Misc pictures

We've (well I guess I should say Brian) been remodeling our bathrooms this summer.  It all started when Brian wanted to redo the tile in N2's bathroom because it was cracked.  I'm not sure why the need was more pressing in their bathroom and not ours (our tile is cracked too) but I shouldn't look a gift horse in the mouth.  We were just going to do the floor but then we ended up doing so much more!  I need to take some pictures and then post them so you can see but that will be another post!

Anywho, we did A LOT of visits to home improvement stores for buying things, returning things and pricing things out.  N2 had to spend a lot of time waiting.  Natalie learned that she could sit in the carts at Lowes or maybe this was a cart at Home Depot.  I can't remember!

We also had to sit in the car and wait for Brian to return things and they had fun driving the car.

 They also got treated to a lunch at Einstein Bagels one day since we were spending more time at a home improvement store.  They found the railing really fun in the checkout line (it wrapped around and made almost a circle-they both could fit inside it).

We were at the grocery store the other day and N2 saw a printed ad for detergent on the ground and thought it was a hopscotch board.  Not sure why a grocery store would have a hopscotch board for them but that is how their mind works!  We stayed for a few minutes so they could play "hopscotch."

Random vacation pictures

Here are more pictures from my phone.  My kids spent quite a bit of time in the car listening to playaways.  We had never gotten them before and they were a HIT!  Noah listened to Wind in the Willows which was 7 hours long (he didn't listen straight through but they could listen for about an hour at a time).  We also got two of the Winnie the Pooh books and Charlotte's Web.  We got some for our trip to Lexington over Labor Day and they only listened to one book each on the trip.  They weren't quite as excited about them-or maybe it was the books we got.

We had dinner in Rapid City, SD in the downtown area.  One each street corner in the downtown area, they have statues of all the presidents (well I assume they have all of them-we didn't see them all).  I'm not sure why but my kids loved looking at them and posing with them.  Each corner generally had one statue so you had to cross the streets in all directions to see them all.  They particularly liked the statue of Calvin Coolidge because he had a saddle.  We managed to see presidents from John Adams to George H. W. Bush.  We didn't see anyone past him and I wish we had had more time to explore the rest of the downtown to find all the statues but it was getting late.

Natalie with George H. W. Bush and Chester A. Arthur

Corn Palace

I finally figured out how to get pictures off my phone!  It was so much easier than I thought-just connect my google account and voila, they are on my google photos account which is connected to this blog.  So easy!

On our way out to our first stop in the Badlands, we stopped at the Corn Palace in Mitchell, SD.  We enjoyed looked at all the murals made out of corn cobs.  We toured both the inside and the outside.

 There was a tractor inside and of course we needed to ride on the tractor.

County Fair

Back at the end of July we went to the Lake County Fair as we do every year.  We go earlier in the day to see the animals and some of the smaller shows, leave for the afternoon and then return for the evening event.  We took mom with us this year.  We got to see all the animals and some animal showings, the pig/duck racing show, the monkeys riding dogs race, the showcase of art art and vegetables and much more!  There are lots of RVs and campers on display and we toured most of them-quite amazing to see how large and luxurious they can get!  There are antique tractors and this year they let people drive the tractors.  Brian, Natalie and Noah all took turns driving the tractor.  Brian got to do more of the driving then the kids did but they did get to help!  (these pictures are all from my phone so they aren't as good as my normal photos and they seem to be a funny size!)

They had a bucket train this year which they haven't had in the past and of course N2 had to ride it.

We let N2 ride some rides as they love carnival rides.  We left  and then returned for the demolition derby.  I had no idea what to expect and it was a lot of fun.  The most fun as the school buses!  We stayed until the end which was when they let any car/truck/jeep/etc that could still move come back out on the track and it was kind of a free for all.  N2 definitely enjoyed themselves!