Spring Break

Last week, Matt had the week off from school. We'd been talking about getting away for a few days, but hadn't made any definite plans. Before we could decide on anything, one of Matt's seminary friends offered us the use of her family's cottage for the week. We happily accepted and Tuesday morning headed up north to Platte Lake (near Sleeping Bear Dunes).
This is the beautiful cottage right on the lake that we enjoyed.
The weather was a little cooler (and wetter) than we were anticipating/hoping for, but we'd stoke up the fire every day when we were inside and bundle up when we went out. We played lots of games, read lots of books, laughed a lot and enjoyed tons of GREAT family time!
On one of the rainy/snowy (yes, it snowed while we were there)days, we went to a little Children's Museum in Traverse City. It was quite small, but a great place to spend a couple of hours in the afternoon. It's focus was the Great Lakes. We enjoyed the water-themed activities, fish, and lighthouse.


This is a picture of Anna crawling around a "pond" with moving fish projected onto the floor at the museum. It was really cool, because when you stepped into it, water ripples would appear.
Anna's trying to catch snowflakes--see the ones in her hair?
Thursday morning we woke to a light dusting of snow on the ground. The sun came out later in the morning, so we headed out. We decided since we were so close, we'd better take advantage of the dry day and head to Sleeping Bear Dunes. Anna had such a great time climbing up the dunesand then running back down. It was still pretty cold and windy, so we didn't stay long.

Matt (and Anna) were able to do a little geocaching on our trip. This turned out to be a really nice activity for the week. We were able to stay warm and dry while we were driving around looking for "treasures" (Anna's take on geocaching), and still be able to get out of the car several times and look around to find the caches. Matt found 8 caches in 2 days.

Our last full day at the cottage was pretty nice--sunny and warmer. After we did a little driving around and exploring, we headed back to the cottage for dinner. We thought we'd better take advantage of the sunshine and play by the lake for awhile. Since two of Anna's favorite things are rocks and sticks, she had was having a blast!

Saturday after we cleaned up and packed up, we did a little more geocaching then headed toward home. We made a little stop in Manistee for awhile. It was a bit rainy, but Anna wanted to walk down by the river before we stopped for a snack and a little walk around town.

We had a fantastic time being away from home for awhile and together as a family. We're so thankful for our friends and their generosity in lending us the cottage for the week. It was refreshing to get away for awhile--it was hard to get back into the swing of things today! Matt's in the final weeks of his seminary experience. The next month and half will be incredibly busy, but it's nice to know we're near the end. We are trusting the Lord will lead us to our next new experience in ministry and we're really excited about that!