Road trip with mom!

I left Keith at home for a week and went on a road trip with my mom in Iowa where she grew up.

First, we spent three days at Nordic Fest. I'm a quarter Norwegian, and the festival celebrates our heritage. We got to see a lot of cousins and other more distant relatives, and they even got us all together for a family reunion on Saturday afternoon.

Then, my mom and I set off on our own for some statewide genealogy research. In the last three days we went to small towns and large cities. We hit some cemeteries that were five miles out on dirt roads. We saw schools where my mom attended and family homes where we visited when I was young. By the numbers, we've stopped at the following:

6 courthouses
6 cemeteries
3 schools
7 houses
1 church

We're in the airport now ready to go home. We've stayed in 5 motels in the last week, so we're ready for our own beds, bathrooms, and cooking.

Our day at the river

Keith's family has a rustic river cabin that is the location of an annual gathering on July 4th weekend.  There's a boat with all the water sport options, a jetski, a TV, lots of great food, and family.  Jennifer missed the trip last year because she was teaching GHP, but nothing could keep us away this year.  We also invited Jay to come along.

Here are some of our favorite pictures from the day.  Our camera batteries ran out of juice before we were done, and Jay's camera has some other pictures on there that we hope to get our hands on one day.

Keith kicked it off with the wakeboard.

Jennifer hadn't done water sports in more than 10 years, but she picked up kneeboarding again pretty quickly.

Jay liked the kneeboard, too.

Keith worked on his wakeboard jumps throughout the day.

Jay decided to ski.

Daniel got bounced around on the tube, but he was willing to let go of the handle a few times.

Jay had never been on a wakeboard until this weekend.  He liked it a lot!

Keith couldn't pass up the kneeboard.

Jennifer managed to get up on her first skiing attempt.

This is the one crash we got on camera during the day.  We never tried to capture a crash on film, but somebody gave us one anyway.

David vowed to ride the wakeboard, even if he blew out a knee!

Jennifer had her first ride on a jetski.

Keith turned his first 360 on the kneeboard.

Jennifer and Jay were captured during a brief still moment on the boat.

Jennifer got her first tube ride and dared to let go before it was over.