hOMe-AHA

(Location R)

I was really excited about our next 4 stops.  The first was “Home-aha”.  As much as I wanted to leave Omaha (me and the weather don’t get along) I couldn’t wait to go back and see all of our Omaha family.  That’s right, they are so much more than friends.  Living there from bachelorette-hood until mom of 3 there are people from our days in Omaha that will always be family to us.  We’ve celebrated birthdays, holidays, homecomings, and marriages with these amazing people.  Not to mention, our house, THE house.  Jon proposed to me in the house, he moved in to that house after 3 years of geo-marriage, and we brought all 3 babies home to that house.  And now someone else lives there, a concept apparently challenging for AJ to understand.  He begged for us to do a drive-by, and we did.  I never thought I’d be so attached to a house.  I never thought so much of my story would’ve been written in that house.

We relished the time we had with everyone there.  We met up with friends everyday.  We hosted a bbq at our campground so we could see even more people.  We saw the zoo that we had frequented while living there and is now almost unrecognizable (in a good way), we went to our home church we attended almost 2 years ago and we drove by the 2 places the kids were born.  Something AJ really enjoys pointing out.  We had some repairs to do on the both the truck and trailer, I know it’s shocking, so we had parts shipped there and Jon was ready to do the repairs at the base Hobby Shop.  He got the truck fixed with little issue, but the trailer was going to be a bit trickier.  You can’t use ust any jack stands with the trailer.  After finding a way to get it high enough and secure enough, Jon climber under the trailer only to find the bolts he needed to remove to be completely seized up, on a Friday evening…the day before we were supposed to leave.  After making about 10 phone calls we finally found someone who was willing to squeeze us in to work on it on Saturday.  We very slowly and carefully hitched up and headed to the shop only to find that the parts we had ordered were incomplete.  We dropped of the trailer and alternated eating lunch at Pizza Ranch with the kids and running around to different hardware shops for the part we needed.  After 7 stores we had what we needed spread out through 3 different franchises and got back to the repair shop just in time for them to close.  They’ll open back up and get right to work at 8am on….Monday.  <<insert Charlie Brown sad music>> 

SLEEPOVER!!!   Some of our Omaha friends, who had moved away before we did, just happened to be passing through and staying with another good friend who had also moved away and moved back.  Did you follow all that??  So 6 adults and 8 kids hunkered down for a fun night together. 

Fortunately, there were no more complications with the trailer, we got to spend bonus time with Omaha family and were back on the road.  Next stop…St. Cloud, Minnesota.

Minnesota, A Fair Place to Visit (Location T)

Steph and Todd are also Omaha friends, but they had moved up the Minnesota about 3 years ago.  Steph and I had a mutual friend that introduced us, but it wasn’t until years later that we became great friends.  We were chick-fil-a, get-out-of-the-house mom friends.  It was a fast friendship and one that I hope we’ll have for life.  Steph’s 3 girls are about the same ages as AJ and LJ, and Baby A is about a year older than Steph’s newest addition, a little boy.  The best part of this visit, was being able to park in their front yard.  They had a ready-made RV spot just waiting for us.  It was so nice to just be able to visit with them without worrying about a commute or taking a day away from visiting to get household chores done.  The kids ran around the yard, collecting eggs from their chickens, played with the dog and made a mess of the “playroom” basement.  We ended up extending our stay here, partly because we couldn’t find any campgrounds available for our new dates over Labor Day weekend, and mostly because I just didn’t want to leave.  Did you know Minnesota has a fair that makes the Iowa Fair look like small potatoes??  You may not know Iowa has a reputable fair, but it down.  One of the biggest I had experienced until we went to eh Minnesota State Fair.  Fired cheese curds, deep fried cheesecake, deep fried Oreos, buckets of soft homemade cookies, ice cream, deep fried pickles, and my favorite cream cheese filled green olives wrapped in bacon and deep fried.  It was amazing!!  And now my body hates me and we are doing Whole 30.

 We spent the next night in Duluth, unfortunately spending our entire time there grocery shopping and cleaning house, but we were headed for Pictured Rocks National Shore in Upper Peninsula Michigan next. (Location U1/2)

Michigan (Location V, W, X)

The plan was to take a very overpriced boat to see the Pictured Rocks, but the winds were too high.  So we hiked instead.  The kids got another Junior Ranger badge and we got to see a small peek at the cliffs that make this area noteable.  It was really beautiful!  Jon and the kids got to hike around the campground along the shore of Lake Au Train.  After our stay in the area we did a night at Mackinac Bridge followed by a long drive to Ann Arbor.

More friends!!!  Brooke and Todd are both students in Ann Arbor who we met back in Navigator school.  Todd was there when it all began for Jon and I.  I followed Todd and his then fiancé to Omaha where we timed our first two kids within a few months of each other, unintentionally.   We spent a lot of time just hanging out at home with all the kids playing together.  It was great to catch up and just spend some downtime with their family.  We even got the stamp of approval from their oldest daughter who shared that she liked playing with the boys.