Kids Day at the County Fair

It was hotter than all get out but the price was right (free). So, we ventured out to Kid's Day at our County Fair with some friends. One snow cone, 1.5 hours and 10 gallons of sweat later and we called it a day.

Wanted: Grabber

I'm 35 weeks along and really starting to feel it. My back hurts, my head hurts, I am short of breath and overall just plain miserable. After this weekend at home I've decided I need a "grabber" tool. The constant bending over to pick up toys, shoes, sippy cups and other random junk is taking its toll. Scott is out of town for a good portion of the week so I'm thinking I could get some good use out of this cool looking contraption! And then it will come in handy again when I'm a senior citizen.

The Weather Rocked Us

Friday night we made our 3rd annual trip to the Jones County Fair for fried food and a great concert. As Lady Antebellum took the stage our cell phones showed a glob of red on the radar heading straight for us. Sure enough, 45 minutes into the show the downpour started. As we raced back to our car it started sleeting and our friends stopped to move downed tree branches out of the middle of the road. As we worked our way out of town we had to maneuver around downed power lines, downed trees, and flash flooding. Seriously, a car was stalled in the road with water covering its tires. We're going to re-think this outdoor concert thing next year. If you recall, the same thing happened to us last year.

Peaches!

Evy is loving peaches this summer. The other night she actually chose to stop eating a sucker and have a peach instead. Shocking, but true.

Hot Stuff

Whew! It's hot outside. In preparation for a beyond hot week we decided it was time to get Evy a pool. Evy's school has sprinkler day every Wednesday and her teachers report that Evy is one of the most active kids in the sprinkler. Apparently she loves it. Apparently we have the wrong kind of sprinkler because Evy does not like either of our garden sprinklers or the sprinkler that shoots out of of the elephant's trunk in her new pool. She wanted us to turn the sprinkler off before she would get in the pool. Ok, whatever. Notice the big mama tummy in the last picture!

A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood

We've had a one day break in the excessive heat and humidity so we decided to take advantage of the beautiful weather. We headed out to Kent State Park for a weeknight picnic, hike around the lake, and stop at the beach.

Musical Maestro or Movie Junkie?

In the last few days Evy has been able to identify the movies associated with random songs that she hears. She identifies the movie before I even hear the music. Here are the examples:

• She has a toy guitar that plays Smash Mouth's All Star. While playing with the guitar this week she said, "Hey, that's the Shrek Song."



• At the Children's Museum yesterday she came running up to me and said, "What's that song?" Before I could place it she said, "That's the Woody song!" Yep. It turned out to be You've got a Friend in Me from Toy Story.



• Again at the Children's Museum she said, "That song on Snow White" as I listened I could hear the music We dig dig dig in our mine... I've never even heard that song.

The thing that amazes me is she hasn't watched Snow White or Toy Story in weeks. If she'd recently seen the movies her ability to identify the songs wouldn't be blog fodder. I'm voting that she's a Musical Maestro, just like any good parent would do :-)

Lesson Learned

[Evy's]


[Baby's]

I am 7 weeks away from my due date and we finally got around to sorting through the nursery today. We are set for room decor, clothes, bibs and other baby essentials. However, I realized that all of the "cuddly items" we had for Evy still belong to Evy and this baby has no cuddly blankets, stuffed animals or soft toys. While we were at the mall I asked Evy to help me pick out a lovey for her baby sister. Unfortunately, Evy was in love with all of the loveys herself. "They're so cute!" "I love them!" "I need a lovey." Hmmm, we left the store with the two pink elephants pictured above.

The Zoo

[A couple of monkeys]


[Evy was first in line for the pony rides and knew right away she wanted to ride the white horse!]


[I had to drag her away from the monkey house--she loved watching this guy and his "friend"]

There is a small zoo relatively close to our house so when Groupon offered up a great deal on admission we decided to try it out. Scott took Tuesday off so he could join us and we had a great time! Evy loved riding the train, carousel and pony! We spent about three hours checking out the animals and I was amazed at Evy's interest in the huge snakes. Yuck! We'll be making a return trip!

4th of July

Over the 4th of July holiday we visited Scott's sister's family at their lake house in Southern Iowa. We watched fireworks from the boat and Evy stayed awake until 11 to take it all in (we paid for that later, when she was awake half the night!) Evy fell in love with Cody dog and baffled her older cousins with her crazy toddler behavior--for example, waking up 4 hours before they rolled out of bed each morning. And, Uncle Kraig helped Evy "catch" her first fish!