Shine

This morning was my Bible study service project. I admit I was dreading the early hours, and cleaning is not my absolute favorite thing to do, but it was actually really fun and it felt great to help out a good organization.

Here's my group leader Pat. When I told her I was taking pictures she said, "Wait!" and she grabbed this broom to set up a good photo. She cracks me up.



Some more girls from my group. Shanna in the middle brought her 7 week old baby, and that is baby number 6 for her! She made the rest of us feel like wimps! Kari (in black) asked if she could do a glamorous pose with that putty knife/ dried on gum remover. Sure! Go for it!



Tori brought her daughter and wow, she is the happiest little helper I've ever met!



Julie and Meredith show off their stylish yellow gloves.

All of the kids stayed at Julie's house with some babysitters, and after we picked them up we went to lunch. Noah was sad that he couldn't go up into the playland with the big kids so Meredith let him wear her sunglasses. He loved them and kept them on for a really long time!

"Ready for my close up..."

Still practicing

Noah has been walking here and there for a week or two now. He actually did beat his sister by taking his first steps earlier than she did. But he's still taking it slow. Most of the time he takes anywhere from 3-6 steps and then drops back into a crawl because it's faster and easier, and much less scary for him I'm sure. Some days he is super motivated and just a few days ago he walked all the way across the family room grinning from ear to ear. But other days (like today) he just wants to be held and snuggled, and has no desire to walk away from anyone.

Here's a short video of a few steps. It's not the best portrayal of his skill, but I like the proud little laugh at the end :)

Critters

Today, after a quick grocery trip, we walked over to the pet store to look for a new bed for Ruby. We quickly decided that for $50 we could make a much better bed than they were selling, but oh boy we did not anticipate all of the animals that would actually be inside the pet supply store! The one we used to go to went out of business, and I think all they had were fish. But this one had so many fun things to look at that we stayed for an hour or so, without buying a thing.

There were bunnies with stick up ears

and floppy ones too

Lots and lots of fish

A parrot sitting up by the cash register

Both kids loved the cockatiels. They were pretty noisy, and Anna started out laughing at them and telling me how cute they were. But soon she turned serious and she kept repeating, "They want to fly, mom. They really want to fly". Ugh, moving on!

The Humane Society has an adoption center in the store and this little cat was meowing at us to come over. I am no fan of cats, but I had to admit this one was pretty cute. Or maybe just needy?

There were also dogs, and an insanely cute puppy that I didn't take a picture of because the worker was looking at me funny. But I seriously wanted to take that doggie home with me!

These next little guys inspired this post title. When we first walked in I saw the hamsters and gerbils and called Anna over to see them. I told her what they were and she said, "No mom! Those are critters!". I was cracking up. Who told this little city girl that small rodents were "critters"?!

There were plenty of other reptiles, guinea pigs, and frogs, but the biggest draw for Anna was the critters. The dog grooming and bathing room was pretty interesting to her too, and Noah thought the whole place was pretty fun.

It was just a short stop on our daily to do list, but it was some unexpected fun for the kids. I'll have to keep that place in mind on the next rainy day!

Sunny Days

A trip to the park (cheese!)

Pushing your baby brother through the "jungle"

Looking for ducks

And talking to them!

A lunch of Lily Pad Pancakes from The Toddler Cafe cookbook (lovely photography, yummy food). Noah loved them, but Anna wasn't so sure. We'll try again :)

Some sand table time

A personalized pink crown really helps when you're pretending to water the lawn

I keep saying that I'm ready for Fall, but I can't deny that sunny days really do allow us to do so many different things each day. It's great to have so many possibilities each day, but it's usually the mama who gets tired first!

Popsicles!

Last weekend we used up some of those blueberries by making popsicles. Just yogurt, sliced pears, and blueberries (none of those cucumbers!). Yummmmm...



I have been really trying to crack down on my little climber boy, but when these curious little cuties popped up to see the blender, I just had to let them watch.



Yeah, I think she liked them :)

Frog Princess

This week we went to the craft store and loaded up on all sorts of fun things to do together. We've pretty much eliminated TV altogether for the kids, since mommy started reading this book. So since there is no Dora when we get bored, we needed other things to do! I had picked up a little caddy full of paints, things to paint, foam shapes, puff balls, googly eyes, etc., when Anna spotted these little $1.00 wooden masks. She immediately went for the one wearing a crown, the frog.

She walked all through the store with it up to her face like this. Every time she passed someone she would croak out, "Ribbit!" and they would laugh.

When we got home she was ready to go. By the time she was finished you could no longer see the polka dots or smile on the frog, just a big green head! When Nathan came home from work she greeted him with a big RIBBIT! and a few dance moves.

