Just back from a week of family vacation in beautiful Door County, Wisconsin, the Cape Cod of the Midwest. What is it about a family driving vacation that causes me to go into Dad overdrive? I was up at 4 a.m. the day we left and we had our sleepy charges on the road by 5:20 a.m. in a pounding rainstorm. From there, it was a week of big fun. Some highlights, for those of you who couldn’t make it:1. MUCH NEEDED SLEEP: Including napping in a hammock with Owen;
2. MUCH NEEDED CHANGE OF SCENERY: This view from our rented house;
3. MUCH NEEDED SLEEP INTERRUPTED: We took advantage of the twin’s general level of exhaustion by plugging them into twin beds for the first time rather than cribs. The house we had rented was high on a bluff away from pretty much anything. Each night the peaceful silence was broken several times by thuds that back home would have been neighbors car doors slamming shut nearby, but here signaled a twin falling out of bed in his sleep once again, followed by a plaintive and confused wail. Apparently bed rails are necessary for our next trip;
4. VACATION WITHIN A VACATION: Owen decided the first day of our arrival that our rented house was a lodge in which Deanna and I were the proprietors and in which he was a guest. Once in full guest mode he played it to the hilt, at one point looking quizzically at his little brothers, then turning to me with a serious little face and asking “What did you say their names were again?”;
5. WIFE REPELLENT: The intensity of the mosquitoes caused me to buy some bug repellent that was so toxic it caused Deanna’s lips to go numb after she kissed me on the neck. When mosquitoes were in the air, romance was not;
6. PIE!!!: We gorged ourselves on all manner of pies in our cherry-orchard laden vacation destination. Peachberry: peaches, cherries, blueberries; Summerberry: raspberry, blackberry, blueberry; Carmel-Apple-Walnut: you figure this one out. Pie for snacks, pie for desert, and best of all, pie for breakfast!
7. BOILED WHITEFISH: Eating boiled Lake Michigan Whitefish drowning in butter after laboriously picking their bones out is not for everyone, it is true. Including Deanna, seen here in front of the pot of boiling fish with Cooper shortly before she bolted to a different nearby restaurant with her Mom for dinner, leaving some of the rest of us to enjoy this Wisconsin delicacy. Mmmmm, mmmm, good!
4. VACATION WITHIN A VACATION: Owen decided the first day of our arrival that our rented house was a lodge in which Deanna and I were the proprietors and in which he was a guest. Once in full guest mode he played it to the hilt, at one point looking quizzically at his little brothers, then turning to me with a serious little face and asking “What did you say their names were again?”;
5. WIFE REPELLENT: The intensity of the mosquitoes caused me to buy some bug repellent that was so toxic it caused Deanna’s lips to go numb after she kissed me on the neck. When mosquitoes were in the air, romance was not;
6. PIE!!!: We gorged ourselves on all manner of pies in our cherry-orchard laden vacation destination. Peachberry: peaches, cherries, blueberries; Summerberry: raspberry, blackberry, blueberry; Carmel-Apple-Walnut: you figure this one out. Pie for snacks, pie for desert, and best of all, pie for breakfast!
7. BOILED WHITEFISH: Eating boiled Lake Michigan Whitefish drowning in butter after laboriously picking their bones out is not for everyone, it is true. Including Deanna, seen here in front of the pot of boiling fish with Cooper shortly before she bolted to a different nearby restaurant with her Mom for dinner, leaving some of the rest of us to enjoy this Wisconsin delicacy. Mmmmm, mmmm, good!
8. NORTHERN WISCONSIN HUNTING CULTURE TAKES HOLD: Spying a life-size fake sheep on the front lawn of a store, Owen spontaneously yelled “I’m hungry for lamb!” and proceeded to unleash a barrage of imaginary bullets into the sheep from close range with a pretend gun;
9. POOPIE THE BROWN - FEARLESS VIKING WARRIOR: The twins tried on plastic Viking helmets in the store of Al Johnson’s Swedish restaurant. While wearing the helmets, they both suddenly began dancing around, grabbing at their diapers and loudly chanting “I’m poopie!!!” in unison. The stoic Swedish crowd in the shop were unmoved by either the cuteness, or, to their credit, the stench, of what was a fairly amusing, albeit stinky, display.
10. MY MEXICAN BRIDE. Lastly, Owen and his 8-year old cousin Emma, going by their stage names of Aiden and Annika, concocted a 100-act play that included the death of their moms (causes never specified, but some suspect insecticide poisoning!), the subsequent adoption of the twins, now named Leo and Ian (pronounced, amusingly, Ion, as Emma/Annika has apparently only read this name and not heard it said out loud), and their dads subsequent remarriages. While my brother-in-law, I am told, had to search “every church in Illinois” before finding a new bride, I was apparently able to avoid all that pesky church-going by picking mine up in Mexico. One night, when Deanna poked her head into a room where the “play” was taking place, Owen looked at her and said “Mom, what are you doing alive?”
9. POOPIE THE BROWN - FEARLESS VIKING WARRIOR: The twins tried on plastic Viking helmets in the store of Al Johnson’s Swedish restaurant. While wearing the helmets, they both suddenly began dancing around, grabbing at their diapers and loudly chanting “I’m poopie!!!” in unison. The stoic Swedish crowd in the shop were unmoved by either the cuteness, or, to their credit, the stench, of what was a fairly amusing, albeit stinky, display.
10. MY MEXICAN BRIDE. Lastly, Owen and his 8-year old cousin Emma, going by their stage names of Aiden and Annika, concocted a 100-act play that included the death of their moms (causes never specified, but some suspect insecticide poisoning!), the subsequent adoption of the twins, now named Leo and Ian (pronounced, amusingly, Ion, as Emma/Annika has apparently only read this name and not heard it said out loud), and their dads subsequent remarriages. While my brother-in-law, I am told, had to search “every church in Illinois” before finding a new bride, I was apparently able to avoid all that pesky church-going by picking mine up in Mexico. One night, when Deanna poked her head into a room where the “play” was taking place, Owen looked at her and said “Mom, what are you doing alive?”
Anyway, as I adjust back to life back here in Illinois, with my new Mexican sweetie and my sons Aiden, Leo and little Ion, I will leave you with a couple of more pictures from our trip. Adios for now.
2 comments:
Michael, I enjoy your writing and Owen's imagination. This weekend we are going to Decorah, Iowa for NordicFest, you and your crew should try it next year- lots of Scandinavian flags and Viking things
http://www.nordicfest.com/2006.asp
Thanks Gail! Perhaps we will take you up on your suggestion. By next year's NordicFest, we should be ready for more Scandanavian fun. Enjoy a pickled herring sandwich on me this weekend!
Thanks also for the Canadian/American flag jean jacket you made for Owen - quite possibly the coolest gift he has ever gotten and by far the best thing to come out of my little blogging experiment to date!
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