Rants from the Alright Guys: While the guys are away...

This past week, most of the Alright Guys made their yearly trip to GenCon. Here's a sampling of how the rest of us ~~celebrated~~ spent our time while the men were away.

First stop, relaxing at our "far away" Grandma and Grandpa's house (AKA Mickey Mouse Grandma (she collects all things Mickey) and Grandpa B*******t):

Next, it is important to note that these wonderful Grandparents live quite near a favorite kid destination, known as Michigan's Adventure! A week long trip to Grandma and Grandpa's would not be complete without a day spent making ourselves sick on twirly rides and roller coasters while eating 25 cent cotton candy (yes! it really is 25 cents!). However, since our photographer (AKA Mom) likes to partake in these events as well, pictures are limited.

(RtoL: Jadyn, Ryan, Trent, Jillian, unknown) (Trinity wouldn't go on without Jami)

Continueing on with our fun...as some of you already know, this family celebrated (or didn't celebrate) a significant Birthday this summer. Not only did yours truly hit the big 3-0 mark, but both my brother and his wife hit the big 4-0, my mother (my brother's stepmom, she didn't have him at 15) hit the big 5-5, and my nephew hit the big 1-0 (and my sister who also has a summer birthday hit 3-9, also not my mother's biological child) so we had a party. My 3-9 sister happens to have a huge house with a pool. Perfect for a party.

In addition to her awesome pool, my sister also happens to have a trampoline. A trampoline that was happy to see some use as my niece whom it belongs to happens to have already reached the age of 16 (how the hell did that happen?) and doesn't use it much anymore except to sun bathe on. My sister and my niece were kind enough to teach my kids a new game. It's called "Crack the Egg". One person forms a ball in the middle of the trampoline. The other person needs to jump enough to make the person in the middle (the egg) "crack", this happens when the person in the middle can no longer stay in their little ball. The kids thought this was the greatest game ever.

(Jadyn "cracking" Trinity) (Aunt Michelle helping Trinity "crack" Jadyn)

Here we insert random humerous pictures taken at Grandma and Grandpa's house:

Due to the fact that I happen to have a State Park sticker on my vehicle this year, Grandma and I decided to take the kids to visit a rather "neat" place that is also near Grandma and Grandpa's house. So near in fact, that in my younger days I was known to ride my bike to this destination. I would not recommend this though. In fact, I wasn't sure I could even walk up the hill to get there from the parking lot at this stage of my life, but I did. And the kids thought it was cool, so it was worth it. This place I'm blabbering on about? The Block House. (For more info read the sign above my mother's head):

Last in our adventures...a trip to Duck Lake State Park. Technically, we visited here first as well, however, silly me had forgotten my memory card at home and hadn't made it to Meijer to buy a new one yet. So, the pictures are from our second trip. Normally, Grandma prefers the state park beach closer to her house. However, due to the fact that it was very windy and there was a red flag flying (which means NO swimming in Lake Michigan if you actually read the sign instead of just telling your kids that it means they need to be careful) we chose Duck Lake. With this set up, Lake Michigan is on one side, Duck Lake is on the other, and there is an ankle deep channel that runs between them, perfect for the kids to splash around in.