Right before I took this video she was giving me a very detailed description of exactly how one should go about painting a frog mask. But when I asked her to tell me again, she felt she'd already explained it enough. I still like this video though, because you can hear her calling me "mom". I haven't been "mommy" since before we went to New York! :(

We have been doing lots of fun things around here and I have a ton to write about. Cutting back on TV and computer time is great for the family, but not so great for the blog! Hopefully I can get caught up while the kiddies sleep :)

Jumpy

Last week we went to open gym hours at a local gymnastics school. We met up with my sister and her boys, and all the kids had a blast jumping and running around.

Anna liked popping up out of these tubes to watch kids swing on the hanging rings



Noah is trying to walk more and more lately, but he was happy to see lots of crawler friendly activities.



Anna calls any sort of walking like this (on a curb, etc) "boardwalking".



Noah tried to be big like Sam...



but eventually decided to stick closer to the ground.



At first Anna was afraid of this giant foam "cheese pit", but after she tried it out she realized that it was super fun. I think it helped that Sam was leaping in and doing somersaults off the edge!

I thought for sure that Noah wouldn't like the unstable footing, but he went crazy in there squealing and waving his arms around. Don't worry, he was only inches from me so I could swoop in and grab him if the bigger kids got too close. I have a really cute video of him playing in there, but Blogger is being terribly annoying and keeps erasing my entire message whenever I add a video!

Yay! I feel big in here!

Anna spent most of her time jumping on the trampolines that were even with the ground so that no one could fall off (another video I can't add - grrrrr). She also tackled the little rock wall to get up to the slide saying quietly to herself the whole time, "I'm doing it! I'm doing it!". I didn't get any pictures of some of the more interesting features of the gym, since my kids stuck to the little things, but Anna was mesmerized by the older girls practicing on the balance beams and uneven bars. When we left she told my sister that she would soon be going to ballet school. I think that may have something to do with this library book we checked out last week, but I also know Anna would love to take a dance or gymnastics class. Maybe after we tackle the new experience of preschool.....

Blueberry Babies

Last Saturday we took the kids back to the blueberry farm. We hadn't been since Anna was Noah's age so we knew it would be even more fun this time.

The next two pictures remind me a lot of this curious little girl. She was so small!

Before we got out of the car we told Anna that we were not going to eat any of the blueberries because we needed to wash them first. She was fine with that plan and didn't try to eat any. But poor Noah just had to sit in the stroller since he can't really walk and being bored and hot made him one angry boy. So I caved and gave him a few berries. Soon he was going self service and eating right off of the bushes!

Anna caught on quick and started a pattern of put one in the bucket, eat four, repeat. Even when she would get a good amount in her bucket she would give them to Noah or to "the birds and the nice little ants".

A haircut is in the near future for Noah, but I love how it curls up when he's hot.

It was pretty hot and the kiddies cheeks were getting red, so we headed back to get a drink while Nathan finished picking a few more berries. I think he looks like Anna here, don't you?

Anna drank about 50 cups of water. I think the animal print paper cup may have had something to do with that.

See ya blueberry farm! This week on the menu: Blueberry popsicles and Blueberry Nectarine Buckle. Plus the kids demand a handful at least 74 times a day :p

At the museum

Friday my sister and I took the kids to the children's exhibit at a nearby museum. There were so many fun things to do and the kids had a blast. Unfortunately the staff at the museum said no flash photography (why?) so every one of these pictures is blurry, but they're still cute.


Anna loved this little house, and it took forever to get her to move on to anything else!





This blurry photo makes it look like she's in her very own oil painting :p

The little guys liked the baby area. Noah was right at home on the crawling ramps.

There was a big room to do art projects, and the kiddies took full advantage. Anna asked on the way there if she could paint at the museum, and I kind of gave a vague answer in case she couldn't. A great surprise!





How cute is this little artist?





Coloring directly on a light table is super fun!

Making faces

Anna spent a lot of time in these people chairs and the reading corner. We would go on to other parts of the room and we could look over and there she'd be!

Somehow word got out that Noah was starting to walk, so he decided he better be extra cautious on this play boat.

This video is really dark, but it was so funny that I had to try and share. There was this dark room with a big screen, and when you went in you could see yourself in sort of an infra-red outline. For some reason Noah went crazy while we were in there! He kept going right up to the screen and waving him arms and squealing. This video is actually tame compared to how he was really screaming and laughing!

By the end of the day, everyone was exhausted!

The museum is on the campus of our city university, and as I sat there eating lunch in the student center it was hard to believe that just 4 years ago I was doing my graduate work and teaching there. On my last day of class a well meaning professor stopped me in the parking garage to congratulate me on finishing. He asked what schools I might apply to for my PhD work, and I confessed that I didn't think that was where I wanted to go next, but rather Nathan and I were talking about starting a family. The look on his face said it all, as he basically tried to convince me not to waste my life by having children and being a mother. Sitting there four years later and feeding my babies just reinforced what I knew all along. I absolutely chose the right path, and taking my children to the museum beats another degree by a long shot!

p.s. Can everyone see our new blog header now? It's been acting strange...