The Otte's

We went to the Native American concert, Brule.

(I suggest to click on the pictures to see them bigger on your computer, as the costumes of the dancers are beautiful1)

 We got to see fan dances, shawl dances, flag dances, and listen to great stories about peace and understanding.  The music was beautiful!

 We were inspired by the Native American drumming, and the flute playing.

 We were reminded that it cools down in the evenings in South Dakota.

 It was a beautiful uplifting experience.  John and I both said it was one of our favorite experiences on the trip.

 Afterwards we got pictures with the dancers.  Their costumes were amazing!  We talked to them about how all of our kids were also dancers, but our little group did not want to perform for them that evening.

 The lead singer of the band talked about how he was adopted and the experience he went through.  I talked to my kids about how how our family has that in common with him, and they decided that they wanted to let him know that we had that in common.  He was so good talking with them and building them up, and sharing how lucky our family is.  I had to agree with him on every bit he said.

 Phew, vacations are exhausting!

 The next day we started with Dinosaur park, and honestly I was not looking forward to this one, as I knew there were about a million stairs, and John and I are not limiting Quinn to anything, so we were going to get our exercise!

 Here the kids are, all at the top!

 Here is where I ended up having another amazing moment with my kids.  I told Denali and Isaiah to go ahead and get up the stairs and start playing together, and dad and I would get Quinn up there soon.  We opted for her stroller type of chair, as we did not want to carry her and drop her, and her power chair was not an option to carry as it weighs hundreds of pounds.  So we started up the stairs, and honestly it was not as bad as I imagined it was going to be.  So we got about 1/3 of the way up, and then Denali bounced back down, with Isaiah on her heals, and they said something about how we are a family, and we are a team, and we are going to help get Quinn up the stairs together, and they grabbed a corner of the chair, and we got up those stairs in no time at all.  I had to do my best not to cry my eyes out.  I know I have amazing kids, all three of them, but seeing the love and team spirit they have, and how they volunteered to help instead of running on just makes me so proud!

Here we are at the bottom after the experience of doing the stairs and playing on the dinosaurs up above.  OH how blessed we are!