School Days

For many families, September means the end of summer and the beginning of a new school year. Cole is an old pro at this routine, starting his junior year in high school. He has taken on a heavy class load this year, with lots of honors and AP classes, as he prepares for college. He's also added another band to his activities, now performing in Pep Band in addition to the Concert and Jazz Bands.

Heading out the door, ready for school

Zach and Alex, on the other hand, began their school careers this year, entering into Kindergarten. They are having a blast at school, and they are doing really well, especially with their letters and numbers. They really like their teacher, Mr. Kampa. We take the boys to school most days, but on Fridays when Daddy works from home, they get to take the school bus. Daddy then joins the class to help out for a few hours - something both he and the class really enjoy.

In addition to school, the Fall season meant lots of activities for Zach and Alex - flag football, joining the Cub Scouts as Lion Cubs, and swim lessons.  It's been a busy Fall!

The Sept-Oct 2011 photo album has pictures from Zach and Alex's first day at school and their first bus ride to and from school. There are also pictures from flag football, a family trip to the Scarecrow Festival at Emma Krumbee's, a playdate at the Festival with some of the boys' friends from New Horizon and a few fun activities around the house.

Dells Part 2

On the train and ready for a ride

Continuing on from the last post... The following day, we spent a day at Circus World Museum in Baraboo, which was the winter headquarters of the Ringling Bros. circus for many years. Zach and Alex even got to be *in* one of the circus shows, staring as an elephant and a tiger!

That evening, Joe and I escaped..er... went out for date night, enjoying a wonderful dinner at a cafe in downtown Dells and then playing some mini golf.

The next day was "Train Day" with lunch at Buffalo Phil's, which brings out drinks and food to guests via model trains. When they're not carrying food, they deliver smiles with favorite character toys and gadgets like bubble makers. There's also an arcade there, so we had some fun playing games after lunch. From there, we visited our favorite train museum - the Riverside & Great Northern Railway, where Papa and Joe are members.

The final day of the trip, we had fun playing around our resort - go-carts, mini golf (indoor and outdoor) and the outdoor waterpark. We did it all!

Check out all the rest of the pictures in the Dells 2011 photo album .

Dells Part 1

The Vandermarks with Paul Bunyan

The 5 of us took a fantastic family trip to the Wisconsin Dells in August with Grandma Pat and Papa Bob. We stayed in the Glacier Canyon Lodge at the Wilderness Resort, where we were able to enjoy all sorts of fun things - indoor and outdoor waterparks and mini golf, go-carts, arcade games and more. We also visited some of our favorite Dells attractions: the Ducks, the R&GN Railway trains, Mt. Olympus amusement park and Circus Museum.

We took a ton of pictures so I split them into batches. The first couple of days, including some swim time and arcade games at the resort, a WI Duck tour, rides at Mt. Olympus and dinner at Paul Bunyan's Shanty, have been posted to the Dells 2011 photo album. Enjoy!