Remembering Grandpa

I lost my only Grandpa a couple of weeks ago. He was 91 years old!

April 2, 1920 – September 7, 2011

What a life, right?

My grandparents went on their first date on Grandpa’s birthday. Then they were married on his birthday a year later.

with my mother, their first born – no, not born on Grandpa’s birthday but that would have been neat!

Love this pic of him with his 2 girls.

He was a dairy farmer and school bus driver

with his 3 granddaughters

how I will always remember my Grandparents….

isn’t Grandpa’s head of hair something!  Happy that he passed his thick hair down to me.

I went down to visit him in the hospice, which was an experience I’ve never had before, but looking back now I will treasure that I got to say goodbye to him and comb his amazing hair.  

The funeral was a tough day. Having little ones there we weren’t sure what their reaction would be. E did ok, but did get more upset and almost scared than I predicted. M wouldn’t go in the room and would shut his eyes when he passed the room. I remembered the funeral home from my great grandmother’s service. I think I was the same age as Ethan, too!

I was surprised the small town funeral home even had flat screens for pictures. I was in charge of scanning a bunch of pics and put them on cd for the service. We also made a posterboard of memories. I could tell that Grandma somewhat enjoyed looking at the boards.

We had small reception at a house following the funeral. It was nice to see a lot of family that I haven’t seen in years there, too.

Love you Grandpa!

Shipshewana girls trip

The girls in my fam planned an outing to Shipshewana. When I say girls in my immediate family – it is not counting my grandma. I have a small family.

I took off Friday, Aug. 26 so we were going to leave that morning. My mom wasn’t feeling good so it was delayed a little. We took a trip there 2 years ago and decided to stay in the same hotel.

It is fun to count the buggies we saw on the way in. I drove part of the way, due to mom still not feeling well.

 

ate at the Blue Gate both days

isn’t that meringue pie amazing looking?! I’m not a fan of the taste of meringue, but it is quite impressive

and I HAVE to get a whoopie pie! Well, I got a pumpkin and a chocolate ones.

Mom and Aunt Carol

cousins…

my great Thanksgiving style dinner from Sat. lunch

shopping…

loved this frame with little boxes… think Trent could make me one

love the Indian in the candy store

I was searching for a homemade throw rug, but didn’t find one in my price range.

I ended up buying more things than I wanted. I bought this awesome vintage sign that was made for me

I got a cute little purple purse

Embellish Your Story picture frame and the seasonal magnets,

We saw more buggies on this trip. Isn’t it neat to see them just tied up outside a store?   

Nice time with all the ladies and fun to get out and do some shopping.

Ethan’s Day of Fun

I wanted to take Ethan out for a day of fun before he got his expander on. Just an outing some places we had never been and he would like. This was way back on July 16.

We went out to Lombard mall to Magiquest.

He had tried it at Great America before and loved it. We paid for admittance so we could walk around with him this time, too.

You walk around and look for hidden items from clues in your little book and aim your wand at it and if you are right it should light up. Most of them were 5 things, then once you complete it you get a token in your profile. They have specific names for everything, I just can’t recall them all.

Some of the quests were challenging, so glad we could help him out. We did have ask for some hints from the ‘workers’ there. He already had the wand, but we let him pick out a rune (the blue thing on the end of it) It is a really neat place and he is the perfect age for it, too! I just found out that this place closed down last weekend! Ethan was upset to hear that, it is a shame since it wasn’t that much of a drive to get there.

Then we had lunch at Famous Dave’s BBQ in the mall, first time there so our waitress explained the different sauces they offered…

and then she asked us what our favorite sauce was and gave us a bottle of it to take home for free! I guess they do that we first-timers!

Then we drove up to Schaumburg to Woodfield Mall and surprised him with a trip to LegoLand!  

awesome display of Chicago made of legos!

and the lighting changed from daytime to nighttime, which was AWESOME!!

they had really cool displays with animals made out of legos

even the President was there!

There were two 4-D movies that were good, and another little ride that led you through more displays of legos. They had this fun little ride

then he spent the most time at the create a car corner… they had these ramps to test out your car, he loved this. I think most people’s cars kind of fell apart at the end of the ramp.

tons of legos to play with

Most of LegoLand was kind of for younger kids. It is hard to realize that Ethan thinks some things are babyish now.

We let Ethan make up his own little lego guy, I think it was like $3 and then he picked out a small kit, too.  

We wanted to get ice cream and found Red Mango. I told Trent that this was frozen yogurt and he thought it wouldn’t be any different. I knew it would taste a little different.

It was totally self serve! You could pick whatever flavor or multiple flavors. I think I had 3 types. Chocolate, and 2 types of vanilla. Then you added whatever toppings you would like.

Then they weighed it and that is what you paid. I think our 3 bowls was $14

 

Ethan didn’t really care for it. I think he just ate the whipped cream and sprinkles and cookie dough chunks. Oh, and then some of the chocolate spilled on his shirt. He hasn’t worn that shirt since then due to a big stain on it.

Fun outing, wish we would get out to Chicago area more often, we don’t realize it is so close to us!