Home!

Well, we finally returned home this past Saturday evening from vacation, but have been so busy that I haven't got around to updating until now. We had a wonderful time.

I can't remember how I got my slide show to work at one time, so you'll just have to look at the pictures that I select for this blog. I may spread it out over the next week or so. Keith and the girls call me Olan Mills (I did take a little over 500 pictures - thanks to digital cameras!).

We had a calm flight to Chicago. When we left DFW, it was quite warm, but when we arrived there, we quickly retrieved our jackets out of the suitcase! While waiting for our flight, we did get to witness a whole plane of our soldiers that had just returned from Iraq. I had my camera in hand, but could not see for the tears that came. We stood and welcomed them home with a few other people. I thank God for these men and women that have given of themselves for our country!

This is a stained glass that I found on our first day in Chicago. A man created it after the tragedy of 9/11.



Our first day there we just explored the suburb where we stayed. The second day, we went down to Navy Pier in Chicago. It's a neat place that is on Lake Michigan. When standing out on the pier you can look across Lake Michigan and seen the steel factories in Gary, Indiana, that are 65 miles away.



Skyline view of Chicago from the Navy Pier.


We had a good laugh while taking turns standing in front of the crazy mirrors!


Our third day there (we were not too far from Indiana) we took a drive to Nappanee, Indiana, to visit Amish country. The girls and I have been reading some books by Beverly Lewis, so she had our curiosity up about them. Two days after we were there an F3 tornado came and leveled a good portion of this small town. We got really excited when we saw our first horse and buggy, and finally turned off of the main road to the backroads where their houses were. One of the first sights we came upon was where they were having a funeral. We later did stop and talked to a young couple that were out riding their bicycles to get directions.

This was a sign where they were having the funeral. I found it amusing, because we're not used to these sights!



A couple of Amish children out doing their chores.


I tried to be as discreet as I could while taking pictures of the actual people, because they do not like their pictures taken. They consider it vanity.

This is the couple that we later stopped and got directions from. I did hide my camera while talking to them.


We also drove through the campus of the University of Notre Dame in South Bend, Indiana. Very beautiful! It is a dream of ours to visit all 50 states, so since we were so close to the state line of Michigan, guess what? Yes, we drove an extra 10 minutes to get past the state line of Michigan! Are we nuts or what?!



Stay tuned for more of our family vacation (I'm tired and my eyes are starting to cross!).