Father's Day Weekend

We had a very impromptu weekend for Father's day. Sadly, Mike was with his crew up in Custer, SD.
But it turned out a high school friend of mine was also in Custer for a few days with her family, so we went up on Saturday and camped that night with them.

We were able to stop and see Mike for 10 minutes or so on Saturday, and then we got to see him for a couple of minutes on Sunday too. So that was nice.

The girls made some new friends, I loved catching up with an old friend, we all got too much sun, and we did some fun stuff too. :)

We stayed at the Custer KOA where my friends were staying and the girls got to play on this giant blow up bouncy blob. It was really hot and I don't know how they handled being on that super warm plastic!

 We spent close to 3 hours in the pool though, thus the too much sun....

3 of the 4 girls just hanging out

That evening we went to the Big Thunder Gold Mine in Keystone and took a tour of the mine. It was pretty neat to go that far into the hill side and all the kids were freezing by the time we made it only halfway in. Then got to find our own gold! It takes a little bit of technique, but we eventually got it down pat and found quite a few little pieces of gold. :)

Sidney, taking her "cheese" face very seriously.

Tried to get a family picture inside the mine...use flash next time!

Took another one....but I ended up adopting 3 of Mandy's 4 kids

for this photo. :)

The little girls on the tour found the local mine cat and gave him a

good rub down. :)

Panning for gold!

Finally got the technique down. :)

After finding some gold, we headed back to Custer for a VERY late supper. Then we went back to camp and had a fire with some strawberries and some s'mores. It was a very full and very fun day!!

Sidney passed out fast once we finally went to bed!

As did Kylie!

And me wondering the next morning.....why do we even bring pillows along?

The next morning we got a visit from the local family of bunnies that showed up this spring at the campground. There were 2 adults, 2 little black bunnies and 1 little white bunny. They were so cute!!

This one came to say Hi to Kylie.

Baby bunny!!

2 babies, 1 adult

It was so stinking cute!

2 babies

Playing with friends.

Kylie and Lily watching baby bunnies.

More baby bunny watching. :)

 After we said our good-byes to our friends, we stopped and saw Mike for a couple minutes. Then I took the girls over to Reptile Gardens so we could make use of our season passes. Oh My, was it crazy busy!
Yikes!
We took in another gator show and, no offense to the guy who did the first show we saw, but this one was awesome. The presenter was much more into it and seemed much more comfortable with the gators. It was an awesome show!

We also took in a bird show while we finished our lunch and got to see some neat birds. But also didn't get to see some neat birds because they were being stubborn and refused to come out. :)

The girls got to hand a donation to one of the birds

that Reptile Gardens then gives to a charity.

Queenie takes the money from your hand and

sticks it in the donation box for you.

Both girls thought it was fabulous. :)

Then we had to go see the tortoises again.

They were hot and tired and were just laying there,

looking hot and pathetic... :)

 And before we left, I had to promise the girls we could go play on the playground.

Sidney wouldn't stop posing for me when I wanted a photo.

We were hot and cranky by the time it was all said and done and I was so tired. The drive home seemed to take forever! I won't lie. We put in a movie right after we ate supper, so that the girls could sit with me and I could nap!! We all went to bed early!

We were bummed Mike couldn't be with us, but it was a good weekend anyways.