be-a-greeny: matthiessen and mini-golf

we had a day to recover after returning from the dells so of course we slept in and just lounged around for awhile. but then i was like....wait, we're still "on vacation," we should take advantage of this! so we decided to do a little hiking! we called up some friends of ours and they joined us! it turned out to be a wonderful afternoon! not only did we go hiking, we stopped for some delicious ice cream in utica, and then went mini-golfing at the new "starved rock family fun." what a blast!

the girls at the very start of our hike!

olivia, haylie and charlie

erin and saralyn! erin was such a trooper - and saralyn too, for carrying him much of the hike! erin didn't mind walking, but he was more interested in the weeds than walking, and the girls didn't want to wait up for him! lol!

charlie resting.....she loves hiking, but her little legs get tired pretty quick! lol!

an attempt at a group shot of all the kids

unfortunately it was at the end of the hike, so no one was really in the mood for pictures! guess i can't blame them.....we hiked for a good hour and a half!

after our adventure there, we decided we would reward the kids with some playground time! however, as we pulled up, a lady that was leaving said she just finished picking a dozen ticks off of each of her kids. ummm....thanks for the heads up, we'll pass on the playground! so saralyn and i decided ice cream sounded verrrrrry delicious and refreshing right about now! i had key lime pie ice cream....yummmmmmo!! i'm pretty sure i'll drive to utica in the next week or so for more.....baby jo loved it and what baby wants, baby gets! (for now anyway!)

then olivia mentioned mini golfing.....it was still pretty early in the afternoon, and we didn't have plans, so we figured we may as well give it a shot! after all, it's on the way home! this was the girls first time mini-golfing and they had a lot of fun! we didn't keep score, but they were all winners!!