201

Today was just kind of a tough day weather wise. I have openings in my schedule to do stuff. When I had an opening today, I got all the outdoor clothes ready to put on him, and then it started raining. Plan B became coloring. We tag teamed on this one.

In the afternoon, I had a Hyvee run. One thing I have noticed is that I'm the only one doing pick ups now. I asked the employee, and he did say it has slowed down. He wasn't sure why it was slower, but he did mention that mid-week is generally slower, and now that more stores have more hours, that there are less pick ups. I thought was was interesting. I really do like the convenience, but for some reason, you just don't always get everything you want. For instance, I didn't get the pizza crust I ordered....and I got some lousy pot pies, not the Marie Callandar ones I ordered...oh well, there are worse things.

In the evening we had Kindermusik. Kai is a growing sunflower, Mommy is a bunny, and they are dancing in the wind.

Lastly, this was the test for the heat as I just switched it to "heat" mode tonight. We had success as the warm air poured out.

200

Other than being day 200, today was a pretty generic day. It did provide for some fun pictures though.

In the morning, we got a chance to put together the submarine from the library last week. It was fun to put on the stickers and then assemble the foam yellow submarine.

In the early afternoon, we went golfing. He is really good at getting the ball up in the air. 

Later on, we realized that the playground was now open. Play around 7PM in the dark is something he really likes. Here he is on the new swing.

As we walked home, he had fun with the shadow and the flashlight.

Then at the start of the debate, he was busy taking notes.

199

Back to work, but my email backlog was only 120ish, so I had some time this morning for a walk. Sometimes there is random singing that occurs. I think the neighbors like it.

Then off to the playground slides in our neighborhood.

We saw this contraption at our neighbor's place. 

After a trip to Hyvee, I decided to do some cooking. We got tomatillos from our CSA. I still have no idea what do to with them other than make salsa, so I made salsa.

Here is the salsa (at bottom) and tonight's dinner, a Mexican Bell Pepper dish (yeah, we had red peppers to use up too).

In the evening, we needed to procure just a few flower petals for our craft.

We put them on the board and slapped it shut tight.

We'll see what they look like in 2-5 days.

Then off for a bath to end the day.

198

And just like that, the Staycation ended. The final event of the Staycation was to visit Gammie and Auntie Dawn one more time before the weather turned more Fall-like.

Here we are eating at the Illinois wayside just across the border. To speed things up, we simply got dressed and ate on the road.

At Gammie's there was some work to do with putting down more of the plastic dividers, and also fixing some of the issues that have cropped up as the ground heaved and sagged over the past few years. I had a helper this time around.

Then getting refreshments from all the tough work.

And some dessert too.

On the way home, we saw this sign from this pizza joint. Sounds like fast food to me!

Also completed my fifth book of the pandemic. This was a fun one. The guy grew up in Wisconsin on a family dairy farm in the 1940's. The era of his farm saw a great revolution as the farm got electricity, tractors, milking machines, and also some unfortunate times, including a barn fire, a massive wind storm and Bang's disease, and all the other massive technological changes that occurred in the 1940's. It is all tied together in the fact that his mother kept the exact expenses of what it took to run the farm. In the end, two of the boys became Ph.D's and the other a barber....none of them took over the farm, which was something that was sad for the author, but a sign of the times to come.

At night, we needed to burn off a little energy, so we walked outside in the 56 degree weather to see what toads were out.

Work starts all over tomorrow. For the Staycation, Mommy's favorite activity was apple picking, his was the beach, mine was the splash pad. My memory that I'll never forget is when the European deer were encroaching upon him, he leaped into my arms screaming, "Daddy, knock them out, knock them out!" I am not sure where that came from, but imagine what would've happened if I took a swing at those deer. They certainly wouldn't have expected it.

197

Since we were able to do most everything on our list of things on our staycation, we were mostly home today.

However, when you need to play, sometimes you need to get out of the house.

We wanted to do a little scootering today. We have done this at Greenway Station, but the new parking lot at HyCite is probably the smoothest place to do it. For the record, this is what HyCite does...."Hy Cite has three well-known, premium cookware lines: Royal Prestige, NutraEase and Kitchen Charm, which are exclusively sold by Independent Authorized Distributors in the United States and Canada, as well as numerous countries throughout Latin America, Europe and Asia."

One reason I like to go to places like this is you see what other offices are like. HyCite has a nice break area outside in the back of the building.

At noon, our drive took us around the country. It was a nice day to empty out the liquid manure pits. This is such a big job compared to those of us used to small farm manure removal. Big semis taking manure, to deposit into a tube, pulled behind a tractor, and then immediately disced into the earth.

Our craft was to make this wind chime.

In the evening, we had s'mores for the 2nd time this year. It was still around 70-degrees around 7PM, so we went for it.

While out there, we noticed the moon had made an appearance....then another planet. I found out it was Jupiter. What was more fun is my Star Walk app said that Saturn was right next to it. My iPhone was able to pick up Saturn too. I have never seen Saturn's rings...someday I need to make that happen.

Then some late night ukulele playing.

196

Today was going to be another really nice today. Our plan was go to to the Wisconsin Deer Park in the Dells. To not use a public restroom, the Dells are about as far as we can go. It is 54 minutes to drive one-way....then you should spend at least an hour there to make it worthwhile.

First off while we waited for the park to open, we thought to do the craft we got at the Middleton Public Library, which was a visor.

Then after breakfast, we were on our way north to the Dells. For the time capsule, the cost for adults is $14 a piece, and 3-11 year olds were $10. Then it is $4 for the Wasa crackers to feed the animals.

For that money, we have some memories.

In the first pen are the deer we see, the white tail deer. 

In the 2nd pen are the European deer. They are much more aggressive in getting the crackers.

In the evening we went to Greenway Station to see if any of the clothing stores changed their displays, to do a little dancing and throw money into the fountains.

195

Today is really the only day where it was iffy if it would rain sometime during the day. With that, the easy thing to do would to start our day by drawing. We liked how the map of Appleberry Farm looked, so we decided to make a map of our house.

Since it was kind of possibly rainy, a short drive to west of Cross Plains and the Ice Age Trail that covers land owned by the Swamplovers organization. The Swamplovers bought the land in the late-80's in hopes of resurrecting the land (they did a great job). The Swamplovers have allowed the trail to traverse their land. Here are a bunch of photos of our walk up to the top. It looked more intimidating than it actually was.

Then at the top there is a nice shelter.

and more views...

In the afternoon, we went to Paradise Park in Cottage Grove. We had a good 25-minutes at the park before it started raining. Thankfully, the cat made an appearance too.

Since we are technically on vacation, we upheld a tradition, to go out at least once. We got take out at Imperial Gardens. 

Whew, that's a lot of photos. Last one....a picture of our tree turning colors. I might take this picture every day to show the change.