Fourth of July 2016

A road trip was in order for the long Fourth of July weekend.

So, we headed through the corn fields, on up to Chicago.

The Pardi's let us crash their pad one night. We got to see baby Otis and play with his toys and let him pull Kate's and Millie's hair. We also got to spend the day with them at our favorite lake, Lake Michigan.

We also were able to see the Fox's there. 

Harvey (or Hervey as Kate used to call him) and Sam.

The best part of the day for Kate.

The next night, the Moss family was cool enough to let us bombard their house and hang out ALL Sunday morning until 1:00 church. Luckily, they are cool with our craziness and our kids play so well together. It really made us homesick for La Grange Park and the Westchester Ward though.

Sunday night, we drove to Springfield, the state's capital and the home of President Lincoln.

We stayed at one of our favorites a KOA Kabin. There are no pictures documenting it though, because sometimes vacations aren't picture perfect and the last thing you want to do is take a picture when things get a little tense.

The next morning was Independence Day.

We went to Lincoln's tomb and we all rubbed his nose for good luck.

The kids were a little nervous to be in a cemetery, but luckily it wasn't a haunted one.

Next up was the Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum.

It was an awesome museum and was done really well. I feel like I walked away with more knowledge of Abraham Lincoln and his family. I would highly recommend a stop there.

A slight disclaimer though, there are wax figures every where and all of our kids (mostly Sam) at different times were not having any of that. That is why Sam and Millie are missing from the above picture.

Our Civil War Era children at the museum.

After that we did some driving around Springfield. Most of the stuff was closed but we felt like the stuff we did visit was enough. It was cool to drive around and see all of the old buildings. There is also a Frank Lloyd Wright house not too far from the Lincoln stuff which is always fun to just look at.

We got on the road and headed south to Hannibal, MO.

Our plan was to watch fireworks there, but we got there so early, we decided to check it out and move on since we were still about four hours from home.

We walked around the town and checked out this museum.

There is a light house that you could climb a million stairs to get to and we thought, it's hot and humid enough and I am pregnant, let's do it. Let's just say, it was cool but not that cool and there is a short cut to get there so you don't have to hike that many stairs. But, we didn't know that until we were at the top.

The view of the mighty Mississippi (top) and the view of Hannibal (bottom) from the lighthouse.

The suckers that painted the fence for Tom Sawyer.

It was a good trip. It made us miss Chicago but it is so nice to know that we have friends up there that, I think, like us and that it's not that bad of a drive to go on if we are ever missing it too much. We ended up watching the fireworks at a high school, I think in Missouri that was an hour away from home. By that point we were over it, so once again, no photo documentary was taken.

But it was a good show and it was kind of fun to just pull up to a small town and be a part of it for a second.