Family visitors

A portion of my family felt like they needed a summer visit to North Dakota.  Can't blame them ;) It actually is a pretty cool place in the summer. And a nephew/grandson lives here which I think had a bit of pull. So they made it up here on Friday, July 24. That was a pretty relaxing day filled with naps and bonding with Harv. He really seemed to form a special bond with his Papa this trip. So sweet. And he says "papa" really cute :)

The next day we drove to Minot to go to the ND State Fair. It actually was pretty fun, except for it being scorching hot. Harv loved the construction and farm trucks and the animals.

 We spent awhile there and he partied until he could not physically take it anymore. He was in the stroller and I saw him flip over and I thought he was going to try to slide out or peek through the back - so I looked around the canopy and saw this...

 So funny. After that we decided it was a good time to head out and he actually transferred to the car ok. And it was cute so I took another picture. Can't help myself.

I'm kind of losing track exactly of the days we did stuff. Don't think it really matters. But there was more playing at home and relaxing. Eating yummy food. Playing games. Staying up late. Harvey getting up early. Etc.

 

Kathryn was flying in Tuesday so we saved some more of the adventurous stuff till she got there. Tanner had to work all week. We made it to the park one day.

 

 We showed off our fancy gym one day and swam and let Harv play all over the place and then my dad and I and Tanner played racquetball. We spent another day wandering around downtown and checking out some stores that are actually kinda cool. We hit up another park and one evening went out to some land owned by one of Tanner's work friends and shot guns.

 

 

 

My mom stayed back while we were shooting and watched Harvey and put him to bed. She sent me these cute things.

 My dad was nice enough to change my brakes while he was here. Harv was nice enough to help.

One day while Tanner was working we headed down to the North Unit of Teddy Roosevelt National Park. It was really pretty and so much fun and Harvey loved it. We took a lot of pictures :)

Still a big fan of garbage cans.

 I have to include all these pictures from this "series". He was running down a trail and just LAUGHING. I was trying to run in front of him to get some pictures and he thought that was funny too. He didn't stop to let me get a solid picture, but these ones still make me smile so much.

On the last day we made it out to Lake Sakakawea. It was so fun. Harvey LOVED the lake. He just was running into it deep and didn't want people to hold him. He loved going out far and splashing and throwing sticks for the dogs and throwing rocks in the water. It was awesome. Gus loved it too and we discovered he has a pretty unique and funny swim.

Kathryn and I

 

 

 He loved the sand too. And yet another day where he got utterly worn out!

Smashing sand towers is the best.

My mom even got me to craft. We squeezed it in on the last day. Fun mom and sister time :)

 

 

Kind of a funny picture to end on, but that really is the last one I think I took while they were here. It was so fun having them up here and Harv had a great time loving on and being loved on by all of them. So grateful they sacrificed the time and car time to travel all this way! It was so sad to watch them drive away.