Our Week at the Cabin

We had a wonderful week at the cabin at KeeNeeMooSha resort. The weather was beautiful, the new friends we met were so nice, the crafts were fun and the fishing improved from last year.

We left Saturday morning, got to the cabin and unpacked in 45 minutes and then headed to church. By this time Natalie was done with her car seat and she was very ancy. So we gave the nice elderly couple quite the show at mass. Once back at the cabin the girls explored and the fun began.

Sunday: Brian was up at 5:30am to go fishing. Bound and determined to get some fish this year! The girls and I got up around 8:30-9am (pretty much all week) and went to the beach to play in the sand. In the afternoon the resort had an Ice Cream social where we could meet the other families who were staying the week. We met an awesome couple, Louis and Leah and their 2 girls, Claire and Elle. They were staying with their parents who are equally awesome. Louie and Susan and Mike and Bev. Super, super nice people. We ended up spending alot of time with them. :) The girls also befriended Cameron, and her brothers Tristin and Tyler.

Monday: Brian up again to fish this time he took Caitlin. Later in the morning we all did the craft of the day, Tie-Dye t-shirts. We LOVE this craft day. In the afternoon Brian, the engineer was "challenged" by grandma Susan who didn't know what profession Brian is in, to build a better sandcastle than the huge sand whale she and her granddaughters had made. Well, he rallied the troops and made an awesome castle and then let Susan know what he did for a living! After dinner Brian, Caitlin, Emily and Rachel went out fishing while Natalie and I went for a "nature" walk. As we're on our walk I noticed that there was a dark cloud coming our way but got preoccupied by the 6 deer that came out of the woods. Freaked me out so I turned for home and RAN! When I got back it started to rain. Brian and the girls were no where in site. It rained harder and harder. I was worried and my mind was racing. About an hour later, FINALLY, they came home drenched! Emily and Caitlin were so pumped up, Rachel was scared. After drying off and the rain subsided we met everyone at the campfire for s'mores. A good end to a very busy day!

Tuesday: Brian out fishing with Caitlin and Emily. Emily was the fisherman of the day with 8 sunnies caught, but on the way back to the cabin the string let loose and they lost all the fisth! Craft was Batik painting-very fun. Brian took Natalie out for a walk while I was with the other three. He was walking down the road and listening to his Ipod when all of a sudden he hears a crack and boom! A tree fell over the road about 50 yards from where he had just been. He thought maybe God was trying to get his attention. Timing IS everything! In the evening we met up with the rest of the group for S'mores by the fire.

Wednesday: Brian out fishing again-starting to see a pattern??!! This time he caught a big northern, a perch and a sunnie. Enough fish for about a meal and a half. Turtle races in Longville. None of our turtles felt like moving this year. Brian came home with the slow-poke award. The girls enjoyed dancing and at the end of the event we all got ice cream cones from Frosty's. More sugar later in the evening when we had Mini-donuts by the campfire. The most exciting thing happened in the evening when Caitlin and the rest of the crew caught a chipmunk! Brian said he'd give her $5 if she caught one and I guess her determination paid off! She even shared her reward with her friends. Just two little scratches or bites-no rabies. Grandma Susan got her all patched up with neosporin and a band-aid. Gotta love those grandmas!

Thursday: Fishing with Caitlin in the early a.m. Craft was painting picture frames. S'mores by the fire again. Surprisingly enough we're not getting sick of s'mores. Leah is becoming an expert on roasting just like Brian does. Nice and brown and perfectly plump. Yummy!

Friday: Fishing one last time and Brian caught a big blue gill. We get to have another meal of fish!! In the afternoon Brian, Natalie and I went on a nature walk while the other 3 girls and the other kids built another sand castle. In the evening we rented the pontoon and rode back to Longvilled to pick up our free cones and cookies we had won at the turtle races. It was so windy but we thought we'd head out anyway. We get the pontoon ready to go and Caitlin realizes she doesn't have her life jacket so she has to run back and get it. This is typical Salfer routine. So off we go. Waves are huge but we find a bay that is calm and ride to Longville. Have our treats and then head back out to do some fishing. Find a "hot spot" and realize Brian forgot the bait back at the cabin. Again typical salfer outing. We try and head back and the waves are just too much so we decide to use wax worms and Emily and I are lucky. We both catch big rock bass-not good for eating. It's still fun thought to get a fish. Natalie did pretty good despite the life jacket. She finally fell asleep on our way back. Which was good! Our last night wouldn't be complete with out S'mores by the fire.

