Hangin' with the Bruno's: Meet Me In Pure Michigan

Earlier this month, the St. Louis Bruno's took the first (potentially annual) family vacation to my home state of (pure) Michigan. I'd be lying if I said I didn't play a part in choosing the destination. It started with my mother and father-in-law talking about a weekend trip to Chicago. Corey and I kind of jumped on board suggesting that we rent a condo, see friends and go to the beach. We mentioned it to Kyle and Meredith and they expressed interest as well. Everyone kept bringing up the desire to go to the beach while there. Which got me thinking... If we really want to go to the beach, why don't we avoid the big city and instead head to the other side of the Lake to a beach in Michigan?! (DUH!) While I'd prefer to go as far up the coast as possible, we already have our annual Ferrier trip (and the associated looooong drive) up to Traverse City and the Bruno's were wanting to keep the drive as short as possible seeing as we were only going for a long weekend. A few VRBO searches...ok, more like a lot of VRBO searches and far too much time at work than I'd like to admit to my boss, and we were booked at a 5 bedroom house in Union Pier, a small town just north of the Michigan/Indiana border.

While the weather wasn't perfect, and we had the token Michigan summer vacation cold day, we got in plenty of fun in the sun at the beach and some good quality time at the house. I think it's safe to say that Carter and Taylor loved their first trip to the beach, Lill loved slumber parties with her cousins, Jim enjoyed the small town lifestyle and the rest of us enjoyed a break from reality. Hopefully we'll be back in the future!

The same droopy cheeks while napping

She loved playing in the waves

One of many trips for ice cream

She was upstairs and quiet for awhile...I walked in to find her in Carter's
bed playing on his Ipad. She was very intrigued about the 'big boy' bed...