Our Family Adventure: Michigan

And here's the annual blast of photos from our trip to Michigan. :)

We left on our road trip after Matt got off work on a Wednesday evening. Albuquerque, here we come!

The open road.

Sunset just east of Flagstaff that first evening.

We had breakfast in Albuquerque with Matt's sister, Dudley Ann, who we hadn't seen since 1991. So great to see her!

Matt & Dudley looking at the best way to head out from Albuquerque. We decided to go north through Colorado.

And a group shot just for fun.

Thursday night, we stayed in Cozad, Nebraska. It was great for Rue to have grass outside the hotel door... on Arizona road trips it's a bit harder to find grass for her pottying needs. ;)

At a rest stop in Nebraska. We loved having the rooftop carrier on this trip. :)

We made it to Marquette at 3:00 a.m. on Saturday! We drove into the woods and slept in the van, inside our sleeping bags like little caterpillars. This is after a few hours' sleep.

Yay, it's David!! So good to see him after six months. :)

David & his friend Micah outside a cool bike shop that sadly was closed before their closing time, so we couldn't go in.

David & Micah having ice cream on the back porch of Doncker's, a great place in downtown Marquette.

Joshua & David, just before David left to drive back to his internship for the week.

At the beach near our friends' house, before we went out to our place.

Rue was a maniac at the beach! She was tearing back & forth along the shoreline and it's actually pretty amazing that I caught this shot. She was a blur.

Matt & me with the Marquette lighthouse in the background (hard to see, but it's there).

At the Beach House! Before the work began...

My brother Dean & his family came up for a few days. He looks so serious there.

Dean's wife, Lisa, and me.

I was trying to get my niece Clara to smile, and realized that Gretchen, who was next to me, was smiling super huge when she hear me saying, "Smile," to her sister. So I had to take a photo of her. :)

Bigger girls digging on the beach.

Dean was very helpful with our projects. Here Matt & Dean are looking at the door moving over project they started, figuring out the next step.

When Clara came up to me in the kitchen and said, "Can I help?", I could not refuse.

More work on the door project. They're making room for the washing machine, which stuck out into the doorway on the other side.

Progress shot on the door frame moving project.

More beach digging

This was actually pretty disturbing to look at, but they were all having fun.

Cutting out the drywall to make space for the new header.

Dean cut & dry fitted all the cement board in our kitchen, which was a HUGE help. It was so great to have him there at the beginning of our tiling project.

The living room at the beginning of the project. Yikes.

Jesse & Caleb. Cousins.

Breakfast with some of Dean & Lisa's girls. :)

A mess to take up before we could lay the cement board in the next area to work on.

When we're at the Beach House, even with projects going on, we still have to take a break for a beach fire and s'mores. And fireworks, too.

Naomi & Katherine roasting marshmallows

Joshua & Jesse in the family room with cousin Caleb.

Abrielle & Julia enjoying ice cream on the back deck.

Matt & David on the front porch. :)

Matt, working on that area that we had to take up the linoleum before moving on.

Group shot of our two families before Dean & Lisa and kids left.

About an hour after Dean & Lisa left, my cousin and her family and some good friends of theirs arrived. Here's Nathan & Heidi.

We met up with Bill & Serenity after not seeing them for eight years, at our moving party!

Serenity with her girls and Naomi.

So good to visit with Serenity after so many years. :)

We love Marquette's 4th of July parade.

The rest of us at the parade.

Rue was afraid of the booms at the 4th of July parade.

With birthday boy Sam (my cousin's middle child) on the 4th. He's 14 now. Oh yes, and this year he was loving the fact that he is taller than me now. A normal occurrence with their children. They're all tall.

Heidi & Nathan and Jeff & Tara on our back deck.

And Matt & me. I have to say, it was actually pretty nice to have to wear long sleeves and jeans while we were in Marquette. It's pretty hot here in the Phoenix area this time of year!

A new favorite pic of our view from the beach path.

A Sunday morning selfie while taking a solo beach walk. Such a beautiful place to be.

We saw our friend Don and his family, who live in Florida. Finally, our trips to Marquette coincided so that we could see each other! It had been nine years, I think. Don was one of our groomsmen in our wedding.

