May Trip

In May, we took a quick 4-day trip to Indiana for Joel's mom's 60th birthday party. We love traveling, and thankfully, our kids are pretty good in the car. By 'pretty good in the car', I mean that they don't cry or throw tantrums. Instead, they enjoy filling the time with talking.

Ollie's favorite thing to do is ask questions. Specifically,
"Mom, are you pressing on the pedal?"
"Which one?"
"Are you now?"
"What's the windshield?"
"Are you pressing on the pedal?"
"Are you now?"
"How much more time do we have?"
"Will we be there in 13-4-9-eleventeen minutes?" (We did finally break down and bring a laptop and video so we could have some silence for 30 minutes of the 12 1/2 hour drive.)

Lily likes to practice making noises, specifically the 'most annoying sound in the world' from Dumb and Dumber. I kid you not. When she's not making that sound, she's pretty happy, provided she's eating.
We spent half a day in Chicago with my brother and his wife, and their kids, Addilyn and Asher. We enjoyed riding the El...

to eat pizza downtown at Giordano's--YUMMY deep dish pizza!

We decided to eat there, despite the 45 minute wait (on a Thursday at noon!)...so our kids occupied themselves fairly well. And after 10 minutes of waiting, we had to get creative...
(After escaping into the kitchen, Lily had to be held.)

Finally, when we did sit down to eat, the waitress commented that our 4 children were so well-behaved! (Couldn't help but wonder what the rest of the waiting children normally do!)
(don't worry, my brother's not mad...just totally incapable of taking a normal picture.)

Anyway--the pizza was well worth the wait. And we rewarded ourselves with Starbucks afterwards.


We drove the rest of the way to Joel's sister's house and stayed a few days there. Joel's sister, Sara, hosted Roglenda's party. It was so much fun! We had yummy food, played outside, and as always, played cards.

Aunt Sara entertained the kids with "Don't Break the Ice"...

Ollie busied himself with yet another outdoor implement--the riding lawn mower. He stayed on that thing for at least 2 hours, climbing on and off, pressing buttons and explaining to the other children how to get on it.


Lily found a quick friend in our niece, Clara. Clara LOVED Lily and carried her around all weekend.

It's wonderful that the older cousins are getting to the age where they love to play with our little ones!

We had such a good trip and can't WAIT to go back in August to spend a bit more time with family. (and go to Toronto without the kids!!!)