South Dakota

We spent from the evening of October 23 until the afternoon of October 26 in South Dakota.  It was a very impromptu trip as I decided less than 24 hours before we left that we were all going.  Blase and Stephen had planned to go with their dad down to hunt pheasants at the ranch.  I decided the rest of us would catch a ride down and drop them off as we headed up to Sturgis to meet the newest family member.  It was driving me nuts that there was a sweet little niece down there that I hadn't met yet.

The funnies part about the whole trip was before we left.  I managed to keep it a secret until 3:29 PM.  We left at 5 PM, so I did pretty good.  I packed everyone's clothes, loaded the van, made a sandwich supper, and still taught school without them catching on.  How did I accomplish that I don't know.  We were suppose to have piano lessons that afternoon, but I had already cancelled them. It wasn't until we were suppose to be there that they caught on something wasn't right.  When I told them we were all going there were mixed emotions.  Blase freaked out and wanted to know how I managed to keep it a secret that long.  Stephen almost cried, "I just wanted a couple of days of peace and quiet," quickly followed with, "Does Dad even know about this."  Silly kid!  The rest of the kids were SO happy they were going to see Loman that there were many, many interpretive happy dances.  The twins didn't care at that point.

It was a very, very quick trip, but we saw our families and had a great time.  Thursday we stayed over at the ranch.  The twins had slept from Watertown to Milesville so when we got there at 11:30 our time they were ready to stay up and party.  They stayed up for sure, but it was no party for me.  They finally went to bed about 2 AM (3 AM our time) and were up again about 5:30. By that point I had only 2 hours of sleep since the twins were sharing a bed with me and they move more than egg beaters.  I did take about an hour nap around 7 AM.  After that we loaded up those coming with me and we drove to see Loman and Bella (because they are the only ones who get talked about non-stop).

When we got to Sturgis we picked up Mom and Loman and played all afternoon at the Mark Park.  It was a beautiful day!  The kids had SO much fun.  We were also able to do a little helping at the park to get ready for winter.  Then we headed back to Mom and Dad's with a few extra tag-along cousins.  The kids had pizza and a sleepover with three of the cousins.  Good memories for all of us.

Saturday morning was exciting as it looked like it was going to be another beautiful day.  I did run to town to get some Halloween candy to get ready to leave for all the kids there. The kids went to play at the park with Mom while I stayed home waiting for the twinnies to take a nap.  Then we headed down and I finally got to see that sweet new niece.  She was everything that the pictures showed and more!!  I didn't hold her very long though.  She's a pretty good baby so we didn't have to take turns keeping her happy.  We spent the afternoon doing some more work on the park and then had an easy supper at the park.  Then we headed back to Mom and Dad's for some games with those who were around.  The kids were exhausted from playing, but you couldn't tell as much as they ran around and screamed with delight.

Sunday morning we got ready for Mass and I managed to make it through without pulling my hair out.  That was thanks to sending a kid to someone else's pew.  Brech sat with John and Maria, Gianna and Cormac sat with Grandpa and Grandma, Rex sat in front of them with Kaylene and the twinnies did their part to be handfuls in the back.  After Mass we grabbed some food and headed to the ranch to pick up the others.  We had a long day, but we were home and in bed by 11:30 that night.

It was worth every minute of time on the road to see everyone back in South Dakota.

I had decided that even though I had brought the camera with me I was going to make it a weekend we just made memories instead of captured them.  THEN - the kids had a dance session on the way home from the Mark Park Saturday night.  They were dancing to Happy from Despicable Me 2.  I had to take a couple pictures them because it was just pure happiness!

I giggled when I see that pictures.  You just had to be there.