We packed up that morning because we had plans the night before we were supposed to leave. As I felt the beginning stages of stress, I reminded myself that we were leaving for vacation with nowhere to be at any certain time. WE had set our planned departure time. Leaving an hour and a half later was inconsequential. And so, we calmly packed and gathered our bags. We solved (what I call) the Pack the Car Puzzle, and it only took two attempts.
On the way up, Abby just wanted to hold my hand. And so we rode, a large portion of the way, holding hands, from front seat to back seat with me twisted to reach her. I hope she knows I'll ALWAYS hold her hand.
Our week was full of everything, and nothing. We did everything we wanted, and there were no expectations. We had an absolute blast. South Haven, MI exceeded all expectations.
We had locally made ice cream three times, once just for lunch!
We watched fireworks overlooking the lake.
We rode bikes, took long walks and took long wagon rides. I can’t help but smile thinking about how much the girls enjoyed their bike trailer and wagon rides.
We visited the Farmers Market. We made smores. We ate local berries and tried local beers.
We rode the Sand Dunes with our hands in the air as we squealed. We walked up and ran down the dunes, too.
We went to the 4th of July parade, waved flags and clapped.
We rented a kayak and a paddle board. We played in the sand and the lake for hours. Sand castle attempts weren’t so productive, but we dug and piled and dug and piled and crashed into our piles over and over.
We took a sunset cruise out on the lake.
We listened to live music at Admiral Jacks.
We rode/walked/drove past houses time and time again just to admire their landscaping. (Maybe that was just me.) But seriously, the landscaping took my breath away.
I clipped fresh hydrangea and lavender bouquets for our house.
We splashed in the kiddie pool, laid in the hammock (As Ava would say, “Let’s hammock together, Mommy") and we chased after the dogs when they stole our pool toys. (Abby calls Yogi "YoiYoi" and I giggle when I picture her running around the yard yelling, “No, YoiYoi!”).
We laughed. We loved. We cuddled. We did it all.
