South Dakota Summer Vacation

Day 1:  Chicago to Mitchell, SD, home of the Corn Palace!   I remember both Mitchell and the Corn Palace being bigger when I did this trip as a 12 year old!  We got to town late afternoon, checked into our hotel and then drove the main drag and explored the building.  There were some neat things to read inside but we weren't interested in being indoors long.   Mask compliance inside and out was incredibly low and there were no patios to eat, so we ordered Pizza Hut and ate in our room after a nerve-wracking trip to the grocery store for drinks (again, no masks except the checkers, one of whom was wearing hers just hanging off her ear instead of over her face...we did the self-checkout).

Day 2:  Mitchell to Rapid City, SD, via scenic road through the Badlands and a stop at Wall Drug.    The Badlands were beautiful!  I don't remember seeing any of this as a kid.  We got out for a few hours to hike around Door, Window and Notch Trails.  The Notch Trail hike involves a big ladder in/out.  We took it in but the crowd to get back down was too long, so we took the shortcut down.   It was a good test of the treads on our hiking boots!  On our drive we saw a Big Horn, pronghorns and prairie dogs.  We didn't linger long at Wall Drug due to crowds.  I wanted an ice cream but the ice cream shop wasn't open and we only had option of chocolate or vanilla at the restaurant.  William got a piece of cherry pie ala mode and really enjoyed it!

Day 3:  Mount Rushmore, Iron Mountain Road, Custer Wildlife Loop, downtown Custer.    Mount Rushmore was much more developed than when I was a kid.  The presidential trail gets you right up under the monument for cool views.  We listened to a ranger presentation and I learned a lot more about the selection of the site than I remember from childhood when I was very focused on the building of it.    The entire park was quite crowded and less than 50% of the people were wearing masks, so we didn't explore quite a thoroughly as we may have in other circumstances.   I was expecting to be more relaxed outdoors versus someplace like Wall Drug, but due to Sturgis coming up the next week - and it being summer - there were shoulder-to-shoulder crowds in some spots, so we tried to avoid the touristy stops that we could like the restaurants and souvenir shops.   The scenic drives were stellar.  Only one buffalo in it all but the natural formations were gorgeous.

Day 4:  Custer State Park, Sunday Gulch Trail hike, Needles Highway.  After breakfast at the lovely cafe at our hotel, The Bavarian Inn, we head out for nature!  I had a particular hike planned in advance for our long hike but as we read the tour magazine we got at the ranger station, we did an audible and picked one that was shorter but involved "rock scrambling" and waterfalls!  It was so beautiful!  It also made my heart race a million miles a minute as we had to scramble almost entirely vertically up wet boulders at the end of our 3 hours of hiking.  There were some hand rails but it still took all the energy I had left to make it up and control my nerves!

Day 5:  Custer to Rapid City via Scenic Byway.  A few miles down the road from our hotel was Crazy Horse, which we just drove by and admired from the road,  We finish the Norbeck Scenic Loop by going that way, though, and with the sighting of one more deer closed out our wildlife viewing.   Our awesome find for the afternoon was the South Dakota Air and Space Museum.  Only the outdoors was open but we spent over an hour reading all of the plaques for the planes they had displayed outside.  We had hoped to visit a Minuteman Missile Silo according to our original itinerary that had us driving from Custer across the state of South Dakota to Sioux Falls on day 5.  But we had discovered a screw in our tire on day 3 so we had to wait for new tires to be shipped to Rapid City in order to drive the 900 miles home.  My car has run flat tires so they can't be patched and the car doesn't carry a spare.  The tires had to be shipped from Colorado and took two days to arrive.  On our extra night in Rapid City we ordered Chinese Food and ate in our room and slept in the next morning while waiting for checkout/picking up our car.

Day 6:  The car was done about noon, since the tires weren't delivered until late morning.  Crazy enough when they got it up on the lift and pulled out the screw, the tire was not punctured.  So we loaded up the two new tires in the trunk, crammed in our luggage all around it and hauled it home.....an exhausting 13+ hour drive.   There was obviously no way to know this until the screw was pulled out.  And we weren't willing to attempt that when we still had to drive for two more days on windy mountain roads.   Luckily everything fit into the car and now we've got two new tires when we need them someday!

First Reconciliation and VBS

We finally got to reschedule First Reconciliation from March!   The original plan was a family prayer service and family reconciliation.   With social distancing, they still held it in the sanctuary versus in the typical reconciliation room, but we did it one at a time.  William was a little nervous but he said he really enjoyed talking to Father.  He didn't share with me what he shared or his penance, but he was happy about the occasion. 

This year's Vacation Bible School was also updated in order for it to be held outdoors in stations where families (versus just the kids) rotated through.   I thought this was great, because we could pick an evening time, and because the events were geared to all ages versus the usual K-5. 