After a break for the 4th of July and Sunday, we got to work on laying tiles. Here are the kitchen tiles, dry fitted.

I was the tile laying lady. It took us Monday, Tuesday & part of Wednesday to get them all cut and laid.

And here's a bathroom selfie of the tile lady. I could not believe how sore my whole body was each day from working on those tiles!

And this is moments after I laid the last tile, on Matt's birthday.

We bought another pop-up camper while we were in the U.P.! It's a 1973 Skamper, and we only paid $100. A hundred bucks! It has some holes that are very repairable, and needed some cleaning out and airing out. Should be a nice one to have on our property up there when we're there.

Heidi took charge of weeding the flower beds and getting kids to help with planting.

Matt's 50th birthday party, at Presque Isle Park, in town. Normally we have a big party at our place but this year, things were all torn up with the tile project. So we celebrated his big day in town. :)

Group shot of everyone who came to Matt's 50th birthday party. :)

The night before we had to be out of the house for our next group of guests to arrive. This was about 10:00 at night, and I could not imagine how we were going to be out of there in time.

The kitchen, all grouted. Yay!

Living room, with newly updated finds from the Habitat Re-Store.

The kitchen, all ready for guests.

Matt finished up the door project once we had the tile project finished.

Flower beds, all planted.

Here's the laundry room, tiled, with the door in place. Much better than how it was in my last post. :)

We drove through the night to see Marissa at SpringHill camp in lower Michigan. She's been a wrangler there this summer, working hard, and it was cool to see her in her environment.

It was Family Camp weekend, so we met a lot of Marissa's friends and their families. Here is her friend Jess, with her sister and of course, Naomi. :)

Jesse on the tram at SpringHill.

Riding on the tram.

Marissa and one of her fellow wranglers. Naomi got a short pony ride.

Jesse's turn. :)

David & me, being weird.

One of the namesake springs at the camp. Pretty cool stuff!

We tie dyed shirts in the craft house.

David & Matt, waiting for us to finish tie dying.

Next day, at my parents' and sisters' church, Naomi with a bunch of cousins. :)

Family dinner at my folks' house.

It's so great to get together each year when we're in town. This year my grandma joined us. :)

The annual extended family photo. This year, one niece was missing because she was gone camping, but other than that, the rest of us were there.

A pic of just our family together. I guess this may be the only photo we had of all seven of us while we were together those couple of days.

Taking David to meet his ride back to the U.P.

Our huge campsite at a campground close to my parents' house.

After we got our tents set up. It was so beautiful there. :)

My sister Becky & her family came to fish at our site with us. This is her husband Dan and their oldest, Sarah.

Fishing with cousins.

Non fishers, watching the fishers.

On our way back to SpringHill to drop off Marissa.

Had dinner at a cool diner in town before bringing her to camp.

Nice sibling selfie. :)

At my sister Rachel & her family's house the next day.

My cousin Heidi, at their new house.

Rue liked Nathan because he gave her scraps of chicken.

My aunt Marge & Bonnie came to see us at Nathan & Heidi's place.

Nathan, Heidi & Calvin.

And us.

Rue having fun chasing sticks with Nathan, Hank and Purnah.

My mom and Andy, my sister Becky's youngest.

My mom had the cool idea of doing a mosaic table of various tiles that are from our different families' projects. There are tiles from our Marquette tile projects past & current, and our tile project here in Arizona, in addition to ones they collected from various projects. I think it will be great to see it next year when we come. :)

Rue loved this trip, and we were so glad to have her with us. She is an adventurer dog. :)

On our way through a small town in Illinois on our way back home, we saw a sign in front of this house. So we stopped to read it. It belonged to people who were very big in Abraham Lincoln's life.

I can't remember if this was the Missouri or Mississippi River... in any case, it was beautiful.

Stopped in Wichita, where Matt's parents were from, and saw this cool mural made of phrases that Shakespeare came up with.

We visited the cemetery where generations of Matt's ancestors are buried.

The Jesse that our Jesse was named after. :)

Had a picnic near their ancestors' graves. Kinda cool. :)

Matt's grandparents' home.

At Cadillac Ranch, outside of Amarillo, Texas. It was insanely busy with people spray painting the Cadillacs. Just one of those iconic things you have to stop at when you're on a cross-country road trip. :)