We're Home!

What a wonderful vacation with our family. It started last Friday morning when I loaded my children and our van while Brian frantically tried to finish his 50 page curriculum project for the class he took earlier this summer. He mistakenly thought he had until December to finish...oops, it has to be done now or Purdue wouldn't allow him to take this teaching job as his student teaching. He drove up later after he finished the project.

Okay, back to vacation. So. I drove me and my kids to Holland, MI where we rented this huge house with Brian's family including his aunt, uncle and 11 year old cousin. The house is next to the marina where my parents keep their sailboat. So, other than my brother, we had all of our family with us. We spent the whole week on the beach, or fishing, or in the pool, or sailing, or shopping, or just relaxing. The house is a short walk from the beach and marina pool, but we had this great dock right outside the back door. The kids loved to fish there. We loved sitting there at night watching the stars and drinking wine. (Well, not Megan and me. We were drinking prego drinks.)

We also celebrated both Mary and Elijah's birthdays. Whew, what a lot of gifts they got this year! The highlights are (Mary): a doctor kit, one of those heads that is for brushing hair and doing makeup (She says upon receiving it, "I needed one of these!"), and lots of Dora things. (Elijah): a Spiderman web shooter, remote control truck, transformer, and soccer net.

We did have a bit of rain this year for the first time in 3 years of doing this, but it was never an all day rain and we did kind of enjoy just staying in the house and drinking coffee. Oh, and we went to see the Bourne Ultimatum which was fantastic. I am quite sure I never would have gone to sit in a movie theater on vacation if it weren't raining. Thanks to all of our family who helped make this year another successful vacation!