Warning: Photo Overload!

ETA: I did actually post this 'for real' on Tuesday.

I took over 200 pictures on our recent trip to Minnesota. Apparently I was catching up for all the times I don't pull out the camera! Jeff and I had such a good time that week. It was especially nice for me considering I was coming off of a pretty junky job, I was able to relax and destress before starting my new job (which is going great by the way, but more about that later). It was so much fun to see all of those kids again and to see Mark and Jen's new house! This was the first time that Jeff and I have spent this much time with these neices and nephews. We usually see them with the rest of the family so we don't get a whole lot of time with them. Nikayda followed Jeff everywhere and he did a very good job of keeping all of the kids entertained: digging for worms, building a firepit, making fires, and of course, playing with chickens!

These pictures aren't really in order...

A day at the Park:

Mia (Jon and Sara's)


Lori (Jon and Sara's)


Will (Jon and Sara's) Mark told him to wear this hat everywhere...so he did.


Nikayda (Mark and Jen's) holding Mia


Janie (Jon and Sara's)


Paul (Jon and Sara's)


Janie


Lori


Paul


Abram (Mark and Jen's)


Nikayda


Will and Janie


Mia


Lori and Paul zonked out after a day at the park


Carter (Mark and Jen's)


Nikayda with Molly (I think) ETA: Not Molly! Thanks Jen!


Nikayda and Abram with the chickens


Mia


Abram


Nikayda


Will


Carter


Carter and Nikayda


Will


Nikayda and Mia


Lori, Janie, and Carter


Nikayda, Janie, Will


Lori


Lori again, check out that blond hair!


Jeff digging for worms with Carter, Nikayda, and Abram


Carter (which of his Uncles does he remind you of?)


Nikayda the whistling girl, she is good!


Nikayda and Carter all snuggled up after a bath


Abram and Carter, their favorite spot


Abram, he thinks all good food stinks apparantly!


Carter


Crazy Willie


Alfalfa, the funniest rooster I ever did see


Nikayda


Carter


And Carter again. He was so shy of us when we first got there but by the last day he was jumping all over me!


BTW spell check won't work so I apologize for any mistakes!

We Went Camping...

PLEASE NOTE: There are some missing photos, I will edit that as soon as it works.

That was over a week ago! It's been so long I almost forgot! We stayed at Bewabic State Park in Crystal Falls. I think we all agreed that it was a really nice campground. We camped with...
Keith and Katie L with their baby Bennett (not sure about the spelling):

Paul and Amanda (so sorry Amanda, this is the only picture I had!):

Corey and Heather J and their baby Kael (I just realized this is the only picture I have of them! They are the 2nd and 3rd in from the right):
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Not pictured: Greg and Jen S. I never did get a picture of them.
Saturday night, we decided to look for a waterfall, apparently the only one in the area. We took our Malibu bush bombing down some old logging path to try and find it. Problem was, you still had to hike out about three quarters of a mile to find it. We looked for about an hour and couldn't find it. On our way back out to the main road, we found another path that looked a little more promising. We bush-bombed down that path which actually ended up being about ten times worse. We stopped halfway down and walked because we were afraid we'd wreck or get stuck. This one had signs pointing "falls" so we knew we were on the right path:
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It was definitely a fun weekend, staying up til the wee hours of the morning, playing an great 360 game of Rook, and then a not-so-great game of Rook. Then we hopped into the car for another 8 1/2 hours to visit Jen and Sara and their families in their happening town.

Home Again, But first...

Jeff had a tour of one of the terminals at Metro Airport this afternoon. I went along to check it out. We were able to go inside a few planes. We sat in the cockpit, I never realized how many switches and gauges and what-nots there are! Our "tour guide" (maintenance trainer) said that some pilots manually land their planes just because they're bored. In most airplanes, the pilot needs only to record speed and altitude at certain intervals, otherwise they just sit back, relax, and enjoy the ride!
We also saw the flight attendants sleeping quarters in some of the bigger planes that fly internationally. Talk about cramped, I think I would be claustrophobic; my head was touching the ceiling, that's only 5 feet high!
He also brought us in the lower level under the passenger and cockpit seating, I didn't even know such a thing existed!
One of the planes that we were looking at had to taxi to another gate so they actually let us stay on it while they taxied.
Afterwards, Jeff's brother Dave was meeting his girlfriend and her friends who were flying in from Florida. (They had to come back early because there's a hurricane.) So we just walked on into the airport...kind of weird how easy that was considering we didn't have to go through security.

Relaxation

Whew!! Finally a week of relaxation! Sleeping in and playing with chickens. It has been wonderful. I've been taking lots of pictures so I will be able to post when I get home!
Have a fabulous rest of the week!

I'm done!

It's official, I am not longer an employee of KinderCare Learning Center. And it feels great! I am quite suprised at myself however; I did not think I would cry, I mean HELLO! I'm so glad to be done! The thing is, I've known so many of those kids for two and a half years now! And some of the teachers, although the ones that I'll miss haven't actually been there that long. I did get quite a few email addresses and telephone numbers and "stay in touch!"'s.

There's one boy in particular that is SO sad that I'm leaving. He keeps asking me if I'm coming back with the most forlorn look. His mom said he will not forget about me...he's still trying to get over the babysitter leaving over a year ago!

It's been really nice hearing from all of the parents (to the kids) in my class. I have such a great relationship with so many of them, they've been writing me the nicest things and saying the nicest things. Apparantly I was a favorite to quite a few, I really needed to hear that! It's almost to the point where I'm thinking, why didn't I quit a long time ago? I needed that confidence booster!

Well I should probably go while my head still fits out the door!

Have a fabulous weekend! We're off to go camping tomorrow and then Minnesota all of next week! Hopefully I'll have lots of pictures when I get back!

Four more days til vacation!!

And three more days of work! WOOHOO! I am so excited to go camping! And then off to Minnesota! I haven't the slightest idea as to how we are going to get our car moving, it's going to be stuffed! We seem to be playing postman because we have a whole bunch of stuff to bring for all of my siblings that I'm going to see! I may just have to ride on the roof.