Where did July go? I was so tired when we got back from our trip that I kept putting off this blog. Then we did more things that made me tired and here I am. A few days away from August and not one blog.
Of course Louis' favorite part of staying in a hotel is the pool. And my favorite part is how much it wears him out for nap and/or bedtime!
Outside the house are beautiful Japanese Gardens.
Then you go inside to the original part of the house where he lived. This guy was Joe's size (6'4") and Joe could only stand in a few parts of the house. It was also SO dark. There were windows that he covered with this blue glass so you can't see out.
Then there is the Infinity Room which extends an unsupported length of 218 feet and rises 156 feet above the valley floor. By the way, this guy built all of this without a college degree.
Here is a view from the road.
There weren't many other people around and we lucked out being alone for the Infinity Room. We were both a little scared to walk out to the middle. The whole room was swaying and it felt a little like the Cosmos in South Dakota. I was really dizzy walking out and took the tiniest baby steps to look down through the glass at the forest below. We didn't spend much time in this room.
This is one of the views from the property. My pictures don't do it justice. It was really beautiful.
The last part of the tour gets REALLY weird. I can't even begin to tell you how many things this guy collected. Here are a few pictures we took.
This part of the house had real trees in it and looked like a little town.
This sea creature is longer than the Statue of Liberty is tall.
This room has the largest carousel in the world featuring 269 handcrafted animals, 20,000 lights and 182 chandeliers. You can't ride it but it works so you can watch it.
Wisconsin is a beautiful state. I loved driving through and seeing all the cool barns and dairy farms.
Joe's sister and family arrived Monday night and we enjoyed some Wisconsin brews back at the house. Joe's mom didn't quite understand that we were taking a pic of our drinks and squatted down for the low shot! Cheers!
The place we stayed had activities each day so Tuesday morning Louis got up with his cousins to go finger paint. He had fun getting messy!
This day was pretty relaxed. We all went to a cheese factory to see it made and shop for cheese. This was my first time trying some cheese to test how Nola would do with dairy. I'll come back to this later.
Joe read an article right before the trip about how men don't fully mature until the age of 42. Here he is proving this point as he is dying laughing about the video narrator saying, "cut the cheese".
Say cheese!!!
After the cheese factory we were all going to meet at a little farm. You can imagine how happy I was with Joe when I saw the dash below. We had left before everyone else and were driving through the countryside. He was SOOO lucky we made it to the gas station. It was hot and we had two little kids in the car!
Wednesday we decided to try out one of the Dells many water parks. Joe's parent's scored us some free tickets so we had nothing to lose! I didn't get many pics but Louis had a BLAST and both kids were exhausted by the end!
Thursday was our last full day in Wisconsin. This was the day I had been looking forward to. The Olson's decided to do a family float trip. Joe's parents joined us for Devils Lake State Park. It was SO gorgeous! I could come back and camp for a week at this place. Bill & Janelle watched the kids so Joe and I could do a little hike up the bluff. I say "little" but I thought I was going to die on the hike up. I am VERY out of shape and didn't love going up 500 feet in a half mile.
We got back to find Louis with some new toys from Nana to help Papa catch minnows. They said Louis really inspected the fish and might have squeezed a few a little too hard.
I had to rest after the hike.
Our day ended a little early due to some storms but we found a winery on the way home. It was built by Europeans in the 1850's and used until the turn of the century. It lay dormant until 1972, when the grapes were replanted.
We picked up a few bottles to take home.
Our last night we went to a brewery/pizza place for dinner. This was the second time I had cheese and I was getting really confident that Nola was OK with it.
The next day we split up from Joe's family and made our way back home. We booked a B&B in Iowa to break up the trip. We stopped at a railway museum before leaving Wisconsin. The depot was built in 1894 and our ticket included a 55 minute round trip ride in a 1900-era train car pulled by a diesel locomotive. It was pretty cool and Louis really enjoyed it.
Cool old snow plow train.
We had a picnic at the museum and then made our way to North East Iowa where our B&B awaited. It was on a working diary farm and winery. The little farm girl inside me was jumping for joy when we arrived!
The first night we went for pizza in town (3rd time having dairy) and then took a stroll on the property. I might have also had a chocolate chip cookie or two or three. They were in our room and the kitchen.
You are welcome to help with farm chores if you want so we offered to get eggs from the hen house. Louis and I LOVED it. Did you know the eggs are still warm? I of course went into a fantasy in my head of living on our own hobby farm and having chickens.
They used to roam around but are being retrained to eat their feed. They liked the cat food too much.
We got about three dozen eggs and Louis only broke one.
That day we went to a nearby bison farm. It is owned by a sweet old man who was born and raised on the property. He has a little museum of sorts with Native American artifacts and you can purchase bison meat & jerky. He is really proud of it but really is the cutest little old man I've ever talked to. You can tell he really gets a kick out of taking people out to see the herd. He is really knowledgeable about it all too.
The herd.
They walked up in their pecking order. We tried to throw corn out to the less dominant but the big guys usually chased them off.
Momma and her baby. So cute!
It was cold and windy!!!
We left with some jerky and took one more walk on the farm since we had to leave after breakfast the next morning. We also did a tasting at the winery earlier that day but I didn't take pics. The wine was really good and we took a few bottles home. I should mention the winery and B&B are for sale. It would have been tempting for us if it was a little closer to home!
It was a really fun family trip and I can't wait to do another!! I love making memories like this with my little family of four. Seems so weird to say that!
