Roose 3rd Annual Family Camping Trip

This year for the Roose Camping Trip we went to Rock Creek State Park in Kellogg, IA. This is our 3rd year of meeting at an Iowa State Park to spend time as an extended family camping, relaxing, playing yard games, canoeing, hiking, and eating great food. Jameson's parents, his brother Jordan and his family, brother Austin, and sister Jenessa were all able to be there the whole time (except when his dad went home to fed the cattle and check the water level on the flooding of his river bottom fields from the S. Skunk).

The weather was hot on Thursday when we arrived and a little rainy on Friday but otherwise beautiful. We were thankful not to have any bad storms like we'd had the last two years.

Here is our camp.


Everyone gathered around the fire.

Here we are eating one of many tasty meals. As we've done each year, each family cooks one meal a day. Jen provided us with 'coffee time' snacks and tasty peach cobbler.This year we contributed BLT's for lunch on Friday, BBQ chicken sandwiches for supper on Saturday, and Mountain Man Breakfast for breakfast on Sunday.

Washing Dishes

Playing some Ladder Golf


Alice spending time w/ daddy

Alice sitting on her lawn chair like a 'big girl'.

Waiting for the rain to stop so we can have lunch.

Thankfully the rain stopped and we were able to have lunch. However it started again after lunch so we decided a good 'rain plan' was to gp to Bass Pro in Altoona. Her is Alice in the cart. I still usually keep her in her car seat carrier when we go shopping so whenever she gets to ride in the cart like a 'big girl' she thinks it's great!

The boys (and men) had fun playing on the four wheelers.

Hike

This was the first time we used our hiking carrier with Alice and she loved being up high!

Alice loves swinging and laughs like crazy- it's absolutely adorable!


Bath time for the little girls!

Still trying to wake up.

Alice spending some time w/ Aunt Joy.

Canoeing!



Alice had more fun playing with the canoe when it was out of the water. First she had to walk down the outside and check it out.

Then she pulled the life jackets out of the canoe and put them back in.

Finally she decided it was time to explore the inside o the canoe, so she bent over and crawled on in.

Her cousins came and tipped the boat from side to side, keeping her entertained for quite awhile!

The beach was a disappointment as the water was very muddy and gross. We didn't want to risk Alice drinking any water or eating any sand so she stayed on the grass. Her cousins sure had fun though!

Jameson cooking some tasty supper in his new dutch oven.


This year we decided to have our own family worship service instead of finding a nearby church to go to (after a bad service last year). We sang songs together and listed to a great John Piper sermon on the computer. It is such a blessing to be growing in our walks with Christ as a family.

Packing up.

Timothy played with Alice while we packed up. It is so much fun to see him play with and take care of her. She is blessed to have such great older cousins!

Alice travels great! She sleeps most of the time but when she is awake she 'reads' books- so cute!


It was a great weekend!

July '10

July has been a VERY busy month with A LOT of family time!

Jordan, Joy, Timothy, Arie, and Lydia came to visit for the 4th of July weekend (Saturday morning through Monday afternoon). It was so nice to be able to have them up for several days. Saturday morning we went to the 4th of July parade in Shell Rock. Having never been to this parade, we weren't sure what to except but we were all impressed with how good the parade was. There were a lot of fire trucks from nearby towns, unique floats from local businesses, and A LOT of candy!

Here's everyone watching the parade.

Alice watching on her own lawn chair next to me. Surprisingly she sat there quite well through the whole parade and seemed to enjoy it.

Timothy is getting so big; he'll be starting Kindergarten this fall!

Arie is growing too and is as cute as ever!

I didn't get a good picture of Lydia. She is ALWAYS on the move and had a lot of new things to explore at our house. Her and Alice are going to make quite the team of explorers someday (not to long from now given that Alice has become quite the explorer herself this month).

I got this table for Alice when she started pulling herself up. She was wanting to pull herself up on the coffee table which I decided wasn't very safe until she was more accomplished at this new skill. The table was her favorite toys for weeks and she pulled herself up next to it and played with it A LOT!



The following Thursday and Friday my brother came up to visit because he had a break from his classes (he's going to seminary at Covenant Theological Seminary in St. Louis).


The second weekend Jameson's parents came to visit (Friday night through Sunday afternoon).
Here is Alice enjoying some time with Grandpa Roose.


After Jameson's parents left we packed up and headed to my parents for the week. Jameson had to take a class on campus for his MBA (which he is getting through St. Ambrose) so he had to be in Davenport for the week so it worked out great to stay with my parents for the week. It was nice to have time to spend more one on one time with many of my relatives.
Here are a few pictures of Alice having fun at Grandma and Grandpa T's.




Alice spending some time with Great Grandma Granger.

During our week in Davenport, my mom and I took Alice to the pool for the first time. She wasn't sure what to think of it and seemed overwhelmed by all the people and new things to look at and new noises to try to figure out. In the end she seemed o.k. with the water but didn't enjoy it as much as I had hoped.


The last week in July, Jameson rode RAGBRAI with my dad. Saturday morning my parents came to our house and then that afternoon we all drove together to Sioux City and dropped off Jameson and my dad.

Family picture as we drop Jameson off.

Jameson and Dad dipping their tires in the Missouri river.

The girls!

After having a tasty supper with the guys at a church in Sioux City Saturday night, the girls headed to a hotel in Storm Lake for the night. The following morning we took Alice swimming at the hotel. The water was a pleasant temperature and she loved it! (Unfortunately I don't have any pictures b/c the guys had both cameras). I actually got tired of the pool and ready to leave before she showed any signs of wanting to leave. After checking out we headed toward the lake and watched for the guys to ride in.
Here is their camp in Storm Lake.

We had supper with the guys before heading for Cedar Falls. Here's Alice and grandpa.

Beekman's Homemade Ice Cream



Potter's Hill


Dipping tires in the Missouri river.

Celebrating a successful completion of RAGBRAI.

All in all it was a good week. Monday my mom and I spent the day at home and did some shopping in the afternoon. I'm not much of a shopper by myself (except for garage sales) so I enjoyed shopping with my mom. Jameson enjoyed putting in a hard weeks work and riding amongst corn fields for a week.