July 23, 2021

Friday Night Photos : Family Vacation

I am SO exhausted! There is something about being in the car all day that is exhausting, despite the inactivity (literally just sitting). We drove home from my sister's property in the upper peninsula, leaving at 7:00 this morning. There was construction on the way home, which backed up traffic and added time to our drive. We were in the car for 11 hours! We stopped once for gas/bathroom and once at a rest area for a bathroom break. It was such a long day.

I'm not posting our family photos yet because I'm not sure when we'll get them back from the photographer. (And if I really don't like them, I may not post them at all.) So, I'm just going to post some random photos that I took during the trip...

The Mackinac Bridge is about halfway between our house and Jeanie's property. (It's the bridge that connects the upper and lower peninsulas of Michigan.) Jeanie's property is in Ewen, Michigan, which is just about as northwest as you can get in Michigan. We live about as far southeast as you can get--so it made for a very long drive.



We took Joey with us. On the way up there, my kids rode with my parents, so it was just Jerry, Joey, and me in our rental car. He was SO good in the car--I literally forgot he was in there because he was so quiet.



Jerry pulled up some fun Snapchat filters to play around with--Luke and Riley love making faces and watching themselves with the filters. I love just watching them make faces.




The sweatshirts we're all wearing in several photos are shirts my sister had made for the week--since we were there to celebrate my parents' 50th wedding anniversary (which is tomorrow), the front says "Cheers to 50 Years!" and has their names in hearts. The back is a logo that Jerry designed for "Camp Fireside" (what my sister named her property).

Anyway, my dad taught Luke how to shoot a bow and arrow. I wish I'd taken a video of this shot, but I honestly didn't think he'd hit the target. He hit the target on the first try! Haha.



Shawn (Jeanie's husband) had these huge "chimney logs"--he called them that because it started as a tree that was rotted from the inside, so there was a hole down the center of it. When he cut it, it made a bunch of big rings. When put on the fire, the fire burns from inside the hole and lasts a long time. Anyway, they were super heavy so he brought them to the fire with his tractor, haha.



Nathan (my younger brother) has a black lab named Bailey. She's so funny--she climbs up onto the rocking lawn chairs and curls up into a tiny ball to sleep. It looks so uncomfortable, but that's where she preferred to lie down!



My sister's very old basset hound, Remington, does a lot of sleeping these days. Jeanie puts a bed out by the fire and he lies down there. Riley covered him with a blanket and sat with him. It was so sweet.



Like I mentioned on my Couch to 5K 8-Week recap, I had to start Week 9 while I was up north. Week 9 involves running 3 miles straight--so this was my first workout. I'll write about it on Monday during my final recap.



My mom brought one of those little parachutes that a lot of us probably remember playing with in gym class--she and I showed Luke and Riley how it works. We counted to three and pulled it up hard, then Luke and Riley ran underneath to trade places before it came back down. I used to love it when the gym teacher would bring out the parachute in class!



Jerry with the fish he caught on a pontoon boat Jeanie rented.



This picture below was actually my favorite part of the week! When we went up north in 2017, Nathan let me try shooting his rifle. I'm not a "gun person", but I thought it would be fun to see if I could shoot the targets. I loved it! It was so fun to use the scope to line up the shot and I felt "cool"--I told him I felt like a sniper in the movies, haha)  Anyway, he brought a few of his guns and showed me how to use them.

Nathan and I built this stand in about two hours! (I cut the boards, but Nathan put the whole thing together). We lined up a bunch of cans across the pond and I shot at them. The scope was so good that I only missed about 2-3 shots out of 20 or so. The scope was strong enough that I could probably read a book through it from all the way across the pond.

I'll never take a real interest in guns, but it was fun to shoot some targets with Nathan's. My boys were impressed that their old mom was a better shot than they were ;)


Okay, I have to finish unpacking. I'm going to bed early tonight--I can't wait to sleep in my own bed. Have a great weekend!

3 comments:

  1. I remember the parachute in gym class! I agree that it was always a fun day with it. I think we had a much bigger one, but maybe that's my exaggerated memory!

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  2. That was an awesome recap Katie! I felt like you took us on your trip too.
    Have a wonderful weekend :)
    Michelle

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  3. Glad you had a good time! Why did you rent a car? Don't you have a brand new car that you recently bought?

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