand still.

But then we trapped her in! 

Audrey was a little peeved that she had to dress up to get free food because as she pointed out... "The food is always free to me." So true... but perhaps Audrey needs to pay for all of us to eat next time. And Madeline, she did the math on the receipt while we waited for our food only to inform me that we can eat much cheaper at Sam's Club. "What a deal that place is!" It looks like just the beginning of these two showing their spending habits!!

But lunch was great and the girls loved seeing the cow! First time EVER I haven't had a kid terrified of the cow. Kayla is over her fear and Little Sunshine loved the cow... hugs and high fives the whole time!

And ice cream for everyone! Loved this shot of Madeline!! She is still the pickiest eater in the world but she eats like a crazy person at ChickFilA! 

And so our costumes are headed back to the closet so we will certainly be ready for next year!