Summer's -a-comin'!!

I have spent the last 48 hours doing nothing but scouring the internet for all that my family will be doing this summer. I am so excited because we have so many places that we will be headed and so much the kids will get to see and do. It's a nice excitement because last summer we really went no where and did nothing all summer due to lack of finances. This summer we actually have a nice tax return, and will have a bunch of bills paid off so we are taking advantage of it.

First the kids and I will be headed to my mom and dad's lake cabin in Missouri for a Memorial day weekend 4 day excursion. It will be fun to be boating and hanging out in the outdoors and most importantly catching some fish with the boys (which they failed to do last summer and are super anxious to do). While there I hope to borrow a bunch of my dads camping supplies to add to our very small stockpile for our big trip in July...

Then the second weekend in June all 6 of us will be traveling to Fargo, ND and the Detroit Lakes area in MN to hang out with the entire Coffey clan for a fun-filled 6 day trip meeting and revisiting with Tony's dad and all of his family and Tony's cousins and all of their kids, which we have really never met but are all the same age as my own kids. So my kids will have lots of other kids to play with. We'll be staying at a hotel for the first couple of days, but hope to stay at Tony's Grandparents lake for at least a day to see them, which we might not otherwise see this summer until later...

Then in July it's the "Grand Daddy of them all!!" Our first super big family vacation! We will be leaving July 18 (Mon) and traveling up towards Rapid City, SD...taking a detour through the Badlands up to Wall, SD and Wall Drug and on to Rapid City where we will spend the night. Tue. morning we will wake up early and drive through the Black Hills, Mt. Rushmore, Custer State Park, Spearfish, etc. and work our way to Devils Tower in WY where we will end our day in my old home town, Gillette, WY. We will tour Gillette and show the kids my old stomping grounds while maybe running into some of my old friends...(wink wink). Then that Wednesday we will wake up and head towards Powell, WY where we will stay the night and stock up on all of our camping food and supplies before heading into Yellowstone Thurs. morning where we will be camping for 3 days with Tony's mom's side of the family and Grandparents, cousins, aunts/uncles, etc. EXCITING. So excited for this trip...can you tell?? :) After a fun-filled three days of hanging out in one of my favorite all tme places (Yellowstone and Grand Tetons...) we will head to Laramie, WY (with a pit stop in Rock Springs to show Owen where he was born...) where we will hopefully meet up with a bunch of our Laramie friends that Sunday night. Monday the 25th we will get up and head to Cheyenne where we will be going to the Frontier Days Rodeo and hanging with my oldest sister Kimberly, who will be working with the Press for the Rodeo, grabbing a bite of dinner with her before we head out Mon. evening to head back to Omaha. We'll see if we can make the super late night drive to Omaha or if we'll have to stop at some roadside hotel - but then that Tuesday the 26th we will have a day to rest, unpack, do laundry before we have to work again that Wed. Phew. Jealous yet??

I am so excited for our trip in July because this will be the first time I will have taken my kids back to where I grew up and I'm so excited for them to see how awesome WY is. I'm planning on bringing my computer with to update with pictures along the road. If you are going to be in any of these spots along the way, please come hang out with us!!! I'd love to see my old friends. So off to plan some more...happy planning!