Memories from Mackinaw. And "Mackinac." (Love those Brits.)

My house resembles a war zone. My dogs need some focused attention. The kids start school in a month and we're not even close to ready. I have half a dozen half-baked projects scattered all over the place. And I am just beginning to tame the laundry. Oh, and there may be things growing in the refrigerator that could be considered uncivilized.

But I wouldn't change any of it if I had to give up the weekend I just spent with my girl.

Rachel and I camped for two nights with her Girl Scout troop in Mackinaw City, and spent all day Saturday on Mackinac Island. It was Rachel's first time seeing the Mackinac Bridge and visiting the island, and I am so glad I got to experience that with her.

 

On a shopping excursion Rachel had her fortune read by the creepy-looking gypsy lady in the box. Part of her fortune said, "Your cool thinking sees you through a mishap with a Taurus or Leo ..."

I'm a Leo. Ha!

Fortunately we didn't have any mishaps over the weekend. Except that Saturday was my birthday, and I did get pooped on by a bird. At least it wasn't in my hair. Happy birthday to me!

Getting ready to board the ferry to Mackinac Island. Rach was a little nervous. She got over it.

One of the horses that pulled our carriage on the first leg of our tour. The tour company uses each team for only four hours at a time, and we were lucky enough to be able to watch the handlers switch our team for fresh horses. They are all very good - and quick - at what they do!

 This was the 3-horse team for the final leg of our tour. That's Wade on the right. He was moving a little slow that day, so the tour guide was fussing at him (good-naturedly). Look at that face ...

One of our stops was at the Butterfly House.

It was awesome. The girls loved it. And I had a new camera to play with.

Beautiful butterfly pictures!

Rachel pointed out that this butterfly looks like a fish. And there was a little pond just to the right ... so he looks like he's about to jump in! Can you see the fish?

 One of my favorites landed on Rachel's finger.

 

 And she had a couple land on her hoodie.

 I think this is my favorite photo. I love the blue of the butterfly against those huge, green leaves.

 The carriage tour also took us by the cemeteries. If I had a little more time I would have loved to walk around and take more pictures there.

 Military cemetery.

Another stop on the tour:

 The view from Arch Rock down the shoreline.

 After our tour, Rach and I rented bikes and just rode around for a while. It was SO busy on the island that day! We even got in a little traffic jam involving bicycles, horse-drawn wagons and carriages ... we decided to get off our bikes and walk them through that.

 We took a little loop that goes right along the shoreline and stopped for a few minutes to take in the view.

 Me and my girl.

 A view of the Mackinac Bridge on our way back to the mainland. It had been overcast all day and it was a chilly ride back in the evening.

We had a fantastic time. I always feel so blessed (and exhausted!) after we spend time with Rachel's GS troop. The girls all get along so well and I love spending time with the moms, too - several of us go way back, but I consider each of them friends - and we're a good mix of cooks, nurturers, planners, outdoorsy-types. And thankfully, everyone has a great sense of humor. Because when your dinner burns and the craft project doesn't work out as planned and the campfire is mostly billowing smoke, a sense of humor comes in pretty handy.

Happy Friday! It's birthday sleepover weekend.

Yesterday was Rachel's 11th birthday.

Are you ready for the cliché? Yeah? Time flies, people. It does.

 Rachel, age 6.

Age 11.

As Rach was helping me prepare our taco buffet for the family get-together last night, she asked me how I was feeling 11 years ago at that time. I told her that at about 4:30 the afternoon of the day she was born I was excited, scared, probably in a little bit of pain, and sad that my mama would miss the birth of my second baby because she was in Florida.

We had not found out the sex of either of our children before they were born, so I had no idea we were having a girl. And frankly, I had somehow convinced myself I was having another boy, so that's what I was prepared for. I was astounded - pleasantly surprised - when Rachel was born and the doctor told us our baby was a girl. A girl! A baby sister for Sammy! Even when I called my parents in Florida and told my mom the baby had arrived and we were both fine (praise Jesus, because that girl put me through the wringer before she made her appearance and I, in turn, put Steve and everyone else who was there through the wringer), I heard mom breathe that sigh of relief, and then ... "Mom, it's a girl" ... and I think my mom danced a jig right there on the other end of the line.

Ahhhh. I think we must never get tired of telling our "birth day" stories, do we? I remember some of the silliest details about the days my kids were born, but half the time I can't tell you what I had for breakfast this morning. Whether they realize it or not, much of my world revolves around the two of them. I wouldn't have it any other way.

