Haircut day

Today was the first time that all 5 of us got haircuts together! Quite an adventure!





Jessica's "before." This is her very first haircut ever! We took Katie and Megan for their first haircuts right before they started preschool, so we had to do the same for Jessica. Now it's kind of a tradition to get back-to-school haircuts this time of year.


She climbed right up and sat as still as a statue. She loved the haircut!



Jessi after! Isn't she adorable? She's ready for preschool now!



Back of Jessica's new haircut.

Megan before...verrrry long and getting scraggly.

Megan after. Now she's ready for kindergarten!

Back of Megan's haircut. So much better!

Katie before. (It's so curly because she had her hair in a french braid overnight)

Katie after. She's ready for 3rd grade!

Back of Katie's new 'do.

Oh, and Katie went to a sewing 101 class at JoAnn's this morning, and made a pillowcase! She picked out the fabric herself, and did all of the cutting and sewing by herself. She's hooked! Now we just need a sewing machine...

Katie's Pioneer Camp

This past week Katie went to a day camp at a neighboring city's nature center: "Re-Living Pioneer Life." Like I've written, she has been enamored with history lately (esp Little House books). She really wanted to do a day camp this summer, and as soon as she heard about this pioneer one, she was sold.

She had a BLAST at the camp! The teachers and helpers were very knowledgable and enthusiastic, and they didn't just show the kids about pioneer life, they made them DO everything themselves! Every afternoon when I picked Katie up, she talked a mile a minute about all the fun things she had done that day. She couldn't wait to go back the next morning. I was so excited, I wanted to go to pioneer camp, too!


On Friday, the kids could dress up in pioneer clothes if they wanted. I had already purchased this pioneer dress ($5 steal at the mom-to-mom sale at Katie's school), because I knew that she'd need it in 3rd grade. Part of the 3rd grade history curriculum includes spending a few days in a one room school house at the Rochester Hills museum, in costume. So here's little pioneer Katie!



On Friday, the parents came a little early to see the kids demonstrate their favorite pioneer activity. Katie chose fire-building! These kids built teepee, pyramid, and star fires, and the teachers lit the fires. The kids then showed how they scooped out the charcoal from the bottom of the fires to make a dutch oven on the side. They cooked peach cobbler for us today!



This girl is demonstrating writing with a turkey feather quill. The ink is made from boiling walnut shells in water.



This kid is making a lantern by nailing holes in a tin can.

This girl is weaving a placemat from cattail leaves.

This boy told us how they made strawberry jam. All week long they cooked/prepped food for a Thursday feast. They made strawberry jam, applesauce, biscuits, and beef stew, all prepped from scratch, and cooked on fires they started themselves. They made butter and ice cream, too.

This girl is showing how to make yarn from sheep's wool with a drop spindle. A woman came to demonstrate making yarn on a spinning wheel, but the kids just used the drop spindle.

Cute little pioneer Katie!

This boy is grinding corn into cornmeal.

This girl is showing us how to make a potpourri sachet with herbs and flowers.

Katie on the log cabin porch, showing us the corn separator machine.

Katie and the butter churn and butter press.

Katie on the bed, with trundle bed underneath. The mattresses were stuffed with straw. Did you know the meaning of the phrase "sleep tight?" It refers to hoping that the ropes holding your mattress up would hold tight all night long so you wouldn't sag down.

Katie loved the pioneer kids' toys and games.

These boys demonstrated lots of pioneer tools, including this saw. The kids got to cut logs with it earlier in the week!

At home, Katie showing off her pioneer creations: feather pen, soap carvings, tin can lantern with beeswax candle, marbles, marble bag, and potpourri sachet. She made all of these!

More creations: scroll with walnut ink, nametag, basket, and yarn. She made them all!

It was an amazing experience, as you can tell. We are going to do more day camps through this nature center in the coming years, for sure! I was so jealous of all that Katie got to do and learn!

Day 1 of our "Up North" vacation!

Last Tuesday we began our vacation adventure "up north", like good little Michiganders. We stopped at Wendy's for lunch and the girls had a lot of fun with their kids' meal toys!

On our drive up north, we stopped at Hartwick Pines State Park, to see the only remaining old growth pine and hemlock forest in the lower peninsula.

