Wisconsin

Noah, my mom, sister and I recently drove 13 hours to Siren, Wisconsin to visit family for a week. This is my mom's side of the family. My grandpa has Dementia which puts stress on my grandma who is his caretaker as well as saddens me because he doesn't really remember who I am, but nonetheless, the visit was wonderful to catch up and show off my little two-year-old son!

Siren is pretty rural which makes it landscaped with tall trees and corn fields. It's beautiful this time of year. Plus the weather is in the mid 70's, so it feels wonderful to us Okies to be out in it. And boy, were we! Noah constantly wanted to be outdoors. Whether it was swinging at Aunt Nancy's, finding rocks on the road or picking raspberries with Aunt Terri and riding Uncle Keith's animal decoys used for target practice, he was outside!

The first day we arrived all the grandkids came over to Grandma and Grandpa's for a photo op. There are seven of us. My sister, Kristin, is the oldest. Then me. Then comes Kate, 24 nearly, Jeremy, 23, Holly, 20, Joel, 18, and then Erik, 16. All of us are pretty much grown and out of college or just starting college. Erik has two more years in high school. It's weird to see my cousins all grown up. I have them in my mind as the little kids I used to take care of. It was also very nice to meet Jeremy's girlfriend, Allison. She goes by Ally for short. Thank goodness so it won't be so confusing when we're together!

Mimi tends to do some antiquing while she is there and we did! Noah was excited to go in each store in hopes he'd find some toys. He's after Mimi's heart. :)

We made our yearly visit to Fawn-Doe-Rosa, a Wisconsin wildlife educational "zoo", again. Noah adores the zoo. Anything with animals, he's totally enthralled. This time he was old enough to get a pony ride! He kept yelling, "Yeehaw" like he was Woody from Toy Story. We spent some time out at the lake on Ethan's land making s'mores and playing. (Ethan belongs to my cousin Kate. We can't wait for him to be part of the family officially.)

Noah did fantastic the whole trip - not one single potty accident and adapted well to staying up later than usual. It was a little rough on Mommy having to sleep with a two-year-old all week who thrashes about at night. I played dodgeball from about 1-3 am each night trying to dodge Noah's feet in my face and knees in my back. By the end, we were really missing Cody. We are very glad to be home; although, we miss our Wisconsin family. We wish our times to see each other were more than just once a year. We anticipate the next visit very much!

Enjoy the slideshow of our Wisconsin visit below.