late vacation

Matt and I love to camp. We have been camping all our lives. We both have great memories of growing up and camping with our families. So, naturally our children will love that tradition as well. This is the first year we have gone with just our little family. We went up to the northern part of Indiana, camped in Potatoe Creek state park, and drove through Amish country with a day in Shipshawana. We camped for two days, but after repeated nights of "low" temperatures (we're talking 37 degrees and 41 degrees) we decided to head up to shipshewana and stay the night in a hotel. Mind you this is the end of August. In fact this is the weekend before labor day. I could not believe how cold it was. During the day was very nice in the lower 70's but the evening and night time air was so cold , Addie caught a cold and a couple of days later Corbin and I also did. It just so happened that we were there in this cold snap. Anyway here are some pictures of our adventures. We took day trips and spent slow afternoon and mornings camping.

This barn is in Shipshawana as a museum of Amish life.
You can see a little of the flower quilt they were featuring this summer.
THis is the auction house that is so famous in Shipshawana. It has been in action for over a hundred years. I bought matching maple sitting chairs and 3 dump trucks for corbin.

THese sunflowers lined the drive at Amish Acres on our way through the country

Corbin loved the outdoors. He had a blast exploring the treed, playsets, and anything we let him do.

Addie would rather cozy up and sleep on my shoulder.

Murphy camp Addie spent her time in the bouncer or walker. I spent my time with the children. Corbin spent his time riding his "cummer" (that is what he has named his tricycle). and running around. Matt spent his time setting up camp and gazing at his new camp kitchen. He also cooked most of the meals. He is a great camp cook.

Monday we went to the South Bend Zoo. It was amazing. I knew that it was a lot smaller than the Louisville Zoo and really had low expectations, but this turned out to be a fabulous zoo. It was so accessible to the animals. You really felt like you were right there in their habitat.

they had a butterfly house and corbin really liked looking at them fly

The girls waiting for lunch.

There was a canal of fish through a section. You could buy fish food and feed the fish. There must have been hundreds of them swarming to get food. They were so think that you could only see fish. It was neat.









the lions were my favorite! They were roaring and walking around. I was within 10 feet of them. They are amazing creatures.

Here are the monkeys, no really there are monkeys in the display.

I loved going to the zoo. I think I was being more of a kid than Addie and Corbin were. Matt really liked seeing our reactions to the animals. But missed camp.

We had a fabulous vacation and really liked our time together. Sleeping was difficult. Corbin would continually wake up and not know where he was and cry out in his semi state of sleep. Addie did really well and only woke up the one time to eat and went right back to sleep. Camping with little children is hard. But we will have plenty memories to share.