Wisconsin Weekend

As you know, we attended a pancake feed in Wisconsin this past weekend.

We got up at the crack of 3am on Saturday morning, after staying up until 11:30 the night before making sure the house was spic and span. We knew that we'd be gone until sometime Sunday afternoon, and we didn't want to have to worry about cleaning the house for Bible Study once we got home. As it turns out, we didn't even have Bible Study due to illness.

We were out the door by 4, and Seth drove the entire way.

While I slept.

And he rubbed my feet.

He is all mine.

We got to Peaceful Pines (As Grandpa Henry had named it) around 9am, had our breakfast and took the kids on a little hike through the property

As you can see, Peaceful Pines is a more than appropriate title for this property:

Isn't this beautiful? Seth's sister Maretta was married on that bank (just a smidge left of the center of the photo.) Seth and I had been dating about 2 months at the time. It really was a beautiful wedding: her bridesmaids walked down the hill barefoot and in black dresses, their hair spiraling down their backs. Maretta walked down the "aisle" to Enya's Only Time.

Anyway, although the ground was very wet, the kids had fun "skipping rocks" like daddy, and exploring the woods.

This is one of the little cabins of Peaceful Pines:

Here's a view of the inside:

And a view of the little creek behind the cabin:
Why am I the only one smiling in this picture?
Here is the bus that Grandpa slept in during the summers when he would be working the fields and processing his syrup:

Here is Uncle James' new Sugar Shanty. Uncle James took over the syrup making hobby when Grandpa Henry died.Seth's twin sister Sandy and her husband Davy also made the trip to WI, bringing with them their newly restored Mini Cooper. Upon Seth and My "test drive" of Sandy's new baby, we checked out Seth's family's former homestead:

This is (was) the barn. Seth said it was really cool because there was a silo in that part that juts out. And you can't really see in the picture, but there were high beams that the seven of them would run across.

They were a very cautious and boring family.

And here's the farmhouse:

When Seth's family moved to MN in 1988, the house stood vacant for a couple of years, then suffered a beating from various renters before being sold just a couple of years ago. So needless to say, the house has seen better days.

Unfortunately.

Now, for a couple of my favorite pictures: