The Baker Blog: Lake Michigan Trip

We got in our family trip this year to Lake Michigan. On the way we stopped at my old stomping grounds, WMU in Kalamazoo, and walked around a bit. Showed the kids where my old dorm room was and a few other buildings on campus.

All the stuff in this picture is new to me on the main campus, the building in the background was an old one story square building for art... now it's HUGE! Not to mention the fountain that is now there in the middle of the walk way, it was pretty.

This is at the top of the hill on main campus where I passed many many many a time while I was there. I remember smelling hops being processed at a nearby plant on that hill as well. I miss how breezy it is over there.

We had dinner with a friend Karin, but she slipped away before I could get a picture of her. Karin was my boss while I worked at the Paper and Printing Department at WMU. She was kind enough to meet us at Cracker Barrel and meet the kids, that were less than well behaved after no naps.

We made it to the house and started to unpack around 6pm. This is where Eliza slept upstairs with the boys.

We took a quick walk from the house we were staying at to Paw Paw Lake. It was maybe a 2 min walk from the house to the steps down to the lake.

They had a nice little beach area for the kids to play at. Even had a bin with a few toys for the kids to use.

There was a long dock you could walk out on. Evan enjoyed that.

And I used it to rinse off the boys feet that were covered in sand.

Eliza didn't really like walking by the water that much.

The kids enjoying the beach but wondering where Daddy went to take pictures.

The is the house we rented.

Instead of a step they had a small ramp from the dining room to the living room. The kids used it as a mini slide. Eliza fell quite a few times on it (no injuries).

Breakfast!

Mike taking a picture of the boys while we were planning our day. Eliza is finishing her breakfast in the background.

We headed to St. Joseph in the morning. It was a bit chilly, low 70s, so we all wore our hoodies.

Eliza had pants on until she got too close to the water and a wave got her all wet. But she enjoyed driving the play structure.

Mike went for a walk to take pictures while the kids and I went to the beach. As he was heading to his destination point he got stopped by a train. At the same time Evan was just so excited to see a train go by, I couldn't drag him from watching.

After the train had departed we tried to head to the beach. Eliza would have nothing to do with it, she wanted to play on the play structure. She had to be carried to the lake to play.

The view from Mike's destination.

He took pictures of a bunch of war memorials that were at the top of the hill.

The is the view of the lighthouse from the top of the hill.

View of the beach where we were playing (way in the distance).

This lighthouse had a bunch of lighthouse pictures at the bottom of lighthouses all around Michigan.

Eliza finally enjoying playing in the sand.

Evan enjoying digging in the sand.

Alex spent the most time in the freezing water, but he loved it.

Eliza loved feeling the sand in her hands. I do question how much of the sand got ingested by her.

More play structure time for Eliza.

Which made her happy.

The boys also enjoyed it.

This slide would give the kids a bit of air time on the hump in the middle. They found that quite fun.

Mike and I enjoying the beach.

The boys weren't tall enough to push off to use these things that slide back and forth like a zip line, so I had to push them to either side.

Love these kids.

A picture mike took of me.

Getting Eliza de-sanded after the beach. Who doesn't love a baby butt!?

After we all got dressed we decided to take a walk to the lighthouse with the kids.

You can see the lighthouse right over Alex's shoulder.

We were on the wrong side of the marina to walk to the lightouse, but we did go out on the other pier to look at it.

The kids and I walked about half way out to the end of the pier but a guy said the waves were big enough that they were coming over the pier, so we decided to just let daddy go the rest of the way.

This was the end of the pier.

Looking over at the lighthouse. The waves were much more rough on that side.

The kids enjoying watching the waves waiting for daddy.

Every now and then a wave would come up and just about make it up to us.

Walking back toward land.

We survived. :)

Eliza and I taking our time walking back.

Getting fancy taking pictures

It kind of worked out.

This is of the kids while Mike was taking a picture of them

And Mike getting fancy

We went to a nice little place in St. Joseph for lunch. They had good food and provided the kids with hats to color and wear.

After lunch and naps we headed to South Haven to this play structure for the kids to play on.

You could look out and see Lake Michigan from it.

The kids really enjoyed playing.

And getting dirty. The had as much fun with the rocks as they did the structure.

Everybody swinging.

Alexs looking cute.

Eliza putting rocks on one of the slides.

After playing for a while we headed to dinner. We found this street I had never been on in South Haven right by the Harbor.

We had dinner on a boat in the harbor of South Haven.

This is the view from the boat.

We could hardly keep Alex in his seat.

After dinner we headed to the beach to celebrate Evan not having any accidents or peeing in his night time diaper for a week.

The view while eating our ice cream.

Mike loves ice cream too.

The boys were happy.

The boys have started wearing all the sunglasses they have on their heads at once. This is a demonstration of that event.

Book time in the bed nook back at the house.

Eliza asking if she really has to go to bed.

We decided to say goodbye to Lake Michigan before we headed home the next morning.

Smiles from the boys.

I took a walk down the beach looking for rocks. The rest of the family stayed up in the small cliff.

My beautiful family.

Eliza giving daddy a funny look.

Evan looking handsome.

So from Lake Michigan we decided to just drive main roads back so we could see more of what there is in Michigan. So about a hour into our drive we decided to find a playground so the kids could get out and run around. We found a school in a small town and took advantage. I already got enough sun the day before so I decided to use an umbrella to keep the sun off me.

The only had huge slides at this playground.

And we had to test out the swings.

Eliza did pretty good at keeping upright on hers.

Eliza did NOT want to get back in the car after playing.

We stopped in Allegan, MI for lunch. It looks like they have had a lot of history in that town.

There happened to be a small farmers market that day. So we took a stroll and looked at what there was.

There was a guy selling caterpillars that was super friendly.

We ate lunch here at Minnie Sophrona's.

Alex is happy to eat.

It was a cute little place that reminded me of the bakery in Dexter.

When Eliza drinks water....

When she's done she goes "Ahhhhhh!" Not sure where she picked that up from.

Evan with Daddy's sunglasses

Alex with Daddy's sunglasses.

I thought it was interesting in the bathroom they had a bar door handle to get yourself up if you need it.

The doors in this place were original to the building and were huge. This door was at least 10' tall.

And the hardware was beautiful!

It was a pretty building.

Turns out the building was built in 1903 and was used as the post office.

A neat bridge we drove over that was one lane.

So we must have driven over a nail while in Allegan because we ended up with a flat tire. Thankfully we had the tire pump in the car with us, and as we were pumping it up to find a tire place, there happened to be one 1/4 mile down the road we were traveling. Also, thankfully they weren't too busy and they were still open. So we got in and out in about an hour.