FAMILY FUN DAY

Last weekend we surprisingly had an entire day to spend as a family. All 7 of us - which is a rare occurrence in this household. An entire day as a family was amazing enough, but on top of that we had amazing weather as well.

What to do, what to do....

The Mr. decided that we would just drive around and try to find something fun and new to do. Drive around with 5 kids who enjoy poking and prodding each other, yelling and fighting with each other and generally making every one [meaning the Mr. and I] miserable until we find something to do? You can imagine why I was not too thrilled with this idea.

After an hour or so of driving aimlessly around with the kids driving me toward pulling out chunks of hair out of pure frustration; we found something. By golly we, actually I should say the Mr., found something. Something quite fantastic I must admit. It was a farm way out in the middle of nowhere. One that had a pumpkin patch, hay rides, a playground, a cute little general store, animals to pet, go carts to ride, and all kinds of other fun things to do. And better yet, there was not a single other family there. We had the whole place to ourselves....










































Like I said, I was not too thrilled with the Mr's plan, but I have to admit, it turned out to be a great day. Actually, it was better than great. It was amazing - thanks to Daddy.

TO DO LIST

The "to do" list around this house seems to do nothing but grow bigger and bigger. As I add items to that list I always make sure to let the Mr. know about it by casually saying something like, "Gosh, you would not believe how many light bulbs are burnt out around the house. We should really take some Saturday afternoon and replace them all." Or "My goodness, the kids' bedroom doors make such an awful creeky noise when I close them at bedtime. What do you do to get rid of that -- WD40? Maybe I can pick some up." Or "When you find the time could you look for whatever tool we need to finish taking down the trampoline?" [Cause I already did the backbreaking work of removing all the springs and the outer safety cushion by myself.] Or "Darn it, Lucas tried to get his Karate bag down by himself and broke off the trim on our built in's. Can you bring home a nail gun from the shop so we can fix it?"

Most often I get a grunt as a response, which lets me know in his own special sort o' way that he is too darn busy to get to that sort of stuff. The sort of stuff that I have to look at/deal with on a daily basis. The sort of stuff I can't take care of on my own as I either need assistance with said stuff, or I am not physically capable. And that just sucks.

Anyway, my frustration has been building over this growing to do list of mine, and it all came to a head last night. No, I did not yell, rant, scream and throw a tantrum about all that needed to be done. I have done that before and it really gets me no where. I instead decided that the to do list needed to be revised a bit. Not only did it need to be revised, it simply needed a new home as the paper it was initially written on was a bit tattered and torn from being stuck to the cabinet wall, neglected for so very long.

So I sat down on the couch with paper and pen in hand, wrote out that list, and slapped it right back up on the cabinet wall.

I walked back to my couch, red wine in hand, breathed a sigh of relief and got to watching my show. Turns out letting my aggression out on paper worked quite well.

FOR DADDY

Daddy has been away on a little guys boat trip this weekend and the kids have been missing him. I was trying to think of something we could do to get the kids minds off of Daddy being gone. It did not take long before I decided that it would be a great idea for the kids to make a video for him and we could post it on Facebook for him to see. And not just any video folks; we were going to put on a dance video.

The kids took some time preparing and getting their "moves" down before I announced that it was time for the performance.

Drum roll please....

DADDY'S DAY [A day late]

I love my man. I love how he is able to make me laugh when it seems like there is nothing in the world to laugh about. I love how he knows just how to make me feel better when I am sad or hurting. I love how hard he works to make it possible for us to live in our house in our great neighborhood. I love that he makes it possible for me to stay at home with our babies so that I am able to raise them. I love how he sometimes comes home with a bouquet of my favorite wildflowers for me just because. I love the cards he gives me on special occasions, and the notes he leaves in my suitcase for me to find when I go on one of my rare, but much needed Mommy-needs-a-little-break get aways. I love how well he knows me, what can set me off without a moment's notice, what can make me cry without a moment's notice, what can make me smile at a moment's notice.

But most of all, I love that he chose me to spend the rest of his life with, to grow old with, to have babies with. I love that he loves me.

And I think it is safe to say that the kids love him just about as much as I do. He may not be around as much as other Dad's are, but when he is, he is pretty much the greatest Dad ever.

He takes the boys fishing down at the docks at the Marina, which they think is pretty much the best thing ever. A whole afternoon catching fish with Daddy? What could be better. He brings Ava out for special shopping day's with him which she just loves more than life itself. Why? Because Daddy, of course, buys her whatever her little heart desires. He simply spoils.her.rotten. And loves every minute of it. He spends hours in the playroom with Anthony trying to pass levels on whatever game he can't seem to stop playing on the Wii at the time. Sometimes it's Super Mario, sometimes Star Wars, but whatever it is he sits there patiently playing and listening to Anthony's instruction as to how to pass the level at hand. He snuggles up on the couch with his little Liv Grace and watches Dora with her over and over again if she wants. He lays with her and calms her down when she wakes up in the middle of the night crying and upset.

