How I Spent My Blog Break

Life lessons are learned during blog breaks and vacations, but this post has none of that "wisdom" and a whole lot of photo-oversharing 

Warning (warning? That's not the right word but all that would come to mind): This post contains a ridiculous amount of pictures with ridiculous commentary. There is no point to this post - I learned no major "lessons" on my blog break, I have no pseudo-wisdom to share. I just decided I didn't want to spend our family vacation working/being attached online. That's it, that's all. And then I got some fun pics with my DSLR (first time vacationing with the fancy camera!), so I thought I'd make a fun post about my blog break. You're not going to get enlightened by reading this, I won't inspire you to rethink your blog or your life... But my toddler made some hilarious faces and my baby is adorable, so, you know. Read on for a good ol' fashion over-share post!

We escaped the Texas August heat by going to my parents' lake home in Wisconsin. Unlike our last trip to Maine, there was only one travel issue, and that was hitting major road construction on I35 heading north out of Minneapolis to lake country. Like, dead stopped, nearly doubled our drive time level traffic, the kind Minneapolis is best known for (I don't miss that about living there!). Oh hey, remember when I said I didn't have any wisdom to share? Lied, here it is: Don't book a flight with a car ride immediately following if you have children. They don't handle it well, and it makes you crazy.

But then we arrived and all was well! We had some perfect weather. My mom had food ready for us immediately and wine poured, like the champion she is. She had the cribs set up in her cabin so that she could get up with the kids every morning and cut us a break, even though my weird husband refused to take her up on that offer every morning. Who does that?! Meanwhile, I basically sprinted to the next cabin and locked the door, like love you kids but mama wants sleep, byeeeeeeee!

Immediately the next day, hubs wanted to take Henry fishing off the dock. Now, anything that involves hooks, worms and sitting for long periods of time just isn't my thang, but I tagged along for the photo opps.

Being adorbs while we wait for fishies

So there we are, chillin chillin mindin' our bidniz when all of a sudden we {finally} caught a fish! Daddy reeled it in. Henry was NOT sure how he felt about that large mouth bass (had to double check with hubs on what the name of that fish was because it turns out, I'm no fisherman fish expert. Weird.)

Not touching that thing, dad. Nope.

So Mr. Bass gets tossed back in and another worm sacrifices it's life all in the name of trying to get a toddler interested in fishing. The waiting game started again. And if you're wondering what that thing on Henry's arm is, it's a skull tattoo-thingy that lasted for THREE EFFING WEEKS. Don't miss that now that it's gone... Tangent ended, back to the waiting game!

And right as Henry was about to dip up out of this waiting game nonsense, all of about one minute and six seconds after it began, another fish latched on to that worm/hook combo and spent the rest of his life regretting it... Because that fish swallowed the hook and passed on to another life. RIP, fish. On a brighter note, Henry either got over his fear of flopping fish or just needed a really passive (aka nearly dead one) to touch it and get interested in fishing. So little sunfish, your life was not in vain!

Braving the {much smaller} sunfish

After two fish, I was about fished out, so I went to go see what my mom had done with my lil baby Otto. Poor little dude, one day he'll be big enough to do boy things with the boys and not get handed off to Grandma while mom snaps pics and plays with ISO levels... But until then, he'll chill safely with Grandma.

Happy as a duck with Grandma

I found both Otto and my mom in their respective happy places: Playing with toes and drinking wine. Both of those happy places are more my speed, especially if the contending activity involves hooks and worms.

When the glory of fishing wore off, or my husband got too tired of grabbing Henry's life jacket as he attempted to lurch off the dock and get into "da wadder, da wadder, da wadder!", hubs took Henry swimming. My folks found this old boat tube and Henry got a huge kick out of it. Fifteen year old toy saw a return to it's glory days thanks to Henry!

Now me, I don't get into water unless it's at least 100 degrees out. When I was a Minnesotan, that threshold was about 92 (give or take) but now that I'm a Texan, I need to be heat-stroke-level-hot to want to cool off. So I stayed in the 85 degree sun and got my first tan of the season. Yeah. It's August and I JUST got tan... Because it's too hot here to sunbathe. Add that to the ever-slimming list of things I miss about living up North.

We basically "eat sleep rinse repeat"'ed that cycle the whole trip! We had two days of overcast weather and played with bubbles. ALWAYS WITH THE BUBBLES. They never got old and entertained both kids. Henry would honestly play bubbles for hours if we let him. It's the simple things, right?

I think he's mentally building a shrine for bubble solution. He looks like he's about to tantrum - oh no, he's just passionately shouting BUBBLESSSSSSS nonstop. All day. Everyday. 

Mom went on Pinterest and found a recipe/craft for extra big bubbles that we could make with pipe cleaner wands. Supposedly they were supposed to come out in the same shape of the wand, but that was a Pinterest FAIL, which reminded me of this post. My mom isn't crafty at all so I give her mad love for trying!

Pinterest bubble shape fail. Still made some pretty big bubbles though!

We wrapped up our vacation with a two days in Minneapolis. It was a major win to break up a 2.5 hour drive and a 2.5 hour flight with a few days in between! We were able to see some family and get Henry and Otto together with their cousins, and I was able to see two of my friends and eat two fabulous meals. I tell you what, Dallas is NOT a "foodie" city like Minneapolis is. I miss having a good food scene! Alas, we have young kids so I doubt we'd make it out much anyway... But still. Dallas, pick up your food game!

And then we flew home. Another uneventful flight. And uneventful is the BEST way to fly when you're toting along two little kids.

Have you made it this far?! Gold star for you, dear reader, I always knew you were one of my favorites. That's it. That's how I spent my week and a half long blog break. It was the first blog break I've ever taken, and I started this thing back in April of 2014 and have had two babies since it's launch. I was long overdue for some time away. I hope this blog break post enlightened you with it's nothingness and photo-oversharing! Sorry I don't have the answers to how to have a more niche-successful blog or how to live a happier, more mindful life. Nope. Just photos ;)