Our trip home to see the fam...

Traveling with a child seems to always be some sort of adventure. Caleb is a great traveler for which we are very thankful. I still cannot quite imagine taking multiple children on an airplane, but maybe someday we will cross that road. Thankfully Caleb is fascinated by airplanes, trucks and anything with wheels which are all over airports. We left for Chicago on Thursday and spent a few days with Andrea's parents (Nana Nancy and Papa Sam) and Caleb finally got to meet his Great-Grandmother (the only great-grandparent still living) on Andrea's side of the family. We had a great time in Chicago with Andrea's family and were there to also do a little trick-or-treating on Halloween. The weather was in the 60's and 70's which is unheard of for this time of year.

We had rented a car and drove about 4 1/2 hours to East Lansing, MI to visit Andrea's brother, Joe, and his family. We spent about 3 days with his family. This was the first time Caleb had met this part of the family as well. Caleb loved playing (and being entertained by) his cousins: Aliana (8), Micah (6) and Annalia (3). We went to several cool parks, fished on Uncle Joe's boat, toured Michigan State campus and much more. It was a blast! As you can imagine with four kids running around there was never a dull moment. Caleb is completely bored with us and wants to go back to play some more with his cousins. The trip home was pretty smooth after a 4 1/2 hour drive back to Chicago and then a 2 1/2 flight back to Denver. Other than sitting in a car seat for a long time, Caleb did great. Check out the fun pictures from our trip!

Caleb had so much fun with Nana Nancy. Her festive earrings got him giggling. It was fun to see Caleb playing with the same toys I had played with when I was a kid.

Clearly we know who the adorable pumpkin is in this photograph. Are you kidding me? Caleb's 2nd Halloween. Last year we went to Winter Park, CO and this year Chicago. Who knows where we will end up next year on Halloween.

I am not sure who is having more fun in this picture? I would have to guess Papa Sam. Caleb loved spending time with his Chicago grandparents and hopes to get to see them again real soon.

We walked around Andrea's childhood neighborhood to introduce Celeb to some of the locals and do a little trick-or-treating. They all agreed that he was stinking cute. Who would have thought that it would have been 70 degrees in Chicago on Halloween? Poor little guy was probably cooking in the fleece getup.

Joe gave us a tour of Michigan State campus while Kelsey was kind enough to watch ALL the kids. As you can see the leaves were incredible and the campus was neat to walk around.

These are Caleb's cool cousins. The older one on the right is Aliana and Annalia is the one with the hip sunnies on. Two very fun girls I might say. Both are incredible trampoline jumpers! :-)

This was a large mouth bass that Micah caught. The boys (minus Caleb) went out fishing on Joe's boat on East Lansing Lake for a few hours while the rest of the clan played at the park. It was a fabulous day to be out on the lake with a spectacular sunset featured in the last picture.

This picture kind of wraps up our time with family. Beautiful! We had a great time with everyone and were really thankful for all of the super accommodations. Hopefully we can go back again this spring and meet one of the new additions to our family. Kelsey, Andrea's sister-n-law is due with the 4th child in March. I think we gave them a decent taste of what 4 might be like!