Fargo

After spending the night at Beaver and Denise's house, we left the next morning after breakfast for Fargo. We spent the next few days at Mom's apartment and also at Brian's house and had such a fantastic time. It always amazes me at how many things we manage to squeeze into our time together.

Mom's new place gave us the opportunity to do some exploring which we all thought was great. We enjoyed the library and finding different rooms throughout the place to use for playing games and also for eating. We fried our freshly caught walleye in the gazebo outside of her apartment, savored our Pizza Ranch (yes, Pizza Ranch!) pizza in the game room, and had a giant floor picnic in one of the community rooms that is near the library. 

We played lots of games of ping pong and foosball, a variety of board games checked out from the library and checkers (a first for our boys).  We also managed to make our annual trips to Chuck E. Cheese to play games and to Scheels to ride the ferris wheel and shoot at the shooting range.  Oh, and we did make it to Pizza Ranch for the buffet once and also picked it up for lunch another time.

We also spent an overnight at Brian's house. It happened to be one of the hottest times of the summer while we were in Fargo. Brian decided to make sure there was something for us all to do while we were at his place (as if that is ever a problem since the boys love running around in the open space outside) and came home with a blow-up pool, some water guns, and a variety of pool toys. Once we got the pool inflated and mostly filled with water, we spent most of the day outside by the pool and had a blast.

We also spent time around the fire pit. Caleb even got the honors of helping Uncle Brian start the fire. He gathered and crumpled up newspapers and then got to light the first part of the fire by igniting the fire with his lit newspaper and holding it there while Brian blew on the fire.

Brian showed the kids how his fancy bed works by raising and lowering the feet and head and running the different massage options. The younger kids went to sleep while we older "kids" watched a movie. Towards the end of the night we couldn't find Leo (Gina's little dog) and found him snuggled up with the kids on Isaac's sleeping bag.

The next morning Brian and Gina made everyone breakfast--pancakes, bacon and eggs. Isaac got the giant pancake that was larger than his plate (as shown in the picture above).

We ended up staying one extra day so that Vonda and I could help Mom shop for her dress for Brad and Kara's wedding. After a full afternoon that stretched into the evening and a quick stop at Taco John's for Potato Oles, we found a dress for her and a few other things for each of us as well. (A picture of it will be coming in upcoming post about the wedding!) Because of her move, Mom pulled out some things she has been storing for us including my wedding dress, Jill's bridesmaid dress (as modeled by Camille below) and the flower girl dress I wore when I was in kindergarten (as modeled by Carlie below).

My wedding dress still fits!

Part of the family

Our time with family each summer is always a gift to us. This year did not leave us disappointed since this summer's travels and visits were full of relaxation and catching up with everyone.

And it would not be a summer vacation travels series without at least one picture from our drive:

Snack time in the midst of the back seat mess