Summer Nebraska Trip

I mentioned our trip in my post about Pilger.  Here are the rest of the pictures of all the fun stuff we did! We spent a LOT of time in the car on this trip, 1300 miles and at least 24 hours!  Parker did great almost the whole time in the car and with all the transitions.  The iPad was extremely helpful in the car when he started to get restless.  The piano app can keep him occupied for close to an hour if needed.

 We stopped for dinner in Windom and got some much needed play time!  Grandpa liked the high-back swing!

After our drive through Pilger we headed to my cousin Felicia's house to meet her new baby Claire!  She was just perfect and slept the whole time!  It made me really miss Parker being that tiny!

My mom with baby Claire

We got back in the car and headed a couple hours north to my grandma's house.  We also made our 2nd stop for twist cones.  It was here we decided to try to have them every day of our trip!

My grandma already had some toys ready to go for Parker and he loved playing with new cars and trucks.  The white convertible actually ended up accidentally coming home with us!

 Her town hosts a bunch of events for Independence Day.  We walked towards downtown for "cruise night" and made a stop at the park.  I hadn't been on a teeter-totter in years so it was fun to take Parker for a ride!

 There were a ton of old hot rods and other vehicles "cruising" down Main Street.  Parker loved it!

Great-Grandma, Grandpa, Parker and Nana

There was a big parade the next morning with motorcycles...

 Ambulances...

 and fire trucks!  He was in heaven!

I tried to take a cute selfie, but it didn't turn out as planned!

After the parade, Parker and I headed to a local golf course to tag team with Nana!  She golfed 9 holes in the morning, then I got to golf 9 in the afternoon while she took Parker back to the house.

It was so fun to see everyone, especially my awesome cousin Angie, I just love her!

We headed back to her house after golf for dinner and fireworks.  Parker enjoyed having other kids to play with and I think they liked playing with him too.

 Lovely Angie had a great spread of burgers, brats, cheesy potatoes and more!

Razarita!

Happy Fourth of July!

This is my favorite picture of the whole trip, pure joy!

Parker even managed to stay up for his very first fireworks show.  I wish I could have got some good pictures, but it was too dark.  He was half intrigued and half oblivious.  It was almost 11 before we got in the car to head back to my grandma's, he was out pretty fast!  

 We headed back south a couple hours for the wedding on Saturday.  It was over 90 and humid, but got a partly shady seat thanks to Parker!

 The wedding took place at a beautiful barn that was moved from Pennsylvania.  There was even an old wooden wagon out front that kept Parker entertained for a while.

 I was hoping for a better picture of his jammies, they say "My bedtime is on vacation."  It certainly was this trip!  I took him and grandpa to the hotel and then headed back to the wedding for fun and dancing with Nana.

 My uncle Tim dancing with his his son (the groom), Kyle.

 After a quick continental breakfast we loaded up one last time for the trip home.  It was one of those "stay in your PJ's all day" kind of days!

 We did a little drive through Lincoln, making a stop at UNL's new basketball arena...

 And Memorial Stadium!  This was Parker's first visit, but he will for sure be back in 16 years when he is on the team!

Who says you can't have ice cream in the morning?  We completed our goal, 5 days of twist comes! Runza was the only reliable place to get a cone so we had to stop just before Omaha since that was the last one along our route.

 The rest of the drive was pretty tame.  We hit some road construction and holiday traffic which pushed our ETA a bit, but we were happy to be home.  Jimmy gave us a great welcome as well (I think he missed us!)