Leaving Porter, Indiana!

 Hello!

We do apologize for our failure to keep up on the blog!  It has been a great 5 or 6 days since we last blogged though.  Since then We have seen the rest of Yellowstone, MT RUSHMORE which was amazing, and traveled across the rest of South Dakota, Minnesota, and Illinois.

Mt Rushmore was awesome.  We got to Hill City, SD around 5PM and set up camp at Crooked Creek Resort.  It was a very nice RV and Campground site.  After going to the grocery store and cooking up some really good sloppy joes... (I, Todd made them) we made a fire and had some smores.  Some neighboring campers told us about a lighting ceremony that started at 8 every night up at Rushmore.  We were about 15 minutes away and decided to hurry up there to try to catch it.  We got there at about 8:07 but still caught a majority of the 45 minute production.  It was really fun to hear about each of the four presidents up there (Washington, Jefferson, Roosevelt and Lincoln) and how they helped form this wonderful country.  Then they lighted up the huge monument as the whole crowd sand the star spangled banner together.  It kind of gave us chills!  We loved it.  Then they honored all the veterans who were in attendance and those who have died fighting for our country.  The next day we went up there again to see the whole thing.  We really enjoyed it.

The drive across South Dakota wasn't all that exciting, but after a 10+ hour drive we got to Minnesota around 1AM.  We stayed in Minnesota with some good friends for a couple days and were very thankful for that.  A nice bed to sleep in and good food with some great friends.  Shout out to the Heenans and the Fullens for their hospitality :)  We went with them to the Mall of America which was rediculously huge.  We also went to a cool zoo and ate some really good food.  It was so fun to hang out with them and see them.  Minnesota was beautiful too!

Then we took off early yesterday morning for Chicago.  We got to the windy city around 3 PM.  Tarin was very excited about the Magnificent Mile which if you don't know is a mile long full of stores such as, Louis Vuitton, Chanel, Neiman Marcus, Coach, ANTHROPOLOGIE and the list goes on.  They did have a Nike store though :).  We took off kind of early to try to get to our campground which was about a half hour away.  Traffic was horrible, and thats where plans kind of changed.  Well, that's where I kind of changed our plans.  You see, I can't stand big cities.  SF, Chicago, etc. they are all really cool and I would have loved to go back today and see stuff like the Navy Pier, but I can't stand all the traffic and people!  I made a deal with Tarin that if we went out to a nice place to eat if we could just get on our way today and not go back into the city.  She was fine with that and that's how we ended up in Porter, IN. :)  I know I probably sound like a party pooper and I feel bad because Tarin loves those places, but I just can't stand it!  Anyways we're off today and on to some really cool things!!!!!

Love you guys,

T&T