Monday we wanted to scope things out and get a plan for the week so we kept the day low key. Plus we wanted to give the girls a chance to have a good nap to start the week out with. It was SUPER hot outside so we opted to do something indoors. The campground has their own activity center so that's where we headed. It was a lot of fun for all of us! It was a big jungle gym basically. It had a ball area too that Adah just loved! After spending a couple hours there it was almost time for us to eat supper. Dad was helping prepare supper at the chuck wagon down by our meeting area which is in the campground and just as we were getting our shoes back on at the activity center he called to say he was locked out of his hotel room. It was easily at least a mile, very hilly walk back to the lodge from where my dad was at. We were surprised to even hear from him and I was worried about what his attitude would be like once we got back to him with the key. If it were me I would be grumpy that I walked all that way in almost 100 degree temps only to be locked out of the room, but we came down the stairs leading to our room and turned the corner and there he stood by the door with the biggest smile on his face as he watched his family come down the hall. I won't forget that. He definitely showed me what love is in that moment! Our group sessions at night were great. I only wish we could have been a part of them a little more. I think we got to go twice out of four nights. I am sure as the kids get older in future years this will change though. We also had morning sessions that were great too. I enjoyed them a lot because the kids got to go to their own group sessions while the adults stayed back and had small groups and got to talk about things that were a little more personal.
On Tuesday we went to the parks water park. I let Adah and Kez skip their naps that day and Brian stayed back at the lodge with Eden. I think dad had some good quiet time in his room too! It was convenient because the water park was basically a two minute drive from the lodge so when Eden needed to eat I just came over to the lodge and fed her and then put her down for a nap. She wasn't even awake by the time we got back so Brian had it pretty easy!
Wednesday was our free day meaning there were no morning and evening sessions, and no supper being prepared that day. We had breakfast a little earlier then usual and then packed our sack lunches like usual and headed for the Omaha Zoo! It was so much fun! If you ask Keziah what her favorite thing was she will start listing off every animal she saw and then realize that it ALL was her favorite! Adah will talk about the monkeys with the pink butts (I will try to get video of that!). It is pretty hilarious. She uses her hands to tell the story and gets really worked up and excited. She is telling about the monkeys that have bare pink butts...you know what I'm talking about! Although this was a very good experience for her, for some reason she ended up having a nightmare about it which I will tell you about in a little bit. At the zoo she will also tell you about the tiger that was playing with his bouncy ball and box. He really liked carrying around his box! She will also tell you about the really loud monkeys. I'm not sure of the actual kind but when they talk to each other it is super loud. She did not like that at all! And you could hear it from pretty far away even. She kept her hands over her ears until we were far enough away and couldn't hear them. So back to her nightmare...on the last night of our stay we decided to have the girls sleep in with Brian and I and Austin slept in with Gma and Gpa. This wasn't how we did it all week because we would put the girls to be in one room and then hang out in Brian and my room. However, earlier in the day they had napped in our room so they had their pillows and blankies all in our room and also with it being so late we decided to just put them to bed in our room. Anyway, in the middle of the night Adah wakes up screaming with her ears covered. She claimed the monkeys with the pink buts were coming to eat her ears. I assured her that it was fine, no need to worry and to go back to sleep. About 15 minutes later she started screaming again (thankfully through this all she never woke Eden in the pack-n-play next to me). So I go talk to her again. I tell her she's fine, nothing to be afraid of and she insists again that the monkeys with the pink butts are going to eat her ears. Again, 15 minutes later she is screaming scared so I get into bed with her and rub her back to see if I can help her fall asleep that way. After laying there a bit I look up at her to find her eyes wide open looking around. She softly says to me, "mommy, what is that noise?" That's when it hit me...daddy's snoring was scaring her!!! She thought it was the monkeys with the pink butts coming to get her! Poor girl! So I said, it's ok Adah. That's just daddy. I'm going to get up and just go tell him to stop. She insisted that I not get up because she was so scared. I finally convinced her I would be right back. I went over to Brian to tell him to roll over and she instantly popped up and exclaimed (loudly), "It's ok! It stopped, mommy!" She went right to sleep and I didn't hear from her again the rest of the night! She told us about her nightmare several times the next day!
So where was I? The zoo was a great time. It was hot but we took our time and saw everything we wanted to see. The girls were exhausted as it was day two with no naps. Adah did end up crashing on grandma while we waited on a park bench for grandpa and Austin to get off the sky lift. I am really glad we had the stroller and the wagon. It was nice to have somewhere for Eden to nap separate from where the girls needed to rest. Eden was a trooper the whole day too! We headed back to the lodge for some supper. They had a really nice restaurant right there. The girls slept all the way back from the zoo! I think I might have too!
