The Hillebrand Family: Some Recent Adventures

Its been a while since my last post and we have been busy. Near the end of June, Mandy Grace and I joined most of Mandy's family at McCormick Creek State Park hiking and sight seeing. We all met in Spencer, Indiana at the MacDonald's for lunch and then went to the park. Once in the park, our first stop was at McCormick Creek Falls. After the falls, we drove up to the Wolf Cave hiking trails. We hiked for about a mile and a half to the small cave which was pretty interesting. McCormick Creek State Park is know through out the state for its "water created" sights. Through out the park, there are falls, caves and sink holes.

On July 2, Mandy, Grace, our friend Melissa and her daughter Summer went to the Greencastle Public Pool and spent most of the day there having a good time. Grace especially had a good time swimming and playing with Summer who is the same age as Grace. Mandy and Grace both returned home with pretty good sunburns.

On July 4, Mandy and Grace went to southern Indiana to Holiday World for a family reunion. On the first day, they walked the park and the rode the typical amusement park rides. Grace, being especially ford of the carousel, rode it 4 times. On July 5, everyone walked the water park inside Holiday World. Mandy and Grace enjoyed the lazy river and the wave pool. They came home late that night tired and even more burned, but they had a good time.

As a side note, I remember seeing a picture at my grandparents house of my dad standing in front of a sign that read "Santa Clause Land...Santa Clause, Indiana", Holiday World is the same park.

On July 11, Mandy, Grace, Dylan and I went to the Owen County Fair In Spencer Indiana. We were join by Mandy's Aunt Teresa and Uncle Pete who live in Spencer. Once at the fair, the first place we headed to was the barn so that Grace and Dylan could see and pet a variety of farm animals. They got to see and pet goats, pigs, cows, horses, sheep rabbits, ducks, and roosters. After seeing the animals, went to the food booths for dinner. From there, we went to the midway to let the kids play some games. The very first game that Dylan and Grace wanted to play was a ring toss. It was one of those seemingly impossible to win games where the object is to toss a ring a large distance and for the ring to go over the neck of a plastic duck. The prize if you win is a caged bunny. Dylan, on his first throw almost won. Dylan and Grace did win prizes and two other games and were happy campers. After leaving the fair, we went back to Teresa and Pete's house to give Grace and Dylan a chance to wade in the swimming pool. It wasn't long after this that both kids were fast asleep.