Summer Travels to Wisconsin

It had been 7 years since I had seen my brother and his family, so when my mom suggested we all drive out to visit them while on their summer break in Wisconsin, I thought "sure, why not?"  Holy cow, it's a LONG drive.  It was the kids and I along with my mom.  We decided to see some sites to and from our visit in Wisconsin.  It was a great trip with lots of memory makers.  The kids did remarkably well for the 12 days we were gone.  Raiden had the hardest time with the long days and driving, but he's 3.  What do you expect?

We headed down to Roy, Utah to visit Tracey Scadden and her folks Carol & Gene Horne who were visiting her.  It was fun to see them.  Carol is my middle name sake and long time best friend of my mom.  We headed to the park to let the kids burn off some energy.

We made a nice break in Cheyenne, Wyoming and visited two museums.  It's a really pretty city.  We were glad to have stop there and get a picture by a couple of the big boots.

During the second day, I got to feeling really achy, but felt better the next day.  While my mom got worse on the next day and ended up throwing up a few times.  She persevered and we made it to the Winter Quarters Temple and visitors center in Omaha, Nebraska.  Some college friends are attending Dental School there, so they watched the kids for us.  We also saw the Kanesville Tabernacle in Council Bluffs, Iowa.

 Due to the sickness, we got a later start the next morning and also got caught in a severe lightning and rain storm.  So glad there was a red truck in front of me because I could barley see through the heavy and fast rain.  We made it to Nauvoo, Illinois.  We got to attend the Nauvoo Temple, see a few plays, take a wagon tour and walk around Nauvoo.  It was a wonderful experience to see and hear about the early pioneers and what they went through.  I even have a distant relative who owned a bakery in Nauvoo before traveling out west to Salt Lake City.

We also saw Carthage Jail where Joseph and Hyrum Smith were martyred. Love this picture of the brothers.

 We finally made it to Sussex, Wisconsin.  It was wonderful to get to know my nieces, Alexi and Marin.  We had fun swimming in the pond, riding horses, having a birthday party for Marin and Raiden and going to the museums in Milwaukee.

On our way home, we went through Minnesota and stopped at the SPAM Museum.  What a hoot.

 

It was fun to see the Badlands National Park in South Dakota and have lunch at Wall Drug.  The doughnuts were delicious.

On our way up to Mt Rushmore, we came across a new building that looked like Independence Hall, in fact it was a replica with a really neat life size display of the signing of the Declaration of Independence.  We were glad we stopped. 

 What an awesome experience for the kids to see Mt. Rushmore.  The Air Force Drill Team was there doing some drills.  Cohen was really impressed with the spinning guns.  One of them even signed his cast.

 

  The last day of the trip we had lunch in Jackson, Wyoming.  We got to see a mama bear and cub as well as some buffalo.

 

 

We were all anxious to get home and rest.  Mom hurried home so she could unpack and repack for her next adventure 4 wheeling in the Idaho mountains a few days later.