We traveled north after Christmas. Where north you may wondering? To the very tippy top northern spot in the U.P. Houghton, here we all come! We packed everyone in the Friday after Christmas and we drove 12 hours with our 5 plus Gma and Papa Uitti! We all fit, our stuff fit, and everyone was great.
In Gaylord, stopping at breakfast at Diana's Delights. These 3 had a table all to themselves!
Crossing the Mighty Mac!
We got in late but early the next morning decided to go over to Michigan Tech's campus to hike on their trails!
Tech was hosting a hockey tournament so we decided to get tickets to watch some of the games.
Special times with Gma U.
On the Harry Potter scavenger hunt for Christmas, Drew got a 500 piece puzzle. The U.P. is a perfect spot to solve a puzzle after a fun morning in the snow.
We all took our turns...
Drew put in the last piece!
Playing Spot It! This is such a fun games that we love playing when we go to our favorite pizza spot in Rochester. They have different games you can play at you booth and Spot It became our family favorite. Here Elle is teaching Aunt Pam!
We love visiting Aunt Pam!
Gift time!
Aunt Pam had mentioned that she has never done a gingerbread house before. Be careful what you say because wa-la! We gifted her a with a gingerbread house that came with 3 eager, little elves to help!
These 3 all snuggled up for the night.
The visits are always to short but here we are headed to Mackinac City for the night. Welp, going there no hiccups in the giddy-up. However, going home. not so much. It was like the big snow storm of the break. I was catching my breath but when a car spun out in front of us and thankfully into a snowbank and not into oncoming traffic I was pretty much holding on the rest of the way. When we got to the bridge, Ben put on the Bridge radio that tells you about the Bridge conditions etc. They basically were broadcasting to not go faster than 20 mph, stay in the right lane, and the bridge had icy conditions. Driving over it, I was like well, this is it. This is how it ends. BUT we made it over! The next day, the Bridge was closed due to ice falling from the raptors. The SAME ice that was forming while we were on it!
But we made it! We checked into our rooms and Ben and the kiddos took off for the water park! I was meeting them and has to walk outside to get to the park so this is what I wore. Swimming like a yooper!
Pizza and swimming made everything well in my world and we enjoyed the night!
Finishing up the drive the next day. Sleeping Drew still has my favorite pucker lips.
Zeile's over!
Drew took all his puzzles out one day and finished all of them!
This was a moment. A small moment but it felt big. Ellie asked to take down all of her princess wall stickers to replace them with her new Harry Potter stickers. Our sweet girl who wore princess dresses and tutus is now entering a new chapter. So bittersweet.
We wrapped up our Christmas break with our first family game of Scrabble! We all played, Drew was on my team. :)
We played for so long it went into the next morning...
Luke's shirt came off and we knew we were all in trouble!
Here is our first completed game! My favorite word...When Elle came up with keys on her own going off the letter tile "s". Smartie!
