Back Home in Indiana

June has certainly been different than the first 5 months of this year for all of us. The standard routine
typically includes waking up earlier than any of us want, oatmeal pancakes for breakfast, Kevin taking B to school, Holly staying home to get K and N on the bus and then off to work for both of us. The afternoons and evenings are filled with playing, dinner, some schoolwork/learning opportunities (you can guess who obliges with the two), showers and a little TV/movie time before bed.

Well, the Ragnar road trip started the month off with new adventures. Both kids spent four days in Glen
Ellyn with Grandmo and Grandpo while we ran. They had lots of fun, as usual, but the most talked about portion of the trip was getting to see a raccoon. It was near the garage then in and out from underneath the deck with four babies.  Eeek!

New pink cowboy boots that light up!

Visiting Amy's girls

When that weekend ended, B returned home for two weeks of being an only child, while K stayed in
Chicago. This was actually a fun time for all involved. B got the chance to get lots of our attention and
we thoroughly enjoyed that. He actually behaves better when the focus is on him, plus he’s less wound
up. K got to spend more time in Glen Ellyn playing with the neighbor kids Travis and Elanor. She also
attended a camp at the Morton Arboretum with Travis.

Travis had his birthday party at the bowling alley

Day camps at the Arboretum.  Kari and Travis were happy to have each other there.

For a couple nights she ventured off to Riverside for some time with Grammy Pammy. This is always
exciting as K loves to see Samuel the cat, even though it sounds like he wasn’t himself on this particular
visit.

Spending time at our favorite place, Prophetstown

While it was a lot of fun for K to be away, I can honestly say it was much tougher on me than I thought. This is bar none the longest I’ve gone without seeing my little girl since she came into our lives roughly 6.5 years ago. Thankfully we were able to stay in touch via e-mail.  I’ve been traveling back and forth to North Carolina the past two weeks for work, too, so I would shoot fun messages and sometimes even pictures to Kari (through Grandmo’s email). K is an excellent reader so I enjoyed being able to write her knowing she could sit at the computer and read most of everything I would write.