What I Did on My Summer Vacation

What a busy summer this has been!!! I'm so thankful I have the time and energy to follow my interests, and check-off bucket-list items.

One adventure was going to the Headlands International Dark Sky Park in northern Michigan. I had hoped to see a star-filled dark sky but the clouds moved in, so that didn't work. I DID enjoy the experience because it's such a peaceful place where everyone speaks quietly. I was there for about 5 hours and enjoyed every minute except when gnats would occasionally pester me. I will return to this special place. Go check it out!

Next on my list was a visit to North Carolina to spend a night at girl scout camp with my 9-year old granddaughter, who had already been to this camp twice! The weekend sure brought back memories of my scouting/camping times. Even the food was good! I put a lot of miles on these old legs, up and down hills through the woods. We participated in swimming, archery, campfire with songs and s'mores. Who can beat that? The hot temperature didn't bring out bugs, thank goodness. There was one exception - the locusts!! Oh my that was NOT a sleep-inducing sound!

A couple of weeks later, Emmalee came to Michigan for a couple of weeks so we added more adventures - ice cream social for the neighborhood kids so everyone could get reacquainted, then the kids disappeared. Emmalee was so disappointed. There are at least 15 children in our neighborhood, and they all seemed to go on vacation the first week Emmalee was here! So, she and I visited the Detroit Zoo, SeaLife Aquarium and LegoLand, plus we made numerous trips to Stoney Creek MetroPark - what a treasure that park is!

Besides being brave and going down the 50 ft. slide at Stoney Creek TWICE, Emmalee absolutely loved going to their beach-side playscape, which is one of the nicest ones I've ever seen. All the kids "played nice" with each other, even though they were all strangers.

Perhaps the highlight of our time together was staying up very late and going to the Stoney Creek Nature Center for their campfire evening during the Perseid Meteor Showers. We created sky wheels which showed us what stars were in the sky on a time and month, roasted marshmallows then went to an open area to lay down and watch the sky! The guide also told us about a really cool app, which I downloaded - Sky View Lite. Check it out especially if you have children. (I have no affiliation with the app creator.) We saw a couple of meteors, planets, and heard stories about the constellations. When Emmalee spotted a meteor, she felt very emotional about it because she said it was so wonderful. I knew exactly what she meant!

Emmalee returned to North Carolina and I added another item to my summer list by visiting The Ark Encounter in Willisamstown, KY.  When I got off the shuttle bus, I had to sit and stare in awe at this amazingly huge structure. I thought about how people laughed at Noah and how strong Noah's faith was. I enjoyed the whole experience at a leisurely pace.

If you've read this far, thank you, friend. It's been a good summer!
Blessings.....
  Candice