Happy Birthday....Early!

My sister loves a reason to host a party, so she continued her tradition of celebrating Addy's birthday on our trip home. Addy of course, didn't object, and had no complaints about having some cake and ice cream....again. It was fun to see the girls enjoy each other's company and although they always have a slow start, by the time we are getting ready to leave we can hardly separate them. I can't believe these girls are almost 5 years old!

Cameroon My Man - 21 months

Cameron officially turned 21 months during our trip, but I think I could have easily convinced everyone he was turning 3. Aside from his "solid" physical size, his vocabulary is equally impressive as he can communicate pretty much everything. Everyone agreed that Cameron (or as my brother referred to him only as "Cameroon my man") is particularly fun right now because he is just so agreeable about everything. You ask him to say something, he says it, you ask him to give someone a hug, he gives them a hug, you ask him to go get something, he gets it. It makes him especially endearing right now because he's just so sweet and out-to-please. His charm offense was in full force on the trip and he instantly won everyone over. Some of our favorite moments included the fact that Cameron slept in our room on most nights. This is not normal for us so we learned that he is a rather light sleeper. Whenever he would hear Brian or I move in the bed he would respond with "Hi Mommy, Hi Daddy." And if we didn't respond he would simply yell it louder and louder until we did. And if we responded by saying "shhh, it's nighttime go back to bed." He would then whisper back to us, "ok, Hi Mommy, Hi Daddy" and of course we couldn't help but laugh. I kid you not, this happened every night. It was equal parts annoying and adorable.

Another favorite was that at Scott and Wendy's, because they were just days away from moving, they had already packed up most of their stuff. This left an empty shelf downstairs that Wendy hung a blanket from. The kids loved hiding behind it and playing peekaboo. Cameron especially thought it was funny to hide behind the blanket and say "Where's Cameron?" and then come running out. It was so cute to see his little feet hiding behind the blanket. 

Cameron also got more comfortable with having my sister's dogs Riley and Lucy around. At first he screamed whenever he saw them and was pretty cautious around them. By the last day, the dogs were the ones that were cautious around Cameron because he loved chasing them around.

Booya!

As if seeing Lennard & his family and celebrating Wendy's birthday wasn't enough excitement for this trip, we also got to go to Booya for the 2nd year in a row. It was scheduled a few weeks earlier than normal this year, but it was lucky because the weather was really chilly which is perfect for a tradition based on cooking a soup all day over a fire. It was a lot of fun, we all ate way too much (proof below of just 1 of the tables of desserts!) and I can't believe this tradition has been going on for over 20 years!
The kids love going to the farm and I think love even more the basket of toys my Grandma has for them to pick from. Adelyn couldn't believe that she could pick whatever she wanted! Cameron loved the trucks and I'm sure took more than his fair share.  In their mind, a visit to Grandma Ruby never disappoints and I couldn't agree more. My grandma never ceases to amaze me. She is now working on a recipe book full of her famous dishes- I had to steal a few photos and I can't wait to make them. Maybe Brian and I will have to start a "west-coast" tradition of the famous Booya soup now that we have the recipe!

The Cousins

Adelyn and Cameron not only got to see all of their aunts and uncles, but also got to spend time with their cousins. Since this happens so rarely, every moment had to be captured with a photo:)  I'm sure it got to the point where they didn't want me to catch them with anyone else because that just meant they had to smile for another photo!

The Cabin

After staying with Brian's family for a few days we made the drive up to my Dad's cabin. Although it was chilly outside, we still made the most of it and took a ride on the pontoon, the kids had their first fishing experience and we had a fire & enjoyed s'mores while looking at the stars. It was an awesome cabin stay, minus the sunny warm weather!

The Great Outdoors...Indoors

The weather transitioned quickly from summer to fall while we were back so we had to change some plans to accommodate it. On one particularly cold and windy day we took a short drive to a nearby visitor center featuring exhibits on the wildlife found in the Upper Mississippi. It was perfect! The kids loved seeing all of the animal exhibits, touching the feathers, bones and antlers and running around...indoors. It was fun watching them explore everything and learning some interesting facts ourselves.