On the road with twelve year olds, part 1

When our trip to Japan was cancelled with our two twelve-year-old granddaughters, they decided they still HAD to be together.  I was the one with the time available to do the driving (and I'm always game for a road trip!!), so I took Emeri to Wisconsin to be with her cousin, Sophia.  Then they'd come to my house, and then I'd take them to Emeri's home.  

The family gave their "silly waves" (except Hannah, who was still in bed.)

First stop was Schultz's Cheese Haus along 151.  We've driven by it often but had never stopped.

Emeri had put her billfold on the hood of the car when we took pictures.  As I pulled out back onto 151, I saw it fly up to my windshield!!  I pulled off to the side of the road, put on the hazard lights and Em rescued it!  We were in a construction zone and traffic was going slow also which was good!  We were so glad it didn't fall off on the side road without us knowing, so we gave thanks to the Lord for that!

 Next stop - Sun Prairie for lunch at Noodles and Company.  Have you ever tried their mac and cheese with meatballs???!!!  It was a first for me and oh, yum!!

 We decided that we would do some flipping of coins to make decisions about this trip.

Should we continue on 151 or go through back roads north of Madison?  To my joy!! it was BACKROADS!!  I LOVE backroading!!

Mazomonie

 Stopped at this "ghost town".  Well, there isn't a town there any longer though.  We went in through the little gate and looked at these old gravestones from the late 1800's.

 A Frank Lloyd Wright house!

I took them on the driveway up to the House on the Rocks.  I was willing to take the girls on the tour through the house (Allen and I did that one time-post here) but they thought it was too creepy.

Al and I will have to stop here some time.  It is on my to-do list!

 Leaving Wisconsin.

 The girls had been doing a lot of chatter and how we laughed and giggled!!  The girls said several times that they enjoyed the "no hustle, bustle, hurry and get there, chill drive."  It is the way I LOVE to travel!

I wanted to take them to Sculpture Park in Des Moines.  We had stopped here with Jill's girls when we moved them to Wisconsin.  You can see that post here.  How those girls have grown in 3 years!

"Do you suppose they have a Cheesecake Factory here in Des Moines?"  They did!  We had thought about flipping a coin to see what restaurant to go to, but when we found out there was one and close to our hotel, there was no decision to be made about it!

The restaurant seemed almost empty but because of Covid, the seating was limited and we had to wait for 20 min. outside before they buzzed us.

They wanted us to order by scanning the menu onto my phone but when the waitress asked if I wanted a physical copy, I said "YES!"  I am not the fondest about looking at my small screen.  The laminated menus can be washed off.  

The meals were huge!  I just got an empty plate and took some off the girls' dishes.  We ordered our cheesecakes to go, to eat later at the hotel.  We were too full to eat them there!

Watching HGTV in our suite!  We don't have it on our "poor man's tv" at our house so it is a treat whenever we stop at a hotel.

I love having a suite with a separate living room space since I wake up early and could read there without waking up the girls the next morning.

Eating our desserts after our tummies settled down.

Do you know how to differentiate between desert and dessert?  Sophia once told me that dessert has 2 S's in it and you might want 2nds of the sweet dessert!