Abundantly Blessed: MI Road Trip

In early March, our family headed out on a LONG road trip to Michigan. The main purpose of our trip was to celebrate Jason's dad's retirement. Before that celebration, however, we were able to enjoy a few other wonderful visits along the way. First, we traveled to Sioux Falls, SD, and spent a day with our friends Josh and Katie. These two were just wonderful at entertaining Jaden and Cody. The boys warmed up to them right away!

Cody, enjoying a good book with Josh

Jaden cozies up to Katie

After attending Josh and Katie's church on Sunday morning, we drove through downtown Sioux Falls. This area of town boasts a variety of fun statues, but the top-scoring one by far, in Jaden and Cody's book, was this bronze Humpty Dumpty.

We can hardly ever get the boys to show their natural smiles for pictures these days-- guess all it takes is a Humpty Dumpty character! Cody and Jaden were SO excited!

Rubbing Humpty's bald head is apparently a must.

Josh and Katie knew just what our boys would like. After the downtown visit, we went to Josh's workplace-- the airport! Josh flies small medical planes, so he was able to get us special access inside.

The boys learned what some of the various controls do...

...but mostly were just excited to be so close to all these planes!

Thanks, Josh, for the exciting tour! (This next pic makes me laugh. Right before I took the picture, Josh squatted down so he could be at the boys' level. Of course, Jaden and Cody took that as their cue to squat down low to the ground as well!)

Following naptime at Josh and Katie's house, we visited Katie's workplace-- the mall. As an assistant manager of The Limited, Katie is in charge of quite a lot. One of her favorite tasks, though, is to build wardrobes for customers. She is amazing at this job!! I learned this firsthand when Katie patiently chose clothes for me (I'm a picky shopper!) and found several cute outfits that I ended up just loving. What a treat to spend this time with Katie! Meanwhile, Jason and Josh were entertaining the boys at the mall play area and on some of these various kiddy rides.

Cody gave us a "Ride 'em, Cowboy!" on this horse :)

Josh and Katie were wonderful hosts and great tour guides around Sioux Falls, too. We loved our time with you, dear friends! The next morning, we headed straight east to Austin, MN, to visit Great-Grandma Schleicher.

Great-Grandma had a pizza lunch (complete with fresh fruits and veggies and even special cookies for the boys!) waiting for us when we arrived. We are so impressed by this active, capable, godly woman! After our meal, Great-Grandma gave us a tour around her apartment complex. We saw where she walks on the treadmill at least 3 times a week, where she parks her car, and just down the hallway, we saw the empty apartment that is reserved for Jason's parents. It was fun to visualize where Grandma and Grandpa would be living. Cody and Jaden loved having all this room to run around in. What is it about a wide open area that just naturally makes little boys wild? :)

Thanks for having us for a visit, Great-Grandma! We all love you bunches!

Our original plan after visiting Great-Grandma was to make the brief drive to Rochester and stay overnight with Beth and Andy. The promise of a heavy winter snowstorm along our driving route, however, changed our plans. Instead, we cut our visit with Great-Grandma a bit short and made the LONG drive all the way to Holland that same day. We finally arrived around 2 in the morning, but we had smooth roads and didn't see a single snowflake. Several hours later, when we awoke, there was nearly 6 inches of snow on the ground, with the snow continuing to fall heavily. We were happy we made the decision to keep driving! Cody and Jaden were really intrigued by Grandpa's sidewalk shoveling.

They giggled so much when Grandpa threw the snow up in the air!

It was still early in the week when we arrived (the retirement celebration was on Sunday), so we had a bit of down-time to spend with Grandma and Grandpa before all the other guests and family came to town. Despite their large to-do lists, Grandma and Grandpa happily laid aside their packing and other preparations to play with Jaden and Cody for a couple days. We were very thankful to have this time together. Grandma played cars with the boys and gave them a few new matchbox cars, too. Definitely a trip highlight! :)

Grandma also read a LOT of books to the boys...

played the Disney matching game,

and taught them how to string beads onto a pipe cleaner. What a fun idea! I liked seeing how patient Cody and Jaden were with this project.

Cody and Jaden were quite proud of the fancy bracelets (or anklets?) that they made.

Grandpa and Daddy got in on some of the story times, as well. The boys latched on to two particular new books at Grandma and Grandpa's that we all read over and over and over again. :)

Other fun happenings at Grandpa and Grandma's place included a belated birthday song for Grandpa,

some playtime in interesting new places,

and visiting the church nursery for more playtime!

Also at the church, Grandma and the boys got to watch a plow clearing the large piles of snow out of the parking lot.

Then, we all listened to Daddy as he practiced his song for Sunday's retirement celebration.

Thanks, Grandma and Grandpa, for this special time with you. We all loved the chance to visit and the quiet, relaxed pace. We love you!

Then, finally, we had one last stop before the retirement weekend began-- our old stomping grounds in Saginaw. We were excited to stay with our good friends John and Lisa and their 3 boys. Hayden, the oldest, was very gentle with our boys and cuddled up to them right away. What a sweet kid!

Will (only 6 months older than J&C) was a wonderful playmate! We were so impressed with the way he shared all of his toys without an argument-- and even willingly offered some of his favorites to our boys. I hope Jaden and Cody were learning their lessons from this cute kid! :)

Little Colten endured the extra attention and kisses from our boys without too much of a fuss. :)

In addition to the Duclos family, we also meet up with our friends the Sowatskys. Their 4 little ones don't seem quite so little anymore! Our three families all met at McDonalds for an ice cream treat and some fun at the play place. Ally jumped right in to take care of Cody and Jaden, holding their hands and helping them over the taller play place equipment. The boys absolutely loved her! :)

Here are some group shots at McD's....

(top) Hayden, Tyler, Luke, Ally, Colten
(bottom) Will, Cody, Jaden, Daniel

Ginny, Amy, Lisa & Colten

During our time in Saginaw, we visited lots of different people-- the church pastors and the school staff at Bethlehem, some high school students (the students in my last 4th grade class are now high school seniors!), and other Bethlehem friends. Unfortunately, I hardly got pictures of any of these visits! Between my eagerness to catch up with these friends and our efforts to manage our somewhat cranky boys (that's what missing 3 daily naps in a row will do to 2-year-olds!), taking out my camera didn't get the priority.

I did, however, get a picture of our visit with some wonderful old neighbors, Jim and Lola (aka Speed). :) We were happily surprised to find this couple at home, since they're typically snowbirds until after Easter. We had a nice talk and got to listen to Jim play some beautiful jazz for us on his keyboard, too.

On our last night in Saginaw, the Duclos clan had a special treat for us-- s'mores in the fireplace! What a fun idea! Hayden and John showed us how the roasting was done.