Beach, Pizza, Mud and Time Together

We had a little get-away this weekend, partly for Caleb's 18th birthday and partly because our kitchen cabinets were being painted and we wanted to have everyone out of the way so the job could be completed.  After an early morning trip to the Dept. of Motor Vehicles for C to get his driver's license (yes, kids who live years in China do get to drive eventually!), we made our way around the bend to Michigan, to Silver Beach in St. Joseph.  The water was c-o-l-d, but the sun and sand were warm and we had a great afternoon playing on the beach.

We had dinner at a pizza place right by the beach with our dear Shanghai friend, Sheila, who lives in St. Joe when she's not in China.  :-)  She graciously invited all seven of us (another Shanghai friend, Matt, from our first year there, was with us this weekend) to spend the night in her home... what a treat to get a little visit with her!

Love this shot of our birthday boy, now an official adult!  He's liking his dinner.  :-)

 Fun in the cute downtown area of St. Joseph after dinner.

Sunday, after church and brunch with Sheila and her daughter Alexa, we went to the Warren Dunes State Park.  The dunes are SO high... hard to get perspective in a photo, but you can see how teeny tiny the people at the top are!  Madelyn and Gwen are standing at the bottom, contemplating the climb ahead of them.

 Starting the ascent strong... soon everyone slowed to a crawl!

 Finally made it!

The run back down is so exhilarating... almost makes you want to climb up again so you can run down again!

 After the climb, we walked down the beach to a creek where we knew we would find the special, sticky mud just right for coating your body... if you wish.  

 Everyone started with just a little at first...

 When we finally reached the place where the mud was plentiful, everyone got busy.

 Matt giving himself a mud scrub... don't people pay big money for this in the spa?

 Caleb in a turtleneck.

 Jungle girl!

 The crew is nicely coated.  I managed to stay mostly mud free... I had the camera!

After our walk out of the woods and over a few dunes, the guys were pretty dried out!  Their mud coating was tight and cracking and they were ready for a good wash in the cold Lake Michigan waters.

So fun!  We did this trip years ago with the Sauer family, before Gwen.  It was cool to be back again.  Fun to have this family weekend with Caleb- Saturday is move-in day at Valpo, so this was the last family weekend of the summer.  We ended our little trip with a visit to Shedd Aquarium in Chicago today.  I loved having the kids all together for these three days.  It will be a while before we have this kind of time together again.  Sigh... grateful.  :-)