Little League

When Illinois moved to Phase 4, Little League games resumed. With a condensed schedule they have either 3 games/week or 2 games plus a practice.   Boy, you could tell those kids had been inside for 3 1/2 months!  They had cobwebs to knock off and very little physical stamina.   But William had a great catch as 2nd baseman to end the 1st inning of their first game and score a run after good base running even though he was walked every at bat.  As the season has progressed, the boys are becoming much more skilled and natural.   William has been playing mostly 2nd base and left field.  He had a great game this week where he was 3-for-3 with strong hits and also allowed 3 runners to score!   Our next door neighbors also came to cheer him on at one of his games last week.  He enjoyed having them there!

John is an assistant coach and during games is usually the 1st base coach.  But he did get to be the co-head coach at one game since the head coach was out of town.  Usually our neighborhood has nearly two teams of our own, but with so many families choosing to sit out this summer due to the unknowns, we only make up 1/2 a team.  But the other parents/kids we were paired up with this year share the same camaraderie and good spirit of our neighborhood teams, so it's been nice to get to know them as well.   And we knew one family already - William's best friend from daycare.  So that was a nice surprise. 

Due to COVID precautions, the teams don't shake hands after games - they line up and tip hats to one another.  And each kid has his own equipment including batting helmet and bat.  They also fist bump or elbow bump instead of high five.  But no one wears masks, and I worry about the kids being kids in the dugout.   Parents make some attempt to social distance as spectators - moving our lawn chairs around to stay far enough away from one another.   I usually have to move my chair a few times before a game in order to create space if people get too close for my comfort.   

Windows

Over winter, John and discussed what we wanted to invest in as our next "big project" around the house between patio, windows or carpet/trim upstairs. We decided on the patio and started making calls for that in February.  Well...thanks to COVID causing me to work from home since March and suddenly look at everything with a more critical eye AND causing the cancellation of our 2-week World War II history tour in Europe, I decided we should do the windows, too!

I was able to get referrals from several neighbors and quickly got initial quotes for fiberglass casement windows from three companies who just surveyed the house from the outside and asked me a few questions over the phone.   Once we picked the final one,  they did do an inside measure before finalizing the quote and order. 

The windows took about 2 1/2 days to install and then a fourth day when they sent a painter out to touch up some of the trim.   Due to them needing to be in/out/around the first and second floors, I moved my home office from the dining room to the basement for about a week, and every person on my Zoom calls mentioned it!  It's so funny how we get used to our colleagues' backgrounds and notice a difference!

The new windows look great - swapping out white for tan on the outside and white for brown on the inside.   They also block out a lot more noise which is great since birds were waking me at 4 a.m. with their songs.   I'm excited about the fiberglass instead of wood windows since they won't warp or require painting.  And I'm excited that the interior wood trim is now white.  So, as we continue to be home ALL.THE.TIME getting the rest of the upstairs trim (baseboards and doors) redone is moving up from a 2021 project to a 2020 project!

The after picture isn't a true after, because now we are going to paint the garage door trim and porch posts white, and we have already removed the porch railings to get a more clean, modern look.   As for Europe, we hope to reschedule that trip for summer 2021.   I was able to get cash refunds for hotels and flights, but I'm still battling to get our tour fee back as the company went bankrupt.   It appears to be fraud related versus COVID related, but thanks to COVID the travel insurance company took 11 weeks to respond to my claim.  Their response was "you bought your tour with a credit card so get your money from them."   I have a temporary credit from my credit card and expect that it will become permanent next month.   

Outdoorsy Stuff

In Phase 3, our neighborhood pool was able to open to members over age 15 for lap swim.  To respect the 10 people rule, it was 6 lanes with one swimmer each and 4 lifeguards/pool personnel.  Each half hour a different 6 swimmers rotated in but were required to start on the opposite side of the pool from the prior 6 swimmers so that we didn't share common space while packing up.   Masks were required walking in/out, and you had to sign up in advance via SignUp Genius for a specific time slot.  I was able to go 3 times before our trip to the Ozarks.   And then when we got back we were in Phase 4 and family swim began.  Although the lap lanes are still up during family swim, you can't really swim laps with the same zen as when you're in a designated lap swim time. 

But family swim has been fun.  Now it's limited to 50 swimmers, so 11 families are allowed to sign up per 2 hour slot.   After 1 hour, 45 minutes the families leave and the pool staff cleans before allowing in the next group of 11 families at the top of the hour.    For any sessions where less than 50 people are signed up (the math assumes an average family size of 4.5 people, but we are a family of 3), you can just "walk in" by signing in at the gate.    There are no deck chairs, concessions or lounging areas, so families are actually playing together!   Most summers moms sit in deck chairs talking and drinking with mom friends while the kids play together or stand in line to buy candy!  This year it's really families playing as family units.   Lots of people playing with balls or having diving board contests.  One night no one was going off the boards so we had one side and our neighbors had the other and the kids could practice diving off the side of the pool into the diving well.   You wouldn't get to do that very often in a normal summer!