Campfires everynight, great conversation, kids laughing, margaritas.......priceless. :) Another great end of the summer vacation

Nicollet Co Fair

I'm not really a fair lover so when it came time for the county fair it didn't excite me and I thought maybe it would go unnoticed, but it didn't. Oh well. Brian and our friend Jeff went to the demo-derby while Jeff's wife, Sharon, the girls and I went to all the barns looking at the animals and petting some. This was Natalie's first up-close and personal experience with animals and it was quite funny. Her expressions cracked us all up! After the barns we got ice cream cones and after that we got cheese curds. (Sharon's pregnant, hence the food choices) We took cover in one of the tents where, Michael, a very talented musician that we know was playing. Two downpours came while we were listening to him and people were scrambling out of the demo-derby just drenched. Brian and Jeff being two of them! The night ended with Rachel slipping off the picnic table and scrapping off the first layer of her skin (a 4 inch scrape) and crying very hard-almost a scream. Luckily most people didn't notice because the music was loud enough to drown her out. It was a good night and thank goodness it'll be another year before the next one. :)

Park Point Beach

Lutsen

Gondola riding Girls

Scenic Overlook

Rachel and Mommy

Caitlin out in front with Brian and Rachel catching up quickly

Emily rounding the last curve

Gooseberry Falls

Canal Park-Beach

Mystery Vacation

Brian and I planned a little weekend away, not by ourselves but with the whole crew. It was to be an adventure and it was! It all starts Friday with Caitlin, Emily and I along with our friend Mary and her two kids going to the Mall of America to celebrate Caitlin and Kylie's academic all-star acheivment. The kids rode rides from 11am to 10:30pm. They had so much fun and Mary and I were able to visit without any interruptions. It was great! Brian, Natalie and Rachel along with Tony, Mary's husband joined us later in the evening for the ceremony. What the kids didn't know was that before we left that morning I secretly packed a suitcase for them for a trip to Duluth and the North Shore. They had no clue! I was frantically packing all that I could and hoping I wasn't leaving Brian with too much else to pack before he joined us. So, after MOA we left for "up north". The girls all fell asleep with was nice and we got to our first hotel in Moose Lake, 2 hrs away. So we get there at 12:30 in the morning! Brian and I looked at each other and wondered how we were going to get the girls in the room without waking them, mind you there is 4 of them and only 2 of us! We decided to wake Em and Caitlin and carry in Nat and Rachel. All worked out just fine. Natalie was the only one who decided to stay awake and play, the others fell right back to sleep. At 2am Natalie finally decided to go back to sleep. Saturday morning the girls woke up and realized we were at a hotel and of course wondered if there was a pool. And there was. So they went swimming and had a great time. Ok..time to continue on the adventure. As we are in the van Caitlin asks where we are going and I hand her and Emily a map and tell them we are going North and we are in Moose Lake. See what you can find. Emily all of sudden perks up and says "duluth is north of here!!!! Do we get to go to Duluth??!!!!!" We all love Duluth! So they figured out the first part of our adventure. While in Duluth on Saturday we went to Canal Park and watched the bridge and boats, climbed some rocks and then spent a few hours on the beach before heading to Grandma's for a nice sit down dinner. Sunday we woke up, went to church only to find a couple from St. Peter there who were visiting family! What a nice surprise for us! After church we started traveling north again to Gooseberry Falls, another family favorite! We spent all afternoon there before heading to our next hotel in Silver Bay. Once there the girls remembered the waterslide and wanted to go swim immediately. At the hotel they had a Mile challenge, go down the waterslide 48 times and you would have gone a mile. So the girls of course went for that and made it. Got their picture taken and on the wall with the other champions. Monday, we woke up and traveled north again, this time taking us all the way to Lutsen. There we rode the Alpine Slide and the Gondola up to the highest peak and had lunch at the top. The girls were super excited! After a few hours there, we headed back down to Duluth. Everyone slept on the way-Yeah!! Once there we decided to go to Park Point which is over the lift bridge and has great beach shoreline. We spent a couple hours there playing in the sand, finding cool rocks, swimming and just having fun. After all that fun we were ready to get back to St. Peter so Tuesday morning after another breakfast of waffles (nice complimentary hotel breakfasts) we headed back home. It was a nice relaxing, adventurous mini vacation.