And so, this afternoon I will pick Rachel and three of her friends up from school (Sam, poor dear, will ride the bus home and hang out with Grandpa), I will take this gaggle of girls to have manicures, we will eat pizza, and celebrate Rachel's Year of Eleven. Said celebration also involves a sleepover, so please pray for me!

Happy Friday.

A quick and random update.

Sam got the cast on his leg yesterday. Praise Jesus, it did not have to go all the way up to his thigh as the ER doctor had said it would. It ends just below his knee, and is much less cumbersome than the splint, according to Sam. What a relief. Also a relief: they took more x-rays and said the bones are healing nicely. We go back to that doctor in five weeks ... so Sam will (hopefully) get his cast off for Christmas!

The weather here has been weird, which has become the norm I guess. It was pushing 70 degrees over the weekend and this morning I have snow on my deck. Brr. I don't mind, though. I love those first few days of snow ... it really gets me in the holiday spirit. I do need a new winter coat, though, so I guess I better move that up the priority list.

This week the kids have a short week of school because they get the deer hunting opener (firearm season) off on Thursday, and then a teacher in-service Friday. Then next week is Thanksgiving, of course, and - HAPPY HAPPY! - Steve is flying home from Colorado for the weekend. I feel like I've been living in my truck lately and there's no end to it in sight.

And the dogs. Gunnar has bypassed Ladybug in height, and probably at least caught up to her in weight. His head is twice the size of hers. I do love this cute stage where he's half-puppy/half-big dog and really fun to play with, but I also look forward to the time when he will lay on my feet and not give a darn when the cats walk by. I'm really trying to take a few minutes here and there to play with the dogs and let them stretch their legs since they've been cooped up with Sam hobbling around here on crutches. Now that I've given them some time to run around this morning, I'm off to have lunch with Rachel at school. They have their annual Thanksgiving celebration in which each child can invite a guest. It's the one time during the year I get to experience school lunch again, Turkey Day style. And this is the last year I will do this, at least with my own kids ... as Rachel will be moving up to Middle School next year.

Awww. My babies are growin' up.

A bedroom makeover fit for a tween.

Ten years old is a "tween" age, no? That in between, "not a little kid anymore but not technically a teenager" age?

That would be my daughter. My lovely, spirited, girly-girl when she wants to be, tough when she has to be, younger child.

Steve bought her a t-shirt for her birthday this year that I think perfectly fits her personality. It's from Smith & Wesson, it's black and has the S&W logo in bright pink writing and in white says, "Yeah, I shoot like a girl."

But lest you think pink is her favorite color, she would quickly (and loudly) tell you pink was so yesterday. She has moved on to purple. How befitting. Because purple is the color of royalty, ya' know.

Regardless of her current fave, no 10-yr-old really likes mustard yellow (she says with authority). And that's the color Rachel's room was before we repainted the walls this week.

Now, in my defense, the deep yellow perfectly matched a beautiful antique toy-themed wallpaper border we hung in that room when Rachel was about a week old. It was a sweet little nursery with a honey-colored crib and a quilt rack and a set of shelves that held mementos from the hospital and little stuffed bears and bunnies and pictures in frames.

No more.

Rachel's room is now striped with teal blue, white and purple paint, with sparkly sheer curtains and bright white book shelves. She traded the big, old painted bookcase her Papa made for her for an old sewing table I had that she now uses for a desk. She has new lamps, a few new storage containers, and rugs with a hint of zebra stripe on their borders.

Her fuzzy new comforter should be here within the week ... I still need to hang the curtains that will block out the light ... the trim around the doors and window need to be painted white, as does her bedside table ... and we have a new bed picked out which we will order as soon as the funds are freed up in our budget. But even with a handful of things yet to do to finish off this room, Rachel is really enjoying her new space.

So, without further ado ... some pictures.

 Before ... 

Sweet, no?

Once we got the wallpaper border off we started by painting a white stripe around the middle.

Then we taped it off and painted purple on the bottom section.

And then blue above the white stripe.

Once the painting was done it was all about the furniture and accessories.

Rachel now spends more time in that room than she ever has. She loves it, and that makes me so happy.

 Fun, huh?

Every tween girl needs her own space, and this one's pretty cool. Rachel and I spent most of a week working on it while her brother was away at summer camp.

Time well spent, indeed.

Washington, DC: Part II

Gosh, I didn't realize it had been so long since I last posted! What can I say? It's summer, and we're busy, busy!

We had such a great time. I feel so blessed to have had the chance to go to DC with Rachel and have that mommy/daughter time with an awesome group of Girl Scouts.

As the days go by the excitement over every little thing we did is calming down a bit, but there are some highlights that will always be some of the first things we think of when we talk about our trip.

