Following SD we drove to Minneapolis and stayed with our good friends of many years, Dean and Jodi--and got to see their wonderful kids, Kip and Johanna.
It is hard to overstate how much more relaxing a trip is where there are smart, friends kids Sam's age for him to spend all day playing with! Sam got on with them like a house a'fire--alternately sitting and doing crafts with Johanna, then discussing superheroes at length with Kip. K&J could not have been friendlier.
Nor could Dean and Jodi. Jodi was often ferrying Susan around from one media blitz to another while Dean and I shepherded the kids. We spent one afternoon at a local apple farm, where the kids got to mess around in a bin filled with corn kernels, got to feed goats and marvel at calves and cows (where Dean and I learned to our dismay that cows can stick their tongues up their own nostils--ew!), pet kitties and chicks (the latter being of
no interest to Sam for some reason), climb on tractors, pop in and out of old tires, and generally enjoy all the fun a tourist farm has to offer.
Dean and Jodi have great house which, in winter, has a nice view of one of the lakes on the West side of Minneapolis--the same lake which is home to the owner of Target, and various other rich and famous residents. In their back yard Dean has built a two-storey playhouse with slide and swings, also shown here.
What else? What else is necessary? It was good just to catch up, and so much fun to watch the kids play together. :-)
The cities trip had, for Susan, two very successful book signings, plus a professional events involving local book sellers and librarians with the engaging name "The Movable Feast". And we got to visit Xochitl and Joel. Sam knows their names well from our prayers, so it was particularly good for him to put faces to those names.
Following SD we drove to Minneapolis and stayed with our good friends of many years, Dean and Jodi--and got to see their wonderful kids, Kip and Johanna.
It is hard to overstate how much more relaxing a trip is where there are smart, friends kids Sam's age for him to spend all day playing with! Sam got on with them like a house a'fire--alternately sitting and doing crafts with Johanna, then discussing superheroes at length with Kip. K&J could not have been friendlier.
Nor could Dean and Jodi. Jodi was often ferrying Susan around from one media blitz to another while Dean and I shepherded the kids. We spent one afternoon at a local apple farm, where the kids got to mess around in a bin filled with corn kernels, got to feed goats and marvel at calves and cows (where Dean and I learned to our dismay that cows can stick their tongues up their own nostils--ew!), pet kitties and chicks (the latter being of no interest to Sam for some reason), climb on tractors, pop in and out of old tires, and generally enjoy all the fun a tourist farm has to offer.
Dean and Jodi have great house which, in winter, has a nice view of one of the lakes on the West side of Minneapolis--the same lake which is home to the owner of Target, and various other rich and famous residents. In their back yard Dean has built a two-storey playhouse with slide and swings, also shown here.
What else? What else is necessary? It was good just to catch up, and so much fun to watch the kids play together. :-)
The cities trip had, for Susan, two very successful book signings, plus a professional events involving local book sellers and librarians with the engaging name "The Movable Feast". And we got to visit Xochitl and Joel. Sam knows their names well from our prayers, so it was particularly good for him to put faces to those names.
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1 comment:
Oh good, "getting along like a house on fire" is a good thing.
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