family photos!

A few weeks ago we had family pictures taken by Chelsea Madsen Images. You may recall that "Ms. Chelsea" is one of the teachers at Rose's school, and she has taken Rose's school pictures for the past couple years.  We had SO much fun at Westwood Hills Nature Center, and I was thrilled with the results. I highly recommend Ms. Chelsea if you're looking for a very reasonably priced and excellent photographer!!

Here are the highlights of the 300+ that she took that morning. You can look forward to seeing my favorites (of these) on our holiday card this year. And speaking of holiday cards, if you've moved in the past year or if you haven't previously gotten a card but want to start, let me know your address!

P.S. If you want any of these as prints, let me know!

Wacky Wednesday, and Impetigo

Wacky Wednesday:
Sometimes things unexpectedly work out!  Mike and Rose were at the cabin for four days (MEA weekend), which means that we didn't do laundry on our regular schedule. As a result, Rose was running dangerously low on clothing by mid-week, including having totally run out of pants. Apparently she was uninterested in wearing a dress (with leggings) on Wednesday, so Mike dressed her in a pair of horrid pink plaid flannel pajama bottoms, which she paired with a blank-and-gold ruffly shirt. I try to avoid making any comments about her clothing choices that aren't complimentary, so I kept my mouth shut that morning. Imagine my surprise when we showed up at "school" and all the teachers told her what a GREAT combo she had on... and then I realized it was "wacky Wednesday." Ah, we couldn't have created a better wacky Wednesday outfit if we had tried! :)




Impetigo:
As I mentioned, Mike and Rose were at the cabin last week. When they got home on Sunday afternoon, I saw that the skin around Rose's mouth was covered with a rash! I immediately jumped into "protective mommy mode" and asked Mike what he did to our daughter. (Sorry, Mike!) He and I brainstormed for awhile what it might be:  allergy to a new food? Irritation from drooling? Allergy to a new detergent? Insect bites? Eczema? Gangrene? Leprosy?? Necrotizing fasciitis???    (No, we don't catastrophize at all. Really.)


We turned to "doctor google" and quickly learned that google image searching for anything rash-like is not a good idea. Don't do it on a full stomach.


Anyway, it seemed to look a little better by evening (and she said it didn't itch at all), so we sent her to school on Monday and asked her teachers to keep an eye on it. On Monday night it looked better in some areas, but we started to question whether it might be spreading. We sent her to school again on Tuesday, hoping that it would just go away. Well, Tuesday afternoon I got a call from school stating that she wouldn't be able to come back until after we got a doctor's note clearing her. Wah-waaah.


Mike did a great job of getting her the first available appointment at the doctor's office, but it would have required one of us taking a half day. So instead I took her to urgent care. A couple hours later we had a diagnosis of "mild impetigo" (don't google it!) and a prescription for a topical antibiotic. Whew! So happy it was nothing more serious, but also hopeful that neither Mike nor I contract it from her.

I'm SO thankful that she's not nearly as sick any more as she was in the first year or two of life, but I sure will be glad when we're done experiencing all these random illnesses of childhood!

I refused to photo-document the impetigo!

Attempting free-range parenting

It's dark out, but Rose wanted to play outside while she waits for daddy to get home from fishing. So I (gulp) let her.

She's now running around screaming "this is so much fun!!!" at the top of her lungs. :)

Gunflint!

After a failed attempt to camp in our backyard, followed shortly thereafter by an awesome one-night camping trip at Afton State Park, we were ready for our big four-day/three-night camping trip up on the Gunflint Trail. (We went for the fourth of July weekend, which I think sets a record for my most belated blog post ever. I blame Qwest, and now feel grudgingly thankful to be back on Comcast as our ISP again.)

The drive "up north" was surprisingly easy. Rose has gotten to be a great car companion - especially when she has some popcorn to snack on :)

We stopped for lunch at a cute little pizza place somewhere along the North Shore. Rose was excited to have a "happy hour" drink (i.e., a soda).

Then we stopped for a short hike at a cute non-state park area that I can't for the life of me remember the name of! But it was a great little hike that we all enjoyed.

Then we continued on to the Gunflint Trail! It was a gorgeous drive.

Gotta love photos taken through the front windshield!

Wildflowers!

 Finally we made it to the "resort" where we would be camping. We picked this place because we wanted an "out" (i.e., to have a lodge easily accessible) in case it turned out that Rose hated camping. But we discovered that she is a natural outdoors girl and we needn't have worried because she LOVED it!

Our campsite. Ginormous RVs were just to the left and to the right of us.

It's too long of a story to type out, but remind me in person some time to tell you about the bears that visited us...

The tree on the left is where the bears all climbed up one night. Terrifying close to our tent!!!

This is where Mike and I were sitting when the bears showed up. Eeek!

Since our site was right on the water, Rose spent a lot of time swimming...

She was standing on a rock, but I love how it looks like she's walking on water.

... And a lot of time ordering me not to take her picture. :)

Our swimsuits match!

We went out in the boat several times. It was a HUGE lake - like, overwhelmingly so!  Mike and I both realized that we feel more comfortable on smaller bodies of water. 

Rose was grumpy that day.

And not grumpy that day.

One day we ventured back to Grand Marais to explore. I loved this little town!

The donuts really were amazing.

And I highly recommend the Angry Trout Cafe.

  I fell in love with these wildflowers. Anyone know what they are?

And then it was time for one last campfire and one last sunset before we would be headed home.

 It was a great vacation! We had a lot of fun, and learned a lot about our camping preferences and about how we travel as a family. I'm definitely looking forward to next summer's adventures together!