Wisconsin. Dad and Sherry decided to take a trip up to my grandparents old cottage in Shantytown. They stopped in Chicago and picked me up along the way.

Dad pointed out various historic family sites along the road on the way up. He always tells the same stories and we always enjoy them. "Your grandfather was stationed there before shipping out to the Pacific. He met your grandmother here and when he came back from the war, they got married."

You can chart at least three generations of family history along that drive to the cottage. Grandma Dottie grew up in Shantytown. After getting married, her and Paul and their (eventually) nine sons would vacation up there every summer. "Somehow we all fit in the station wagon with our luggage towed behind us. I remember the first time we saw a McDonalds. That was something."

As my Dad and his eight brothers grew up they started taking their own new families up to that same cottage every summer. Every weekend another group, or a couple groups at the same time. A new generation of road stories.

Sherry: I remember how exciting it always was to see the fast food places that were right ON the overpass, hanging over the highway. That seemed like the most exciting thing in the world.

Grandma Dottie passed away, and Grandpa Paul is too old to spend much time in Wisconsin, let alone a remote cottage. One of the son's took it over and decided to fix it up. This is the first time I've seen the renovations.

Dad: It's not exactly a cottage anymore is it?
Sherry: It's at least three times bigger than it used to me.

If you look at the picture, the farthest to the left house-shaped lump is what the cottage used to be. Now there's a garage and five bedrooms. My aunt Ginny who lives down the road said, "We don't call it the cottage anymore. We call it the palace."

My cousin, Brad, is at the cottage this weekend working on some of the final touches.

Brad: Two years ago when we were getting ready to start building we brought out a surveyor to make sure just where the land starts and ends. [waving his arm in front of the porch] It ended here. The whole cottage was built on someone else's land.