Summer Magic Series

It’s Monday.

I’ve already got kids off to school, on time no less.

Ok, they’re always on time so that’s not that monumental.

I’ve already exercised

Now that’s monumental.

I’ve already made two pans of brownies. Which have nothing to do with the fact that I exercised. I’m not even going to eat them. Promise!

I’ve finally got my whole family registered for the Step Up walk (Hurry! Friday is the team t-shirt deadline!)

So I thought, because of all that I thought I would take a moment to revisit our Summer. Which, in a word, was magical. So many time I had to stop and take a moment to breath it in. It was overwhelming, sometimes, how amazing it was. I have so many pictures (thousands) and so many memories (even more) that I want to share. I’ll do my best to share as many as I can.

Today, though, I’m going back to the beginning of our summer and sharing (because I can’t believe I haven’t done this) the last bit of a little birthday adventure.

Remember how we went to South Dakota for the Memorial Weekend? And remember we went there because that was MT’s birthday weekend and she saw a picture of Mount Rushmore and wanted to go?

That is the birthday adventure of which I speak.

We decided to visit Mount Rushmore on The Girl’s actual birthday since that was what brought us there. It all seemed very fitting.

It was a Sunday, though, so we first went to church then came back to the campsite for lunch. As a little side note that screams to be mentioned when we returned to our campsite it was surrounded by people and cars. A few sites over from ours there was a wedding going on. You read that right. Let me put it a little more plainly, a wedding at a KOA campground. I’ll just say a few things about it. First, dressed in our church clothes we were over dressed. Even the bride was in jeans. The groom work a American flag type button up shirt and jeans. Second, the decorations. The aisle was lined with fake purple flowers and I think there were purple streamers strung from the trees and purple plastic table clothes on the picnic tables. Third, I didn’t take any pictures. I want to. Believe me I wanted to. But I didn’t know these people and I just wasn’t feeling that brave. Even with my zoom lens.

So after the wedding, and our lunch, we headed out to visit Mount Rushmore. We had a bit of a drive so it built up the anticipation nicely. MT was so excited and the close we got the more nervous/excited she got. At one point, sitting between Granny and myself, she sat squeezing our hands so was so excited. It was hard not to be excited with her. I couldn’t help but have those overwhelming feelings of gratitude that we could make her birthday wish come true on her birthday.

When we finally got within site of Mount Rushmore she was speechless. It was priceless.

I have yet to figure out what the draw was, for her, to go to Mount Rushmore. While it is remarkable, it is just a mountain with faces carved into it. And not faces that she knows. But that was her wish and she soaked it up our entire time there. We, of course, did the Jr. Ranger program while we were there and she earned another badge. Something she felt fabulous about and only added to the fun of the day. Granny gave her some birthday money to spend in the bookstore and of all the ones (about lots of different things) she choose a book, with lots of great pictures, about Mount Rushmore.

Oh that girl. There is no one like her.

The next day we took a drive and came upon viewing area where we got to see it again.

It made the experience all the more exciting.

She was thrilled to see it again.

It was a pretty incredible day. One I hope she doesn’t forget anytime soon.

PS Would you like to see something funny?

You’re welcome.