The rest of June 2025

June continued with soccer, baseball, ice skating, baseball, football, and volleyball camps. We did have a trip to Missouri on Father's Day weekend. Kyle needed to go down for his dad's house auction. We visited the Clinton pool, boy it was HOT there!

I'm not good making it to the parks and rep's open water swims in the evening but I managed to make it to 3 maybe, this was the first one: Girls stayed at the beach and played in the water while I did a couple laps back and forth to the other side. 

 

Isaac umped a couple more games. 

The three younger kids did a tennis camp which is in our neighborhood and they were able to ride their bikes there. As I mentioned in the other June post my work schedule had increased just for the summer so we had to do camps that were either at the school, tennis court, or in the afternoon so I could drive them there. Not a ton of camps this summer but they had fun. 

The weekend of June 21st I was signed up to take a motorcycle basics course that would grant me my motorcycle endorsement on my license (if I passed). I liked this idea better than having to study on my own and take the test at the DMV and this way I'd learn to ride a real motorcycle with a clutch... since the vespa is an automatic. The weekend arrived and only problem was we were in an extreme heat warning! And boy was it HOT! We had to be in full gear: long sleeve shirt and pants, ankle high shoes and gloves and helmet. Our instructor almost passed out the first day. I drank about a gallon of water and didn't need to pee once during the first 5 hour session! It was crazy. 

This photo is even hazed over from the temp change of me getting out of the car and walking over to our meeting spot. 

This was the bike I ended up riding for the weekend. 

They gave us lots of breaks. It was 2-7 on Saturday and Sunday. The second day the temp was much better. Still hot! But not like the first day. One of the guys had this cool car I had to take a pic to show Kyle. 

It was so cool how they had the parking lot "range" marked up for each skill exercise. I came back a couple weeks later to capture a drone photo of the markings. 

June 23rd Kyle and I got a little date night going to the twins game for his work. They had the Budweiser deck rented out, it was a fun experience. 

Family bike ride to Sebastian Joe's. Working on our summer bucket list. 

We had so much rain this summer! This was one night as I was taking Mary to her ice skating lesson, had to turn around and go another way. 

more baseball, and a volleyball camp for Mary..

Emma's summer soccer team:

It only took til June 28th to get the paddle boards out! It's been a busy summer but busy in a way it's going too fast with all the things and not necessarily getting to do the little things. Kyle and I gave our self a date while the kids hung out at home. 

 

 

We even had some sun showers on the paddle back. So much rain this summer! 

June 29th, yes more baseball. 

 

Camping at Lake Itasca (June 6-8, 2025)

It had been a while since we'd gone camping. We didn't technically camp locally last year because we did our big grand canyon trip and camped in the RV for over a week. So we dusted off our tent and set out up north to Itasca State Park. We collect the hiking club passwords and try to get a couple passwords each trip hitting another nearby park on the way if possible. 

We went up after the girls got out of school so it was a quick tent set up to try and get settled before dark. First night walking to the bathroom spotted a turtle with Thomas. 

The next day Saturday we had breakfast at camp then started off on the hiking club trail. 

had to get a picture of Mary with Mary Lake :-) 

After our first hike we drove over to where the fire tower entrance was. Itasca State Park is pretty big!

Link to the map here. 

The girls didn't want to join us so they stayed back at the van. We didn't end up climbing the tower because there was quite a line waiting to go up, there was a max allowance. Not worth the wait for us. 

 

Went back to the campsite for lunch then we drove up to where the Mississippi River Headwaters was. Short car ride but Oakley was already snoozing.

  

They had a nice visitor center. 

There was this first area (not the start) Thomas ended up falling in right away so became soaked.

   

A little farther down the stream still working our way to the start of the river. The Mississippi River is SO clean here!

Then we made it!

Kids had fun playing in the water for some time.

 

Then back to camp for night 2. 

Dinner over the campfire, kids playing high and seek or some kind of game I can't remember the name of it and tired pup. It ended up storming just at bedtime. We knew it was coming and cleaned up as much as camp as we could. Kyle and I were in our really old tent and the kids were in a bigger new tent we have. Our tent ended up leaking pretty bad from all the seams, Kyle was able to run to the van and put a tarp over our tent and that helped us stay dry. 

 

The next day we loaded up camp and before making our way home we wanted to hit another nearby state park. It was a little north but not far: La Salle Lake State Recreation Area. 

Oh I should say the ticks were SOO bad this weekend, it was crazy. We found another password and a nice view of the Mississippi River a little down stream from the headwaters, although north, I know confusing. 

Worn out kids and dog on the way home.