Our Week in Iowa

Brothers Reunited- Rizzo and Miles

Oakland Worship Team

Gaskill family

Baking with Brittney

Skyline with Brittney

Skyline with cousins

Aliyah's softball game

Bowling

Kaylee's annual check-up

Surprise!!!

Our crazy family

4th of July

16th Street Baptist Church

Kelly Ingram Park

Kelly Ingram Park and Baptist Church

Our time in Iowa was both busy and exciting. Here are the highlights:

• Game night with Stacie and Patrick. We had a blast playing Sequence with them. It was fun to reunite Miles and Rizzo. We swear they know they're brothers. They jump all over each other and chase each other around the yard. They love each other so much. Rizzo doesn't act like that with other dogs.
• Worshipping at Oakland-The youth group was in charge of the service. Grandma Sue and Grandpa Wayne came to church with us. We had a great discussion and Kaylee had fun serving the meal with her friends. Trace and Kianna got called up onto the stage to help out with worship. It was a fun morning.
• Gaskill Reunion- I organized a get together at Dad and Sue's house. It was so nice to get everyone together.
• Time with cousins- Our kids adore their cousins and had so much fun playing with them. They went to Skyline with us and had a blast on the new Ninja Warrior play area. The warp wall is no joke!
• Fun with friends- Kaylee organized lots of sleepovers with her friends. She was able to spend the night with Brittney, Chloe and Lily. Kaylee is blessed with lots of good friends.
• Issa's- We always love seeing the Issa family. They're coming to visit us in Florida in a few weeks, so our time with them was brief.
• Grandma Becki and the Langfalds- We had a nice meal with the Langfalds. We always enjoy our time with them.
• Games with Grandma Jacque- We spent a nice afternoon over at my mom's house playing games. We also had pizza together at Fong's pizza, followed by ice cream. Aliyah and Grandma GG joined us. It was very nice.
• Bowling with Bree and Aliyah- We watched Aliyah's softball game. Unfortunately, it was cancelled due to lightning. We decided to go bowling afterwards and had a nice time with them.
• Kaylee's annual check-up- Not a highlight, except that the MRI hadn't worsened. Next year they'll repeat the angiogram and that will show us if the AVM is gone or not...
• Bella- After Kaylee's appointment at UIHC, we told her that we needed to go to Rizzo's breeder to pick up some paperwork. She's a go with the flow gal, so thought nothing of it. Once we arrived, I saw a puppy in the yard and said "oh look, there's a puppy maybe we can go pet it." The breeder let the puppy loose and Kaylee went and picked her up. We told her this is your new puppy and she couldn't believe it. We completely surprised the other two as well with a new mini golden doodle puppy, which we named Bella Grace. She was born on April 16th and is 11 weeks old.  She is a big drooler, which apparently is a sign of car sickness. Her mouth was soaked on the way back to Marion. Bella was so excited to meet Rizzo. Rizzo's wasn't quite as sure about her. He acts likes she's s a big nuisance and is ready for her to go away like all the other dogs he's been around on this trip. I guess he's in for a surprise too... 
• Birmingham, Alabama- On the way back to Florida, we decided to take a new route that would take us through some states we hadn't been through before and through Florida's panhandle. Trace and Kianna had never been in Mississippi before and the rest of us had never been to Alabama. We spent the night in Birmingham, AL which was a little sketchy. For starters, we had a hard time finding a restaurant that we could take our dogs to. Eventually, we found an outdoor restaurant that met our need. The following morning before heading out of town, we decided to visit a couple historic landmarks relevant to the Civil Rights Movement. We saw the 16th Street Baptist Church where years before a bomb went off killing two little girls. Across the street from the church is the Kelly Ingram Park, which was the gathering point for many protestors. The park is filled with statues that remember different parts of the Civil Rights Movements and has various quotes along the way. It was a great educational moment for all of us. We watched "The Watsons Go To Birmingham" when we got home. It was a powerful movie that helped give us more perspective.

Roadtrip to Iowa

Our family decided it would be "fun" to drive to Iowa. We wanted to bring Rizzo with us and make some fun pit stops along the way. Our first stop was in Knoxville, TN where we spent two nights with Jodi and Paul Yau and their girls. We hadn't met their youngest daughter, Dana, yet and she was three. Their girls loved playing with Rizzo and our kids enjoyed playing with their guinea pig. Our kids also enjoyed playing on their climbing wall.

We let Kaylee babysit one night so we could have a date night with Paul and Jodi. They took us to a fun greek tapas restaurant and then we walked around a nearby park to get some exercise. It was a fun couple of days with our friends.

From there, we drove to Lexington, KY where we dropped Rizzo off at Brian and Jamie Ross' house before heading to the Arc Encounter. Little did we know, they had just gotten a german shepherd puppy who was crazy. I felt so bad leaving Rizzo with them, as the two dogs were barking incessantly at each other. It was so loud...

We spent the day at the nearby Arc Encounter in Williamstown, KY. They recreated Noah's Arc to scale as written about in Genesis. The arc was 510 feet long, 85 feet wide and 51 feet high. The arc had three stories. Each level focused on explaining a different portion of how the arc may have functioned in reality. They explained how Noah and his family may have fed, watered, and cleaned up after the large quantity of animals on the arc. Kaylee and I took our time reading every placard and enjoying the exhibit, while Trevor and the other two did the quicker tour. They finished an hour and a half before we did, which made them very ready to leave by the time we finished. Thankfully, there was a park and some animals at the end of the exhibit that kept them busy for awhile...

After the arc, we headed back to Brian and Jamie's house where we spent the evening with them. We had a nice meal out and then caught up with our friends while the kids played. We had some good laughs together. Brian is hilarious!

The following day, we headed to the Creation Museum in Petersburg, KY. We weren't in the mood for another museum, but had already prepaid, so went anyway. However, I don't feel like we really experienced it. We sped through it, just to say we had been there. The information was very similar to the Arc Encounter as it focused a lot on creation vs evolution. Anyway, we checked that box and then were on the road again. However, before leaving Kentucky, the kids insisted that we get Kentucky Fried Chicken in Kentucky. Thankfully there was one nearby...

From there we headed to Uncle Todd and Aunt Tracy's house in Bloomington, IN. We spent two nights with them and had an amazing time. They are so great with our kids. Kianna especially adores Aunt Tracy. They had fun feeding the fish together. Uncle Todd and Aunt Tracy have created an organic garden, which keeps expanding. The garden is part of their retirement plan, as they hope to one day have a place where families come to pick their own fruits and veggies. We let Rizzo off leash while there and he was in heaven chasing their dog, Sammy.