Need a Vacation from my Vacation

July was an action packed month. We started it with the 4^th of July. We took Gretchen to see a parade. She was duly impressed with the fire trucks and sirens. A few days later we celebrated her 2^nd birthday with a party in the beating hot sun. Gretchenpalooza was fun but tiring. I could tell our guests were ready to go home to their air conditioning. Gretchen cried while we sang Happy Birthday but managed to sing it randomly days afterwards…..

The week after that we embarked on a road trip! We tried to be smart about it and broke up our drive into 6 hour trips. We visited our friend Jeff in Cincinnati (6 hours from Chicago) and stayed the night there. The next day we drove to Hendersonville North Carolina (6 hours from Cincinnati) to visit our friend Todd (Jeff’s brother). We spent a few days with Todd and then headed back to Cincinnati for the night and then back home. Considering how much time we spent in the car, our girl did good. She only complained about 30 minutes the entire time. With every leg we stopped for food and stopped twice at rest stops to stretch our legs. The hard part was trying to relax while guarding Gretchen in other people’s homes. This was not a sight seeing trip – we were really just visiting friends so we took turns watching her. I think it went well. I brought new toys with us from her birthday (and some I had been saving) so that helped along with Grandma’s portable DVD player for the car.

The rest of July we spent just trying to enjoy the pool and summer. Lindenfest, our community’s street fair is next week – we plan on taking Gretchen on the carny rides (if they look safe). Once that’s over, summer is over for me.

Here are our July photo highlights. However I have more pictures out on flickr for those who are interested.