The Zoo

Since Jesse was at scout camp for the first half of the week we decided that we would go on a little adventure. We gathered up my mom and brother and went to the Washington DC Zoo. We did all of the normal zoo things. We took the Metro down, and we made it there and back without getting rear-ended by another train, so that was nice. We got down there and it took us a while to actually see any animals. Nate kept on asking to see some animals. We finally got up close and personal with an elephant, and from then on, it was a pretty good day, with plenty of animal sightings. We made it home before rush hour, and were all pretty tired from a fun day.

The Fourth

This year our fourth of July consisted of the above picture. We were supposed to go to a breakfast in the morning, but well, we were still tired from the lake the day before. So when the alarm went off, we decided to just sleep in a bit. So we went out to lunch, and then headed over to Baker Park to see what was going on. That could have been fun except that when we got out of the car and put sunscreen on some of it got into Nate's eye, and that pretty much made him miserable the whole time. Poor boy.

So we came home, and Nate's eyes started to feel better. Since Nate does not like loud noises and explosions we decided not to even try to fireworks. By the time we did parking and found a spot and stuff it just wouldn't be worth it for Nate to cry the whole time. Maybe next year we'll try. Anyway, we did sparklers at about 8pm, while it was still light. Nate actually was brave enough to hold them this year, and he loved it. He still asks to get more sparklers and do it again.

So that was our fourth. Not too exciting, but it was nice for it not to be filled with the stress of going a million places.

The Lake

Can you spot Nate at the top of the trail?

Our picnic area.

In the past we have always taken time each year to go camping with our friends the Vandres. This year however, we decided that it was too much of a pain to camp, with now 6 kids under 6 years old. But the best part of the camping trip is that we always make this yummy dutch oven dinner. So we thought, what if we just took a day and spent it at the lake, and then made the dutch oven there, and then went home in the evening in stead of camping. So we picked a day, and invited friends and set out.

We were able to find a picnic area just inside the tree line which was nice and shaded, and great protection when it rained slightly for about 5 minutes in the afternoon. The kids had a ton of fun playing in the water and sand. Graham wouldn't get into the water, but no one was surprised about that. He finally got used to touching the sand, and would sit and play in it. He would not walk on it without shoes on though. What a weird kid.

The kids also had a blast running around in the woods by the picnic area. Graham decided to see how many things he could fall off of that day. In addition to tripping over every rock and root in the woods, he was a little banged up, and it seemed like he could not go 5 minutes without crying about something. But he's tough, and he loved it.

So that was our fun day at the lake. Now we probably won't go camping this year. I'm actually fine with that. :)

Coming soon

it's been a while, but coming soon look for a report on all of our little daycations that we have been taking. The Lake, the Zoo, Baltimore, and today we're on our way to DC. We've just been having too much fun to blog lately. (Yeah, that sounds like a good excuse.)

New features on the blog

So I changed a few things around here in the past few weeks. First of all, if you think my kids are the cutest kids around, but you think that my ramblings make you dumber than when you arrived, I included a link to our picassa site. Which completely counteracts the other new thing I did, which was to add a gadget to make it so that things cannot be copied off of my site. I've always been a little nervous about having this a public site, but this makes me feel a little better that now people cannot copy my pictures to their computers.
In other news, today is a big day for us, both kids have well child dr appointments today. Wish me luck. Jesse is coming home early today, so he'll come with us, not like last year.

The other one is sweet too

Graham has a new thing that he is doing these days. Any time he gets hurt he comes up to me and shoves his fingers in my face for me to kiss. It doesn't matter where he got hurt, it's always his fingers that he wants kissed.

Could you ask for a sweeter boy?

So tonight as we were putting Nate to bed we were talking a little about my dad. Tomorrow is his birthday, and Nate was asking me why I was so sad. So I said that I missed Grandpa, and that tomorrow was supposed to be his birthday, but I was sad that we couldn't be with him. And Nate then said that when we are resurrected we can have a birthday party with Grandpa. And when we are resurrected then Grandpa won't be sick any more, and he can live with Grandma all day. And that we won't be sad when we are resurrected. What a sweet little boy. How he can have such simple faith to help get us through some of the harder days. And then after I left the room, he and Jesse were talking, and Nate said he was so sorry that mommy was sad. Oh how I love that little boy and everything he brings into my life.