Pop and Gram's visit

Way back in July, my mom and dad came out for a visit. They arrived on a Wednesday night. Danny and Soohee came along to the airport to pick them up, then the 6 of us went out to dinner. After dinner, we dropped off Danny and Soohee at a friends house for the rest of their stay in MI. On Thursday morning, all of us, minus Darin, packed up and headed out to Canada. My dad is the only one of his family who left our neighbor to the north, so it was time to go visit the Van Schepens.


We were in Canada until Sunday afternoon. We had a great time. We stayed with my Aunt Chris, the kids ran outside for hours, my dad got sick (not so great), but was better in time for the family reunion on Saturday. It was fun seeing so many cousins, aunts and uncles that I hadn't seen since Tyson was a baby.

Tyson and Jori loved being out in the barn.

Jori and her new buddy Alex had fun dressing up AND bossing people aroundMe and Uncle Don

Me, Kendra, Michelle, Kathy and baby Owen

My dad and his sisters and brothers.Cousins

Kids of cousins

We got back to Michigan on Sunday night. The next morning my dad headed to GR for a week of classes, and Gram stayed back with us. We had a lot of fun. We did some garage saling (my first all year!), she taught me how to do rebates at Rite Aid, Tyson and Jori went on lots of walks with Gram, she painted Jori's toenails and fingernails, and just a lot of other fun stuff. My dad came for dinner on Wednesday and we were all so glad to see him. Then he was back for good a little after noon on Friday. That's when the real fun began for the kids (no offense mom, but we both know he's the man!!)

First my dad spent about 2-3 hours building Tyson a "spy scope" like he had seen on Curious George. Here it is:

It's like a periscope that you can use to spy on people without having them see you. Very cool and totally not something I would have been able to do as it required math skills. (This project was made even more difficult because my mom took me out for my birthday while my dad watched the two kids!)

They also took a lot of walks down the path and caught tons of frogs and toads. I think they came back with 15 one time and 10 another. Here's Papa pretending to eat a frog:

No thanks, we'll stick to our popsiclesTyson's turn to kiss the frog.Pucker up baby!
Snuggling with Gram

My parents flew out on Tuesday just before noon. We were SO SAD to see them go. Tyson said "When will they come back here" and I told him I didn't know. He said "At least we will see them in heaven". Amen little buddy.