Monday, July 18

We ate leftover omelets and the most delicious homemade cinnamon bread ever made by Bridget. Then we did our Bible study. Mom texted that they were almost to Superior. We worked on getting Tug all set up and moved our stuff from cabin to the camper. We ate at noon and then went for a quick spin on our kayaks. When we got back we waited about an hour until 3pm for Mom and Dad to show up. We got them unloaded and Scott did some mowing. Then Scott put the numbers on the boat bc Dad wanted to get it put in and go fishing. God’s grace got it put in pretty quickly and Scott and Dad drove it back AND the letters stayed on. :)

I went over to welcome Patty and say hello while Dad and Scott worked on getting the bug zapper hung up. Scott went and took his bath without me but he was nice and waited while I took mine.

It was a horrible night. We were attacked by mosquitos the whole night. The last time I looked at the clock it was 12:24pm. It was freezing so we couldn’t turn the fan on which catches the mosquitos. Around midnight I got hot so I turned the fan on but I wasn’t willing to come out from under the covers. We barely slept.

Sunday, July 17

I got up at four and laid on couch. I finally fell asleep again and slept for another hour or two. When I woke up it was raining again. It didn’t last long but got everything wet. We got up and made a yummy omelet breakfast. Then Hannah sent us the forecast which was 60% chance rain from 10am-4pm. We headed out so we could kayak and bathe before the rain started. It was fabulous to be on the water again. I kayaked to the edge of the island and back to Scott. It was starting to myst but never amounted to much. His neck was kind of sore. Then we took baths and I swam a little bit back and forth. After that we did our Bible study. We are working on unpacking and setting up Tug but we keep getting random storms. Then we went to the fort bc we had a major crises at work that I’m trying to orchestrate and I needed internet. Scott read while I worked. Then we went to Bobbies and found a couple postcards for Scott’s students. After that we went to Moose Creek for ice cream. While we were there we found some really cool postcards. By the time we got home we were cold and still really dragging so we fixed a can of soup and green beans for dinner and watched a really stupid movie. We were in bed by 9:30pm.

Friday, July 15 - Saturday, July 16

It was a long trip to Canada. We were supposed to leave Friday, July 8th but that didn’t work out. Then we were going to leave Friday am and drive straight through, that didn’t happen. The next plan was leave by noon, then by 1pm. We finally were on our way by 2pm. We weren’t sure where we would stop and were worried about hitting heavy traffic since we would hit highways around 3:30pm. We took 355 to 88. Traffic was heavy but didn’t come to a stop until the exit to 39N. We lost seven minutes there. I slept off and on for about 2 hours. In Loves Park we stopped for gas and lunch. I took over driving while Scott drove. The Wisconsin Dells traffic was pretty heavy but I never had to stop - Scott slept through most of it. We stopped for gas somewhere passed the Dells and Scott took over driving. I found a decently priced hotel, the St. Croix Inn in Solon Springs so we decided we would make it that far for the night. There was a Walmart in Rice Lake and we needed ice and a cooler so we stopped there and got a couple other things. They were out of ice so we ended up “stealing” ice from the hotel to keep the refrigerated stuff cool. The hotel was really cool except that every door we went out or came in there were people smoking. Our room was on second floor and had a balcony on the St. Croix Lake. It was dark so we couldn’t see much of it. In the morning when Scott was still sleeping I sat on the porch and read my book. The lake was all fogged over at first though so I couldn’t see much. We got on the road about 8:30am and went to Duluth Trading Company and then Gander Mountain. We stopped for breakfast/lunch at DQ just outside of Hermantown when I got bad news from work. I had to make some calls and then wait until International Falls to finish getting arrangements made. I drove while Scott slept but we switched drivers in Orr because I had fallen asleep twice. After my phone calls and topping off the tanks we headed to the border. There was only one other car in front of us. The guy asked about five questions and sent us through. We stopped at Safeway for eggs and bananas and headed to 502. We were listening to Ranger Apprentice and got distracted and decided we had missed Ojibway turn. We had been on 502 for sooooo long and we hadn’t seen the usual signs. It was like someone had taken all of the signs out. We were 20km from Dryden and sure that we had missed Ojibway when we finally saw a sign we hadn’t missed it!! A little further on 594 there was a bear running away from us. It wasn’t too far from Machin Dump so we were thinking he was heading there when we caught him. When we got to the cabin it was after 6pm and we were locked out. I had forgotten to bring the keys. Not even sure I would know where they are at this point anyway but I could have at least brought mom and dad’s set. Went to bed around 10:30 - slept in mom and dad’s room it was almost cold with the cross breeze but felt great. I saw lightening about five times and heard thunder and Scott never heard or saw a thing.

Tuesday, July 19

The plan was to go fishing so we came in at 7am to eat and do Bible study. There was a fluffy Great Blue Heron on our rock that we had to take pictures of. After that Scott and Dad went somewhere to by minnows and get gas for the mower. Mom and I packed lunch and our fishing stuff. We headed out to three towers and found out that our trolling mower was dead. We still had a really nice time. Scott caught a northern and Dad caught a walleye. When I was on the phone with Alan a northern hit my line, I yelled in his ear and threw the phone to Alan. Later Dad and Scott both caught a perch that we kept. When we got back Ron showed up and told us about grandson being in the hospital with a really bad bacteria infection. He had to be quarantined for three days. No one could see him. Dad cleaned the fish and everyone went to take naps. After I talked to Hannah about her new roommate news, I kayaked around the island. I didn’t see anything but it was beautiful. It was pretty choppy but fun. The side that is usually windy was the leeward side this time so I went the opposite that I usually do. The water is really high so there isn’t much of a beach. When I got back I weeded the beach a little more and then Nana was ready to wash windows. We washed windows while Scott and Dad worked in the yard.

After windows we fixed fish, beets, salad, and Red Lobster biscuits. It was a delicious dinner. After dinner Dad decided we were not going to go out fishing bc the battery had not charged enough. The mosquitos were horrible so we decided not to go out fishing. There were over 40 mosquitos on the kitchen screen window!! Scott and I put our mosquito abatement plan into action. He sprayed outside of the camper with mosquito fogger and plugged in the zapper. We started the crazy moose puzzle after dinner and worked on the dumb thing for about three hours. Everyone was staying up late because we were waiting to hear news from a family member. Dad and Scott finally gave up around 10pm. Mom and I finally went to bed around 10:30pm after we had heard back. I sprayed the camper windows again and it was warm so we could turn on our fan mosquito killer BUT the mosquitos stayed out!!! It was God’s grace gift! I got almost 8 hours sleep.

Wednesday, July 20

We fished today and didn’t catch anything but it was a beautiful time and we had fun together. I saw a loon with a baby.