Vacation

Wow... what a trip! We took a week and checked out a lot of really beautiful places in the upper Peninsula. We spent the week with this lovely group of people:

It started on a Friday. The Westerman family and our family drove up and stayed in Munising. We wanted to break up the drive, so we decided to stop there. Before we checked in to our motel for the evening, we went to Tahquamenon Falls. They were absolutely stunning!

The next morning, we went to see Pictured Rocks National Lake shore. We were also able to hang out on a nice beach for a couple hours.

It was so nice to break up the 10 hour drive and we were able to see something I don't ever remember seeing. It really was beautiful!

After our few hours at the beach, we hopped back in the car and headed west! Our destination was the Porcupine Mountains. It took us about 4 hours to get there from Pictured Rocks.

We had a really fun week. We camped at a campground right in the mountains. Three other families met us there.

We hiked a lot. The first hike we took was to a place called Lake of the Clouds. It's literally a lake up in the mountains. The scenery was beautiful.

There was a great, sandy beach within walking distance of our campground. The kids loved swimming! The first day, Lake Superior was numbingly cold. But honestly, it really warmed up throughout the rest of the week.

We did a ton of hiking. Ava and Allie did awesome. Everywhere we hiked, they had to find a walking stick. Hannah did very well too, but it might be because this was how she hiked:

I'm amazed at all the waterfalls we saw. We took a drive south in the middle of the week to check out Bond Falls. They were amazing.  

I have to say, we are not campers. This next picture might explain why. We didn't have the greatest accommodations. Now I say that in the most grateful way possible. We were loaned this camper and if we hadn't had it, we would have been in a tent, sleeping on the ground! So again, I'm super grateful, but this camper is pretty old! We put two tares in the canvas the first day. It's an '82 so it's seen it's share of camping trips. And it was pretty cramped in there. I didn't realize just how much you need to camp. SO much of our discomfort was from our lack of experience. The other bummer was that it was quite a walk to the bathrooms. But I must admit, I have never been more thankful for my house. If anything, camping is a great way to remind us of how extremely bless we are and how much we have!

The other tough part was trying to get these three rug rats to get to sleep every night! It was no easy feat.

But once they were asleep, we could go enjoy the bonfire and these beautiful sunsets. We were literally feet from Lake Superior. Our campsite was waterfront. It was awesome going to bed to the sound of crashing waves.

On Thursday we drove up the Keweenaw Peninsula. One stop along the way was to Michigan Tech, which is where Mike's dad graduated college. We also traveled all the way up to Copper Harbor, the northern most city.

On the way to Copper Harbor we drove up this mountain and were able to see for miles. The views were amazing.

This was on a very rocky beach in Copper Harbor.

It was an amazing week. It's wonderful to get away from all responsibilities and just be able to relax and enjoy our family. I know the girls loved it. And more than anything, I came home completely grateful for all the things God has blessed us with. I take for granted so often the fact that I have a big beautiful house, with electricity and running water. I have an amazing bathroom in my bedroom! What gifts those are that I don't recognize very often.