Our crazy times in life make THE BEST memories. I fondly remember the year this Santa bought a large playhouse for her kids because it was on sale. She stored it in the backyard shed for two months. Then, on Christmas Eve, once her elf was certain the kids were asleep, he went to get it to put it together and found the shed frozen shut! The craziness that ensued in the following hours are some of my favorite Christmas Even memories. As are every long road trip to do something random, 4 a.m. wake up calls during a pandemic to go star gazing, and this particular night we attempted to see the Northern Lights.
Seeing the aurora borealis has been on my bucket list for years. It's now on the middle mini's list as well. When we heard there was a chance of maybe seeing the lights on this clear night, we made our way to Whiterock Conservancy. After spending nap time that day reading about where we should go, we learned this is the place in Iowa for star gazing. We gathered all the info we could, made sure the skies would be clear, and at 9:30 p.m., well past bedtime, we drove over an hour.
It should come as no surprise that we didn't see the Norther Lights once we arrived (apparently, the lights never made it this far south), but we were able to do some superb constellation finding. We got magnificent views of the Milky Way, laughed as we stumbled around in the dark, and then realized that we were cold and needed in a snack...in the middle of nowhere.
This was most definitely not our typical Wednesday night, but it might be one of my favorite ones we've ever had.