We had a lovely hike through the forest, and we learned a lot on our walk. The humidity and the mosquitoes were horrible, though...it was the worst hour of our whole trip in terms of comfort! We also went through their logging museum buildings and enjoyed walking through a re-creation of a logging camp. Katie's been on a real history kick lately, so it was neat to see things in person that she's only read about.

We got to our hotel in Mackinaw City in the late afternoon, and headed out to play on the beach right away. The girls could play in sand ALL. DAY. LONG. if given the chance! The water was cold, but they didn't mind one bit. They gathered tons of shells to add to their shell collection.

This picture is funny because you can see Chris, Katie, and Megan in the far back right of the picture, hopping waves on the sandbar. Every 15 minutes or so, a ferry would come in or leave, and it would create small (but fun) waves to play in. The waves were the most fun where they crashed on the sandbar; we spent lots of time hopping over and through the waves!

After swimming, we went on the first of many long walks that night. First we walked the whole downtown strip of Mackinaw City, then we stopped for a dinner buffet (we were hungry!), then we walked to the state park at the tip of the mitt. Here are the girls being silly in front of the lighthouse right by the bridge.

Here they are, right by the lighthouse again, but with the Mackinac Bridge behind them.

We walked around and let the girls play on the beach around and under the bridge. Then we took a nice, leisurely walk back to our hotel to unpack and get some much-needed rest!

Day 2 - Mackinac Island

Last Wednesday we took a day trip to Mackinac Island. The day didn't start out so great...we had planned to take a special ferry ride that went UNDER the Mackinac Bridge...but they had to cancel that excursion due to heavy fog that morning. So we got a regular ferry ride and couldn't see a thing til we pulled into the Mac. Island harbor.


We decided to bike around the island first, while it was still cool. I rode a tandem bike with Katie, and Chris pulled the other two in a trailer. It was a ton of fun!



We stopped for several sight-seeing hikes on our way around the island. Here is Jess and Chris hiking up to see Arch Rock.



Here are the kiddos in front of Arch Rock.



Here's Katie at the top of Arch Rock. The fog was so cool and eerie, rolling in and out. When we biked through patches of heavy fog, our hair and sunglasses got wet! It felt good when we got to the sunny patches, though.



I got brave and snapped this shot while biking. This is the only highway in the US that does not allow motorized vehicles! It goes all the way around the island, right on the shore. We loved seeing all of the houses, how I would love to live off this highway!

We stopped for a little break, and the girls found about a trillion perfect skipping stones at this beach. We stayed for a long time! The water changed into the most amazing shades of turquoise as the sun faded in and out of the clouds.

Jessi didn't want to leave!

I got brave again, and snapped this shot of Chris pedaling through the downtown. It was quiet when we arrived at 9am, but it got reallllly busy by noon!

We enjoyed lunch right on the harbor. Our waitress was a college girl from Rochester Hills! It's a small world...

Here's Katie by a beautiful garden.

After lunch, we trekked up the big hill to get to the fort. By this point, the fog had cleared, the sun was out and was cooking us, and the girls were ready for naps. We did manage to see everything in the fort, but it was only in quick little glimpses. Here we are at the top of the front fort wall.

Here are the girls at the top of the fort, with another view of the harbor. You can see that Megan is starting to melt.

The kids had fun in the kids building! But none of the buildings were air conditioned, so we couldn't stay long.

We watched soldiers march around and shoot guns, and then got a picture with a soldier.

Before leaving, we stopped to get some ice cream downtown. It was soooo good on such a hot day!

Megan got Supergirl ice cream! See??

So did Jessi. She was a mess! A happy, sticky, mess!

We sat on the top of the ferry for the ride back to Mackinaw City. It was windy!

Then we changed into our suits and ran down to the beach in front of our hotel. The girls had a blast finding seaweed (see Katie's head), rocks, and shells. And they played in the waves from the ferry boats that came in every 15 minutes.

This was the view from our hotel onto Lake Huron. Beautiful!!

That night, we walked to downtown Mackinaw City for dinner and fudge, then came home to crash. (I stayed up late, reading on the balcony, enjoying the peace and quiet and the sound of waves)