Quick Wisconsin Trip With The Boys

I feel like I leveled up on this whole Stay At Home Dad thing this week.

The boys and I took a quick trip to Wisconsin this week while SkyWaitress is in Texas for work.

We loaded up the car and headed a couple of hours north.

We visited some friends who have some space “in the middle of nowhere” as my kids exclaimed. Theodore was adorable when he realized what this meant as we found ourselves with nothing but famland and highways surrounding the SUV. “Why would anyone build a house in the middle of no where?!” I very kindly tried explaining that some people like space between them and thier nieghbors. My little suburban boy was confused, but shrug and skeptically said “Okay then.”

The kids had a blast playing outside with water balloons, on the trampoline, with a basketball hoop, and on the swingset.

Wesley tried really hard to shoot some nothing but net shots. I’m pretty sure he made a handful at least.

I realized too that this was the first time I spent an overnight with both boys on my own at a location other than home.

It was a good feeling. I felt both prepared and capable. That’s really saying something too. I’ve felt unprepared most of my parenting journey. This was a welcome exception to that experience.

We’ve been to Las Vegas, Los Angeles, Nashville, North Dakota, Florida, Niagra Falls, and so on as a family unit. This time it was just me and the boys. And everything went pretty darn well!

The workshop in my buddy’s barn was of particular interest to the boys. I don’t have an incredible work space like he does so they loved looking around at all the tools and contraptions in there.

Theodore LOVED riding around in the wagon. He’s been wanting one of his own for months so this was a real treats. He would ride it in and pull around the other kids in it too.

We don’t have a trampoline at home so Wesley spent hours on this one. The brightly colored balls found thier way inside the net eventually too. It was like the coolest soccor game ever to them.

Jeremy has an Ooni pizza oven and knows I’ve been talking about getting one. He was happy to show off his pizza making skills and shared a ton of cooking tips. I’m happy I added it to my Father’s Day shopping guide this year.

I mean, look at that. It tasted like we ordered out for pizza. I’m in love with the idea of a pizza oven of my own at the house. That would be so awesome.

Theodore obviously loved the pizza too. He was also especcially impressed with the reusable metal straws they had along side the reusable cups like we have at our place.

The weridos like rolling around the bed at night. Just happy they didn’t fall off of it. You can see the pillows below were strategically places just in case.

Yes, they basically cake cake with chocolate chips in it for breakfast. They were REALLY fluffy purple pancakes. Breakfast was obviously a hit.

The heat meant we broke out the water balloons. They were a splash. Ha! #dadjoke

Morning coffee from my point of view.

On the way home we stopped at Culvers, because Wisconsin, and ended up eating our ice cream outside. The resturant’s air conditioning was not working well so it actually felt cooler outside than inside. And it was 88º outside!

I tool this picture to illustraion how my kids have basically no personal space. We had a whole table to ourselves outside and in the shade. Where did they choose to sit? As close to me as humanly possible because I wouldn’t let them have ice cream in the heat while also sitting on my lap.

Anyways, this was an awesome trip and I’m happy we were able to take it. We’re already planning on doing this again sometime soon-ish.