Fond du Lac, WI

Our stay in Fond du Lac has been a wonderful “vacation” to wind down our sabbatical even though it was cut three days short. No regrets!!!  Breezy Hills Campground is great with nice, well-kept, wide sites and every amenity you can think of.  To top it off, the weather has been pretty close to perfect with highs in the mid 70s and low humidity.  Even the one wet and rainy day turned out OK as I will explain later.  

We arrived on Monday evening in time to get camp set up and even have a quick dip in the pool before dinner.  The pool is pretty small for how big the park is but they also have a swimming pond that we would try out the next day.

Tuesday we just hung around the camp.  I was feeling a little under the weather so spent the day taking it easy and drinking herbal tea.  About 4pm Will wanted to check to see if the hardware store had whiffle balls (they didn’t) but everyone must have been tired of being in camp because everyone came to the hardware store!  On our way home we stopped at the “Kelley Creamery-the creamery in the Middle of Nowhere”, though it is just a ¼ mile from our campground. The creamery is very popular, we never saw a time when it wasn’t busy. We grabbed some quarts to eat after dinner.  We found out later when we went back to get more that they change their flavors every day.  One thing about the great weather is that we cooked for ourselves every night on the griddle!  That night it was salmon, hash browns and grilled carrots.  

Wednesday was a very rainy day.  We had tickets to see the two two teams in the NL Central, the Brewers & the Cubs in Milwaukee for an afternoon game.  We headed out hoping the rain would let up.  When we got there it turned out their stadium has a retractable roof just like Seattle.  We were very glad for it.  We were absolutely stopped in traffic right up until game time so we missed the lead off home run by the Cubs and the answering home run in the bottom of the 1st by the Brewers. As we were driving up a guy in the car in front of us was waving a broom because the Brewers had won the first two games of the series but a little later we saw the broom on the ground and it looked run over.  It was a bad omen for the Brewers and they lost the game.  It is such a rivalry and Chicago is so close that the stadium seemed to be ½ and ½ of each team’s fans.  We were home in time to griddle up some pizza.  The dough was a bit sticky so I didn’t get the crusts as thin as I would have liked but everyone liked it anyway.

Thursday the weather was much nicer and the kids swam and played while I worked most of the day.  Not much to write about.  The griddle dinner of the night was shrimp stir-fry.

Friday we decided to trek to Osh Kosh and visit the EAA Museum and site of the EAA convention David skipped to stay in Nauvoo.  It was a fun museum full of airplanes and stories.  We had a good afternoon there.  The kids headed straight out to the pond when we returned and made a long dock with 4 rubber docky, having fun playing until time for dinner.  We tried smash burgers and they really turned out great!

Saturday we visited the Fond du Lac Farmer’s Market.  It was great and we came home with lots of produce.  On the way home we stopped at Kelley’s because they were having a special event in their big sunflower field.  They are raising money to support veterans, so both beautiful and a good cause.  We got some great pictures, and more ice cream.  We hung out at the trailer for a while and then headed to Green Bay for Packer Family night.  It was just as expected, tons of Packer fans, a visit to Lambeau, and a great fireworks show to finish.  We did not look appropriately dressed as we entered, except for David who was wearing his fan gear.  So, our first stop was the Packer Pro Shop where we managed to get properly attired.  As far as watching the Packers practice, it was a little predictable but they found ways to keep it a bit interesting.  I personally thought it was lots of fun. But, getting out of our parking lot was terrible and it was midnight by the time we got back to camp.  

It was tough getting up but we were only one minute late for church which was an improvement.  The Fond du Lac Ward had a great testimony meeting and a very excellent Sunday School Teacher.  We spent a quiet Sunday afternoon though our non-faster wanted to make a cake, not my first choice for a Fast Sunday activity!  We had a repeat of the griddle pork medallions and hash browns, this time with delicious farmer’s market corn with cake and ice cream for dessert.

The kids’ last stop will be tomorrow as will travel to Minneapolis.  As President Uchtdorf once said, we are not made for endings even when we know there is a bright future.