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!

Tags: Dells, family outing, Grandma Pat, Papa Bob, vacation

Thing 2, Thing 1 and Daddy with the Cat

As I mentioned in the last post, we celebrated Father’s Day by spending a day at the Minnesota Zoo with two of the best dads I know – Joe and my dad, Bob. We even ran into our good friends Robert, Kwo Ue and their daughter, Athena! The zoo is always a great time, but it was extra fun thanks to Seuss on the Loose, an exhibit that featured the artwork of the great Dr. Seuss. Our own Thing 1 and Thing 2 were thrilled!

Papa and Grandma with their handsome grandsons

The pics from the zoo trip are in the May-June album. Also added to the album are pictures from some Wii bowling, teeball (including team pictures!), a deep-dive during swim lessons, and videos of Z&A talking about a favorite book.

Zach and Alex also reached a big milestone in June: their first ride on big kid bikes! Yeah! They did great – and they were so proud of themselves!

Tags: Alex, bikes, family outing, Joe, milestones, Papa Bob, Zach, zoo

OK, so I’ve admittedly been terrible about blogging about all the events going on in our lives. I spend lots of time editing and posting new pictures, as you can sometimes see in the Recent Photos widget, but I never seem to get around to writing about it. Honestly, I think the photos tell a better story anyway (not to mention I’m already writing when I do the captions…).

The Vandermarks, Sept 2010

I’ll try to get better about posting simple updates when a new batch of photos have been loaded (like the remainder of our April trip to AZ that uploaded last night), but in the meantime, here’s just a straight list of the albums that have been updated/created since last Sept:

• Sept-Oct 2010 – the Scarecrow Festival, the circus, Halloween
• Visit with Auntie Mary Ann – who came to visit us in Sept
• Infiniti Crash II: The Deer – the results when a deer runs in front of a car doing 65 mph.
• Nov-Dec 2010 – Christmas decorating, Thanksgiving in Chicago, big snow storms
• Christmas 2010 – yep, pictures of presents and family at Christmas
• Jan-Feb 2011 – Cole’s 16th birthday, fun birthday parties, making cookies and craft projects
• Zach and Alex’s 5th birthday – including their 1st “friends” party
• Mar-Apr 2011 – Karen’s birthday, planting a garden
• Spring Break 2011 – a few days of fun in Chicago
• Arizona – April 2011 – a family get-together

Tags: Alex, Belouseks, birthday, booms, cars, Chicago, Christmas, circus, Cole, family outing, friends, GG, Grandma Marilyn, Grandma Pat, Grandpa Dan, Halloween, holiday, Joe, Karen, museum, Papa Bob, party, playtime, Santa, school, Thanksgiving, Tucson, Vandermark family, Zach