He loves our kids more than life itself; and this is another one of the many reasons I am so crazy in love with him.

Happy Daddy's Day honey! I love you....

NORTH SHORE

Our little get away to the North Shore this past weekend was nothing short of amazing. And I have to say, I was amazed by how amazing it really was. [You think I used the word "amaze" enough there?]

I had never been to the North Shore, and I admit, I never really had any desire to go there much less any other place in Minnesota. I always thought, Oh, I live in Minnesota, why would I want to go on vacation in Minnesota? Boooooring! Give me hot, sticky, sunny weather, a beach and a cocktail in my hand -that is what I call vacation. Which meant take me to Key West, Florida, Hawaii.... You know the places.

I admit, as we were driving through Duluth to our final destination, I was still feeling a bit hesitant. Not knowing if I would be bored out of my head and desperately looking for the nearest beach or happening bar/restaurant to entertain myself at by people watching.

But when we arrived, all my worries melted away.

The Mr. had taken care of all the details, and I have to say, he did quite the job. We stayed at the Grand Superior Lodge in Two Harbors. He decided the regular rooms in the lodge were not good enough for our last-little-get-away-before-baby-arrives, so he went and rented us our own little one bedroom cabin over looking Lake Superior.

All I can say about this place is.... perfection. It was the epitome of what I had asked for - a peaceful, relaxing, romantic getaway, just him and I.

This was the view from our patio,


The patio that the Mr. enjoyed sitting on each evening while enjoying an adult beverage after a long day of exploring. I would have to say, he deserved it after bringing me to this little piece of heaven.


We did our fair share of exploring The North Shore - one of the most amazing places we stopped at was Gooseberry Falls. The waterfalls were nothing short of unbelievable. The crazy thing was that us tourists had free reign of the place, you could walk right up - I mean right up- to the side of a waterfall and look down. It was as if you were in the middle of no where on your own little adventure - like LOST. [I may watch too much T.V.]

Here I am standing a safe distance away from one of the waterfalls. I would not dare to get much closer, as I have to admit, I am pretty clumsy, even more so when I am pregnant. I would be the one they would be telling the unfortunate story about on the local news station. Top news today: A pregnant tourist plummets to her death after tripping on a rock and falling down a waterfall at Gooseberry Falls today. Yep, I can see that happening.


We even managed to get a picture of us together next to the Falls. This is never an easy feat, as both the Mr. and I feel weird about stopping complete strangers who are enjoying their day to take a picture of us. But I figure if we did not do this at least a few times on this trip, we would not have any pictures of the two of us together, and I would be kicking myself.

So, we stopped a lovely couple who looked as if they were on the same sort of romantic little get away as us, and asked them to snap a quick picture of us. This time we were up higher, where they had built a wall so that no one had the ability to plummet to their death. That is unless they were trying to.


Here we are inside the visitors enter looking at this wolf. Apparently this breed [would you call it a breed? Heck, I don't know] is no longer in existence, so this one they stuffed and put on display is pretty special. We thought the kids would enjoy the picture, so here I am, posing with the big fella.

I got a few shots of the Mr. hiking down the trails toward other fun things to see.


Here he is feeling how cold the water was. At this point I was ready to lay right on those rocks and let myself be covered in the freezing water I was so hot. Being 8 months pregnant and hiking up and down stairs, dirt paths, and rocks is not so easy. Not to mention it makes you hot. Really hot. Like sweat dripping from your forehead down in to your eyes hot. No jokes - I felt as if I were 16 again and had just spent an hour running up and down and up and down the soccer field playing a game. Sad thing is now at 33 all it takes is a bit of hiking to get me to sweat like that. Oh the joys of getting older, being out of shape and being pregnant.


Here we are in Grand Marais checking out the view.


Right after this little sight seeing expedition we happened upon a shop called "The World's Best Donut's" and decided we had to stop in and have one. In deed they were very yummy. Would I call them the world's best donut's? Not so sure about that, but I can say I could have eaten a dozen of them.

Outside of this little shop was a fun place to stick your head for a photo. Of course, I had to have the Mr. take a picture of me. I look pretty good, right? An obese woman with yellow pig tails, holding a tray of donuts. Nice.



No, this is not the only pictures we took. There are many, many more that are still sitting on my camera. I just thought I would show a few of the highlights from our trip and leave it at that. Not to mention this post would be about a mile long if I were to have uploaded all of our pictures to see.

So there you have it, our trip to the North Shore. It was amazing [there I go with amazing again], beautiful, peaceful, relaxing, and perfect in every way.

Thank you to the Mr. for planning it and making it so special - our last little get away before our little peanut arrives in 6 weeks! I love you, love you, love you. You are the best.