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One Sunday in July we spent the day with our friends Paul, Karen, and Zoe. It had been too long since we’d last seen them so it was super to be able to drive out there for the afternoon. We had a great lunch outside and then went swimming in the pond right from the backyard.

Here are the kids waiting impatiently for lunch:

I’m not sure what they’re doing here but they’re having a great time!

Everyone in the pond! (Well, except for cameraman Eric who opted to stay on land and take a ton of pictures instead – he wanted another turn with the new camera, I think!)

Family swim:

Once we returned from vacation, July was spent soaking up as much summer fun as we could manage.

We spent it digging in the garden, going to playgrounds, swimming at Grandma and Grandpa’s, swimming at a local pond (here Quinn is playing with his friend Charlie)…

…going to outdoor concerts at the library park with friends (all the kids were running around like crazy – here are the boys with their friends Nicole and Matthew when they finally decided to take a breather!)…

…going on a hike with lots of moms club friends…

…going to zoo camp (Quinn went for a week of zoo day camp – here he is with his Southern Screamer puppet on the last day of camp)…

…and lots more fun stuff. We visited our friend Paul, Karen, and Zoe (more on that soon!), went to the Polar caves in NH with Aunt Becca, and generally did a lot of fun (and exhausting!) stuff.

Miles is still napping several afternoons a week, but doesn’t always want to give in to sleep, so sometimes I find him like this…

…yes, he’s really asleep under there!

On the last full day of our trip, we met up with Eric’s Aunt Barb, and our college friend Jessie and her two cutie-pie kids at the Kohl Children’s Museum. This was probably the best children’s museum I have been to – I wish we had one just like it near our house!!!

The kids visited the art room, and the car room (spent a while in there!) and then hit the grocery store. Here’s Miles shopping…

Somehow I think it’s supposed to be groceries on the conveyor belt!

They visited the library and the home center (didn’t spend too much time there – the boys weren’t interested in putting baby dolls to bed.) Then they zipped over to the animal hospital to be veterinarians…

…and apparently pets as well!

Next was the water room and after that they discovered a house that you can work on! You can put siding up on the outside walls and shingles on the roof, and then head inside to wallpaper (magnetic panels) and “paint” the interior walls and install flooring! The boys had a blast in this area – who knew, apparently I should be putting them to work more at home!

They also explored the recycling center and the area about the great outdoors.

We ran short on time, so we missed the restaurant section and some other areas, and we couldn’t go to the big outside area (they closed it because the temp was in the 100s.) We stopped for lunch and afterward I realized that I hadn’t tried taking photos of the four kids together. Here was the best shot out of MANY:

Most of them looked like this:

or this!

It was a blast and we’d definitely go back again. And it was awesome to see Jessie and finally meet her two kiddos!

Check out more photos in the Chicago vacation 2010 album!

Our vacation days were packed with fun things to do, including:
*Mini-golfing to celebrate a belated Father’s Day with Papa

*Swimming in Nana and Papa’s community pool

*Hanging out with cousins (even Wrigley wanted to get in the pictures)

*and friends!

More photos coming soon of aquarium, train museum, etc.!

Decorating gingerbread houses with the MOMS Club kids…

Playing outside in the snow…

Taking Nana and Papa to La Salette to see the lights. Within minutes of arrival, the boys discovered a carousel and had to try it out…

It was pretty cold so we were all bundled up!