Week of weeks- Wyss Vacation 2019

I don't have the best concept of time and realized almost too late that we would be getting home from vacation the day before Cadence's birthday.  And that I should probably come up with gifts and a cake before we left... she requested Paw Patrol, and I found some ideas on pinterest.  Then I went low stress and bought everything- cake mix, frosting, and fondant.  I got the basic cake done in between Miriel breaks, and worked on the color flow logo.  The cake went into the freezer fully decorated and I left the colorflow to dry for a week... it looked pretty good(ish I don't have a very steady hand) when I made it.

Anyway, a little bit of added stress while trying to pack 6 people up for a week of vacation. 
They were wearing the same color... awww.

 While I am enjoying telling the girls stories about when I was growing up (they are particularly fond of hearing about the trials of sharing a bed with Michelle), I forget that there are other stories in which I am not the heroine...:)

 Little miss Miriel is starting to smile at us!  Yay for being past the first 6 weeks!!  

 Emmy is singing Miriel to sleep, Cecily is practicing piano, and Cadence is getting into trouble... including putting deodorant on her tummy.  

 Cadence has a bad habit of losing her precious blanky- we find it balled up and stuffed all kinds of strange places.  It went missing for almost 48 hours and we looked EVERYWHERE.  I had lost hope of finding it and figured it had gotten in the garbage somehow, so I ordered some similar fabric online just in case.  She had been very sad, especially at night, so her face when I opened the package... *gasp* (awed, quiet voice) Blanky! For me?!  It was very sweet.  And then Emmy found the original on the windowsill behind the curtains and blind we rarely open in their room. Because that's where everyone puts their most precious possessions and then forgets about them.      

 On Friday we played real life tetris and loaded up the van to the 'tippy tippy top!' So much stuff, it was ridiculous. 

 The drive to Michigan went pretty smoothly, Bob had mapped out a route with no highways, and we ended up on some slightly sketchy Indiana country roads... but we made it safely.  I introduced the girls to Hank the Cowdog CD's that we borrowed from the library.  They thought he was pretty funny. :)
It was only in the upper 70's the first day, and the pool was cold, but they didn't care.

 I was not super excited about swimming in cold water, thankfully Uncle Ron was willing to play with them.

 Drying off and warming up.

 Emmy roped Clayton and Jessica into playing dragons with her... haha.  

 We walked to the closest beach access in the evening. The Lake Michigan water level is super high this year so the beaches were small and not very sandy.  Emmy got busy making a rock 'store.' 

 Cecily and Kebe and Shena hunted for cool rocks.

 Cadence got wet. (the water was freezing! only 60-something degrees.)

 And Cadence's blanket went missing on... we looked everywhere.  And had everyone else looking.  And looked under furniture and cushions that probably haven't seen the light of day in years...  Cadence was a very sad little girl when she had to go to bed without her little blanky.  Bob found it the next day in the upstairs hallway... rolled in a ball, tucked into this dark corner.  Turns out, Emmy hid it the day before because she was mad that 'no one would play with her.'  *sigh*  After that we put both blankys on a closet shelf and only let her have them in our room.

 Typical vacation scene- boys quarteting, people napping, snuggling babies, and Grandpa and Grandma sitting back enjoying it all.  

Cadence really enjoyed dessert on vacation.

 Kacie's birthday happened and there was confetti and a pinata! 

 Cadence tried to hit Fred with the stick instead of the Taco pinata... haha. 

 So Jacie helped her...

 Emmy was very pleased...

 And Cecily too... I'm not sure they even knew there was candy inside until it broke open. :) 

 Playing games with the Kellenbergers. Cecily loves it when the twins are around.

 Happened to wander into the living room while Dr. Ned (violin) played from Fantaisie-Impromptu from memory on the piano... and of course it sounded amazing.

 My younger cousins are great.  The girls got to go to the "Sparkle Spa" one afternoon (they declined nail polish because 'Mom doesn't like it.' ha!) for foot rubs and fancy braids.  And one of the guys (who won't be named) played the villain in the pool all afternoon- they named him "the Evil Jiggle Belly."  haha.   Poor guy. (He's really not jiggly at all.)
Great Grandma Lydiann gave wagon rides one afternoon. 

 She wanted to go outside so bad after it rained and managed to get pretty wet and dirty in the puddles.

 We spent an evening at the playground.

 The older two learned to play banana-grams with the Aunts. :)

 We drove to the beach at New Buffalo for a few hours one day.  Little beach baby slept most of the time.  

 There wasn't much sand there either and the rocks were brutal on adult feet.  The kids loved it, though.  I went in the water briefly.  It was so cold it took your breath away- literally, it was hard to breath once I got in up to my chest.

 This was a Klondike bar...

She would come into our room and request her blanky, then she would just lay on our bed with it for a few minutes before giving it back for safe keeping... silly kid.  

 Sidewalk chalk at the pool in the afternoon- that's a picture of 'Di's Pool' if you can't read pre-schooler.  

 Miriel was so good all week!  She wanted to nurse a lot, but she also slept a lot and was pretty happy the whole time. 

 Shelly watched the kids on the porch during Wednesday night church.  I was there for moral support.  Or something.

 Thursday was our last day, so I took the older three to another beach access nearby, Bob stayed back with Miriel.  The water was calmer, but still cold.  

 Cadence helping Shelly build a cairn.  

 The weather was so perfect.  Low 80's and not humid.

 Grand Beach Inn is in various states of repair.  Our bathroom was pretty much brand new, but the door to the hallway was falling off the hinges.  Our favorite carpenter finally fixed it for us the last day.  So I guess you could say we left it better than we found it!  

 I spy.... Aunt Pearl taking a selfie?!  hehe.  

 Cadence, Gideon, and Boden hanging out.  

 Shelly captured this picture of a very forlorn little girl who was not ready to come home.

 We bring everything on vacation, including the kitchen sink... and a recliner.  Not even kidding.  :D

Packing up is always chaos, but we made it out by 10 am and had a good trip home.  We had to stop multiple times for bathrooms and diapers and lunch... we got to McDonalds just as Lori's and G and G were leaving.  Grandma insisted on paying for us, of course.  As if a week of vacation wasn't enough.  Listening to another Hank the Cowdog story, and then letting them watch Robin Hood kept the girls happy-ish.  At least, none of them cried all the way home like our last vacation.  
Highs and lows... hm... this was a really good trip, so other than how awful it is to get kids to bed the first few nights I don't have many lows.  Or maybe I've just lowered my expectations so far after four kids.  Highs- I got to spend a lot of time with Cadence since Cecily and Emmy were off playing and Miriel slept a lot.  Since I didn't really have any work to get done we got to just hang out and play, which was fun. And the older I get, the more I appreciate the time I get to spend with all of the generations of my family.  If we just got together on holidays for a few hours I wouldn't know my aunts and uncles and cousins nearly so well.  And they really wouldn't know my kids... as it is, Cecily really wants them all to come over to play Mario Kart with her sometime and that wouldn't happen without Wyss Vacation.  
So now we are home and had a few hours to recover before Cadence turned 3!
Blessings.