One of those memories, oddly enough, is the bus ride.

We had pretty much a full day to get to know our traveling partners. Or get to know them a little better, since we were at least familiar with the ladies from our area. At one point as we traveled through the hills of Pennsylvania the bus driver pulled off to the side of the road and stopped - all very suddenly. There was a busy highway on one side of the bus and a guardrail and steep cliff on the other side. For several minutes nobody knew what was going on and the bus driver wasn't sharing. (We did determine he was OK, at least.) With no power on the bus (read: no air conditioning) it got sticky in a hurry. One mom got pretty anxious and asked us to open some windows. We obliged. But one row got a surprise when they released the latch on their window:

Oops!

You can't really tell from the photo, but that's actually a double-paned window and it's the outer pane that shattered - so thankfully no one was hurt, and when the bus driver slammed the window to get it to shut, much of the broken glass fell to the ground.

It turned out the bus was overheating and we had to pull over a couple more times before we made it to DC. It happened again on the way home, so somewhere on the turnpike we met up with a different bus and had to unload and reload all of our stuff. The good news: it was a much nicer bus. The not-so-good news: we got home a bit later than anticipated (which wouldn't have been a big deal if it hadn't been 2 a.m.).

There is so much to see and do in Washington, DC, and much of it is walkable. And boy did we walk. We walked, and walked, and walked. We left our hotel after breakfast by 8-8:30 in the morning and we didn't get back until at least 10 each night. The bus would take us to one location where we would visit, then walk to the next place and the next. And so on. We had no trouble sleeping, lemme tell ya'.

Our favorites? The Museum of Natural History - we would love to spend an entire day there. The Star-Spangled Banner exhibit at the Museum of American History - what an amazing piece of our nation's history. The Lincoln Memorial - it's much grander than either of us anticipated. The war memorials and Arlington Cemetery - all beautiful and humbling.

And while I would love to go back as a family and show Steve and Sam some of the things we saw and spend more time exploring, there will never be a trip quite like this again. Because I did it with my girl ... my Girl Scout.

Rockin' the Mall.

Holy smokes, it was HOT that day!

 Rachel goofin' with the camera.

 At the Lincoln Memorial.

At Arlington Cemetery, near the Eternal Flame.

One of the greatest things about the Girl Scouts of America is how they encourage girls to be whatever they want to be, and make sure they know that girls can change the world. The Rock the Mall event was pretty powerful (if you could survive the heat), the entertainment was great, and we got to be a part of a world-record-breaking dance and singalong. Pretty cool.

We did take a little "detour" during that big day when Rachel got a nosebleed. Poor kid ... she gets them occasionally but never as bad as the one she got that day. So we spent some time at the first aid tent until it stopped. She was just fine after that.

We have some wonderful memories of this trip, and I'm so glad Rachel was persistent with asking me if we could go. I had fun with her, I enjoyed walking around with Rachel's hand in mine and experiencing something new together.

It reminded me, too, of how thankful I am that I am able to do this kind of stuff with my kids. As a homemaker I didn't have to get up early to head to work after only a few hours' sleep, and I am surrounded by family who took care of everything while we were gone, making it possible for me to go, and to focus on my daughter.

I can't wait to go again someday.

What a trip! Washington DC, Part I

Today: photos.

  George, our tour guide.

 National Museum of American History

 Girl Scout display at the NMAH

 Entry to one of my favorite displays - The Star Spangled Banner.

(You can't take pictures inside.)

 Dorothy's ruby slippers!

The National Museum of Natural History

The Old Post Office - where we ate lunch.

 Tower view of the Capitol building (from the Old Post Office).

 Tower view of the Washington Monument.

Cool rooftop gardens.

 

FBI. Need I say more?

 Ford's Theatre, where Abraham Lincoln was shot ...

(We didn't go in, just saw it from the street.)

 And the Petersen House (across the street) where Lincoln died.

~ ~ ~

 

 Korean War Memorial

Lincoln Memorial

 View of the Washington Monument from Lincoln Memorial. The reflecting pool was empty as it is being reconstructed. Still a beautiful view!

 Lincoln Memorial = BIG. Huge!

 Vietnam Memorial

 WWII Memorial

The White House!

Girl Scouts' 100th Anniversary - Rock The Mall Event

It was so hot they brought out a fire truck, opened a hydrant and sprayed water for hours to cool people off.

The last place we visited before we left was Arlington National Cemetery.

 The changing of the guards at The Tomb of The Unknown Soldiers.

The Kennedy family's eternal flame.

Tomorrow (or ... whenever): our favorite memories from the trip.