Chicago! Part Four - Hanging with Nana and Tata

I think this is my favorite picture of our whole trip. I love to capture "moments" and beauty with my camera and this is a great combination of the two. Aaron has been looking forward to going fishing for so long and finally he got to go with his dad. What a great moment! I think this is the kind of picture that will always make me feel something when I look at it and those are my very favorite!

This is Nana and Tata's house. They are currently living in a small apartment to help Nana recover from her broken leg, but this has been a fun part of family gatherings for years. The first picture was taken on the lake directly behind the house. The scenery all around is breathtaking!

Tata invited us to have dinner at their place with some family friends. We had a great time. It was so fun to spend time with them.

Chicago! Part Three - Tom's Farm

Brynna thought it was her right and responsibility to carry out as much corn as she could. She found out that the chickens and ducks liked the corn right off the cob much better than the old dried up stuff and I think she spent 15 minutes holding a cob for them to peck at. She could have done that all day.

They had this really cool silo filled with about 18 inches of corn for everyone to play in. I think that was everyone's favorite. Grandpa, Dad, Ashlyn, and Aaron all took their turn being buried in the corn and rising out like a monster. It was hilarious.

Cyerra wanted to pose for a picture in front of every cartoon character display they had. There were plenty of them. I now have lots of pictures of Cyerra smiling at me. These have been rare so I am treasuring them.

Fun fall decoration, huh? I think that is a great idea. Don't be surprised if some fall you drive by my house and I all of the sudden have a pumpkin tree. =)

Chicago! Part Five - Timber Ridge

Cool Pumpkins in the lobby!

We headed up to Wisconsin for our last day there for a day trip to Timber Ridge. It was perfect! Our luck had finally run out on the weather and it was cold and rainy. Perfect day for swimming, right? Only when you can spend the day at an indoor water park that is big enough to keep kids entertained for hours, yet not too big to worry about losing them. Wow, what a day. There were two water slides, a lazy river, a little kids play area, a rope bridge, etc. They had a blast! Cyerra of course promptly fell asleep the moment we got back in the car to go home. What a fabulous trip. I have never met anyone like my in-laws to be able to show us such a good time. Food, family, fun, why vacation anywhere else?

Chicago! Part Two - Our Date

Grammy Spencer offered to keep our kids occupied for the day so that we could go out for a date. Hmmm, free babysitter, different place, what to do? We were supposed to take the train into Chicago, but changed our minds at the last minute. Three hours on the train just didn't seem like the best use of time to me. So off we went to explore all that Crystal Lake had to offer. After a few errands we headed to this little crepe shop for lunch where I discovered that I have no desire to ever eat goat cheese again. We drove around a little while, quizzed a guy at the camera shop on the necessities of getting a studio up and running, and then my favorite part, wandered around this awesome park minutes from where the kids were playing with Grammy at home. I really wish we had a place like this 5 minutes from our house. It was beautiful with all of the fall leaves. The end result was still over 3 hours travel time, and maybe we should have taken in the sights in the city, but I've got some really cool pictures!

Chicago! Part One - Grandpa's airplane

We got to go see Griff's dad's airplane! We hadn't seen it before. Griff, Ashlyn, and I even got to go for a ride in it. It was awesome! I even got to take my camera up with me and get some cool shots of the fall landscapes. Aaron and Brynna are hoping to get up next summer when we go back. So where are the pictures of me in the plane? You'll just have to trust me that I was behind the camera in those pics from the plane. One of these days I will learn to give up my camera for a moment so my kids will remember that I was around too!