Thursday we weren't really sure what to do. It was another hot day but being that it was our last we wanted to do something. We ended up taking some much needed good naps and then heading over to the miniature golf course right there in the park. Adah was done after just a couple holes (so was I), but the rest of them enjoyed it. I joined back in somewhere along the way and even got a hole in one! Keziah is at a fun age where she doesn't really remember doing this kind of stuff in previous years so she is sort of doing it for the first time. She really had a lot of fun! We ended the day with nice cool baths and some air conditioning!! Mom and dad were a little burnt out so they decided it would be alright for me to put Eden to bed and go back to the evening session with the other two girls. I knew it would be a late night for them but since it was the last night I wanted to make the most of it! We talked about where the next trip would take us and some things we should do different/same. We will see where the next trip takes us!
Friday we headed down to the camp for some continental breakfast. They went into Omaha and got Panara bread bagels and some donuts. We were free to stick around the camp and do whatever but we were ready to get on the road. We went back to the lodge and packed up all our stuff. We stopped in Omaha at The Pizza Machine (highly recommend) to eat lunch and let the kids run off some energy before the long drive back home. I have a video down below of the girls riding one of the rides. Austin had a lot of fun doing go carts and playing different games. He had a card that allowed him to play any games as much as he wanted for 90 minutes. We ate lunch first and then got down to business! For the girls we just bought some tokens to play. There is an entire area made for just Kezzie and Adah's age. It was a good way to end the week! And after a good nursing for Eden, we all piled in the car for naps and headed back to mom and dad's!
I have a few things that stuck out to me through the week. One was watching Keziah get so excited to share with others. My mom bought a 6 or 8 pack of bubbles when they stopped at the store early in the week. She thought the girls would enjoy them while we were sitting at the meeting area. Kezzie asked her if she could share them. My mom obliged. Keziah was so excited! No, I mean, she was super excited! She got them all out of their packages. She organized them by color. She put them back in the sack. She would get them back out and at one point attempted to open them all and take off the seal under the cap. She could not wait to hand them out. We let her take them with to supper and told her after supper she could hand them out. She almost forgot to keep one for herself! It was so sweet to see her giving to others and being so excited about it!
Another moment I don't want to forget is when we first got there on Sunday and were sitting in our lawn chairs after supper just talking to people and waiting for our group session to start (@ 7:45ish) a lady named Kristeen came up to me. She knew me somehow but I wasn't really sure of who she was and she saw me holding Eden. She got down at eye level with Eden and very intentionally looked at her and told her how beautiful she is and wonderful and how much God loves her and how much she has been praying for her. It brought tears to my eyes. I am so amazed and so thankful for all the people who have and are still praying for her. It meant so much to me to have someone come tell Eden that.
I had a proud moment too when a women making conversation with Keziah was asking her name and how old she was and then said, "Wow, you have beautiful eyelashes. Who do you get those eyelashes from? Your mommy? Or your daddy?" Kezzie replied by acting like both of those questions were ridiculous saying, "No, I get my eyelashes from God (you silly)!"
I don't have much to say about Austin other than God has had His hand on him all summer and especially on this trip. I always worry about Austin having fun and not feeling like everything is for the younger kids. There were many kids his age on the trip. He made some really good friendships. I hardly saw him every night because he played baseball with his friends every chance he got. He even got asked to hang out by the campfire with a family one night. He had a really good time! And I am so thankful!
Here is a video one of the guys put together after requesting pictures from everyone who attended. It turned out really well (unlike me, he actually puts music to his videos)! There was a kiddie parade one of the nights we missed the evening group. I guess it was a pretty big deal! You will get a glimpse of that in this video! It was just such a neat thing to be around other believers of Christ, just doing life and having fun together! I can't wait to see where we go in another 2 years! I am also posting my own video of pictures from the week and then also a video of our trip to the zoo if you would like to see that!
The kids had a blast at the zoo...I took so many pictures basically just so they can look at them over and over. Don't feel like you have to watch through this one but the animals are really neat to look at!
Here is the Pizza Machine video. We went a couple years ago before Adah was born and we had a lot of fun so we wanted to go before heading home. In this video my mom and I couldn't stop laughing because Adah was screaming just because everyone else was but she wouldn't do it when everyone else did she would do it a second later. And it wasn't like a regular scream, it was like a bird chirping scream...it was just hilarious! One of those things where you had to be there!
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