On Frozen Pond

Man, Is it GOOD to be home.

It's always a kick to travel and visit and stuff, but it's ALWAYS GOOD TO GET HOME AGAIN...

...especially from the frozen North.

Buuurrrrr.

We had a GREAT time visiting Doreen's sister and family in Aitkin, MN. It's fun for the cousins to play together and get to know each other better and enjoy playing. The Play Shelly wrote was a lot of fun. And running around with Doreen, Joelle & Natalie in the snow was a blast as well.

The below freezing temperatures at times were a little bit, well, chilling - through and through! It was neat to see whole lakes frozen over though. Absolutely Amazing!

We left yesterday morning (Mon at 10:45a eastern) and it was 19 degrees. We heard the Twin Cities had 'freezing rain' and since we were 2 1/2 hours North of them, Doreen drove first. The roads were clear until Minneapolis, and just a bit wet so Doreen drove all the way into Wisconsin - where we stopped for lunch and switched drivers.

I drove in 'sick' weather, snowing, blowing, icky flat out nasty stuff for HOURS, sometimes only going 30, 35 MPH. I saw 3 accidents (after they'd happened), 1 really bad one. Then one guy in a pickup pulling a trailer blew my doors off, about 20 miles down the road he'd spun into the median. Couldn't help but chuckle a bit!

Finally around the Dells, WI we ran out of the BAD, BAD weather. The roads were clear the rest of the way home - thankfully.

One pretty big 'burp' on the trip was just to the west of Chicago, Joelle, who had been complaining a bit of an upset tummy, hurled everything she ate at supper. So I had to quick pull over and Doreen and I are trying to clean her and her seat up and get her fresh clothes and calm Natalie from crying at the whole event. Wheeeeew. What a stresser! She felt better after that though! :)

We got to the house this morning (Tue at 6:30a) 19+ hours later. Wheeew. It was a balmy **GRIN** 41 degrees. After being in the Cold in MN - didn't even feel like I needed a coat. :)

We threw the girls into bed and jumped into bed ourselves and all of us slept until 9:30a and felt much, MUCH better!

We just finished 'brunch', getting all the 'junk' out of the van and into the house, getting the laundry started.

Just checking our e-mail and news on the web and now I've got to load about a dozen or so windows on the pickup and take them to the framer of my inlaws apt/studio in Chattanooga, an hour and 20 minutes away.

More driving.... :(

Feels like we're on the road again in our truck.

...Almost.

Have a Terrific Tuesday!