We also got outside for a long bike ride one weekend.   We took the trail through our neighborhood forest preserve over to the next town and then navigated on the city streets (the mostly not high traffic ones!) to get to a DQ for an afternoon treat!  Then we retraced our steps home!

Another day this summer, the guys took out our new-to-us inflatable kayaks that were part of William's birthday present.  I had work to do and couldn't join them, but we also only have two kayaks, so not sure our long term plan!   They had a great time but William severely under applied his sunscreen for being on the water and got a bad burn on his ears, face and tops of his legs.   Time and lotion helped with the healing.  And he's been much more diligent with his sunscreen this summer for tennis and pool time. 

     

Lake of the Ozarks

We had been planning a Princess Party to Disney with our good friends, but decided to cancel after Florida became a hot spot and with Disney having various cancellations and changes that wouldn't be fun for a "one and done" sort of trip.  As an alternative we rented a house at Lake of the Ozarks.   The number one requirement was that it have its own swimming pool.    There aren't many of those but we found a neat VRBO on the lake with a pool and boat dock.   We brought the food we wanted for the week and cooked - or got delivery - so that we didn't have to interact much with the partying and mask-free Ozarks that made national headlines over Memorial Day weekend!   It was a warm, sunny and fun week!  I was thrilled to just hang out in the pool for hours and finish reading two books.   A truly relaxing getaway!

 

Anniversary Dinner

Only a week after all of our social distancing birthday party efforts, William went to his best buddy's in person birthday party.   John and I had trouble deciding what to do - and the friend's parents did, too - but ultimately they decided to host a backyard bounce house party for a few buddies and relatives, and we decided to let him go.

Since we found ourselves with a free Friday evening and patio dining opened on June 1st, we decided to venture out to a sushi restaurant in our downtown to celebrate our 19th wedding anniversary.  Our downtown area is very popular for our city of 155,000 people and for neighboring towns, so it's always swarming with people and parking is a pain.    We had no trouble finding a parking spot, but the sidewalks were relatively normal.   John pointed out that was because anyone who was downtown right now was outside.   Normally there are thousands more inside of the restaurants and shops. 

After we put our name in for our table, we stood along the upper tier of the Riverwalk and noticed at there were three or four high school or college age boys who were swimming/showing off/goofing off in the river.   While the river is very popular for kayaks and canoes and paddle boats it is absolutely not for swimming!  I was shocked the police didn't happen by considering they were patrolling in greater numbers after the recent vandalism following more peaceful protests.   But, alas, no one but cold water and boredom eventually got the swimmers out!

We wore masks walking through the downtown streets and into/out of the restaurant lobby (such as when I had to go inside for the bathroom) but no masks on the patio seated at our table.   Instead of a menu there was a QR code to scan to bring it up on your phone.   Waiters were wearing plastic gloves (which I don't think are better than washed hands) but then the waiter touched my phone to show me a drink I might like.  So, clearly a work in progress.    Our food was amazing!  My favorite was actually a vegetarian roll called Green Goddess that had creamy avocado.  After dinner we walked through downtown some more to see all of the Black Lives Matters and other signs that popped up after the protests of the prior week.    Some were hanging on windows and railings and some were plastered over the plywood that covered shop windows. 

A Trip to the City

I had to make my first trip into my office on June 2.   It had been planned for awhile to coincide with when our mail room and tax processing team would have a large batch of tax returns that needed by signature and mailed out.   But it happened to fall right after a weekend of protests following the death of George Floyd, so the Loop was barricaded.   Usually to get to my office is about a 3-5 minute drive from the expressway.   This day all of the drawbridges into the Loop were raised (and heavy trucks also blocked them) to control traffic flow so I had to drive past my usual bridge and just keep going into the detoured traffic flow.   The one that was down where traffic was directed had a security checkpoint.  I had to show my driver's license and say that I was headed to my office and its location.    The reason for the precautions was that many of the looters from the prior days were coming in from out of town.    It took me an extra 30 minutes to get to my building.  And then I'd already been warned our parking garage was locked so I had to park on the street outside the building.  However, streets were totally deserted of people, so I wasn't worried about having my car out all day.    It was an eerie combination police presence to get into the city combined with empty streets and an empty office building once I arrived. 

 

 

 

The building had been outfitting with mask wearing signs on the doors and social distancing markers in the elevators, but I didn't see anyone except the 3 people working on my mailing.  I thought I'd feel very nostalgic about being back in the office but I did not.  It was so weird to see where everyone had been working one day and then were not.   Water bottles on desks; sweaters on the backs of chairs; dressy shoes under desks.   Just like time stopped and the people left.  Though apparently the cleaning crew is in regularly because the plants had been watered and were alive.  I did what I was there to do and left.