Blackberry Festival

We have a blackberry festival in our town yearly. Since we had nothing else to do today, and taking two young children to play in the 90+ degree weather for a few hours sounded like a good idea, we walked up the street to see what this blackberry festival was all about. The kids did quite well and only got testy towards the end. Or neighbours run the train that goes in around a block, so blessedly we got to ride for free. G had decided that trucks and trains are the best thing EVER and we had trouble getting him off. Alexis also liked going and talked the neighbour girls into riding with her when Chris and I got tired.

Overall a new lackey had started for Chris. Hopefully, this guy will work out better than the last helper he had. Summer sessions are almost over, so hopefully we won't end up with a truly wacky fall term.

Nothing new is really happening for me at work.  We have our biannual qualification happening this next week, so the past week has been a bit stressful preparing for it. 

Tomatoes

Out neighbours are growing tomatoes in their front yard. They enchant G and every time we walk by them we have to look and see how many "ball" there are. We stopped by yesterday and they are really starting to grow.

We also tasked with it neighbours and got to see them finally.  It has been a while as they are busy right now.

We also got to see the US Womens national team pound Japan in the Women's World Cup Final. We set several records during the game and came away with several of the awards for the tournament in general. It was a good game and quite entertaining to see A trying to scold me a time or two. If you did not see the game at the end of 20 minutes the score was 4-0. Not exactly a typical soccer match score. We I kept trying to eat dinner but got up repeatedly to watch and cheer for the women.  Since it was dinner time A felt the need to get me to go back to my dinner seat. She wasn't too happy with the response of me saying I'll just watch the game. Chris tried explaining to her that i got a special dispensation since it was a match that happened every four years. This week she did learn about literal-ness though, so no real surprise.  We told her she needed to sit down because she kept going to the kitchen for no reason so she say on the floor beneath her chair. 

I need to get to work though so hopefully you ask had good weeks last week and have a good week this week. 

All boy

We couldn't get in the door at Lowe's without paying in the lawn mowers.  We climbed on ALL of them and had to see how each one worked. 

Hi! Hi! Tuck!

While we were driving the incredibly long distance to Disney a few weeks ago (all 9 or so hours) G decide to start waving to truckers. I can only imagine what the truckers aware enough to see a little hand waving at them.  We would wave as well once we got to the front. A few truckers honked at us to say hello which made G giggle.  The general sequence of events:

G, "Tuck! Hi!" As we got close to the rear of the truck we start waving. G would try to climb out of his 5-point harness carseat (which he did successfully Houdini his way out of in a parking lot on the trip) so the he could wave the entire length of the 53' truck. As we approached the front the trucker would wave or honk if they were paying attention. 

This sequence has continued for two weeks now. We have even started seeing it with pick up trucks around town.  It is a fun game he is playing and laughing about. 

The reason I'm thinking about this is that today we made the trek to Winston-Salem to see a Pediatric ENT and an allergist with G.  As we drove we waved to truckers between bites of cereal, muffin, and raisins.  We also decided that raisin make great projectiles when expelled from the nose. They are the right size to partially insert into a nostril, and with a quick blowing action can go far. We had to apologise to the doctors today wanting to look up his nose...

The result of the visits is that allergies are probably a large part of the inflammation and fluid in his head. We will do some more allergy testing as he gets older. In the mean time we are going ahead with "ear tubes" to get the fluid out of his middle ear.  He will become proud owner of these devices the beginning of August if all goes according to plan.

We also found out where the massive amount of food has been going on him: his feet. We got him measured in April, and in 3.5 months his feet grew 1.5 sizes. We got him some new shoes while we were in the big city as well since we had some time between the doctor appointments.

A is becoming quite the 4 year old.  She even played nice and remembered my friend was picking her up from school today since the trek was not for her to make with us.  The really cool thing is that A has stopped sucking her thumb.  She hasn't sucked her thumb since before our Disney trip.

Shoes!

One of the best parts to Disney was A's fascination with the character's shoes. After we got to meet Sofia A lifted the hem of the dress to check out the shoes. Sofia didn't quite know what to do about that. When we were done simply starring and being shy with Elsa (she jumped up and down screaming until we got to her) she had to check out the shoes.  Elsa was a bit better prepared and she lifted the hem of her dress to show off the stylish snowy shoes. Even though she was technically "done" taking to A, Elsa told her about the shoes and talked about hour pretty they were.  Anna's could be seen, but she still had to get a good, close view of them. As Jasmine walked by A got a good look, but we didn't get in line because she doesn't know Jasmine well. Ariel was self explanatory with her fin on display for all to see. Note she wants a mermaid fin. We've always known that A will be a shoe girl (her grandmother is one, so at least it is honest) but not quite the extent of it. 

It was also neat to see the shoes weren't forgotten as part of the costumes for the actresses. The shoes were integral and looked quite comfortable, even to my comfort-over-style eyes. 

The amount of detail in the costumes was also remarkable, but I'd expect nothing less.  How the princesses carried themselves and always made the girl in front of them seem like the only one in the room was remarkable to me. A screamed, jumped, waved and made a huge attempt to get to all the princesses before her turn, but the princess never wavered from her current child and didn't mention the weird behaviour to A when they met with her.

Anyway, just a thought about Disney that I don't want to forget. That and we need to go back with more people who want to see true excitement before A decides the princesses aren't real.

Where in the (Disney) World did we go?

It has been a bit more than a week since I posted something, but I had a good reason. I always like to post pictures and I just couldn't until I got home to my "big" camera. We got some great shots and had a great time.  We went on vacation (yes, with kids) for our 10th anniversary. We had planned on doing something "big" for the 10th anniversary because we felt a decade was worth celebrating. Then once I got sick several years ago, Disney came on the radar. We had always kind of planned on going there simply because rumor had it that they could feed me. Gasp. And feed me they were able to do! We got to talk to a chef at every restaurant or buffet (yes, buffet) that we went to. I got to talk and after the first couple even didn't get lists of ingredients and just trusted (gasp!) the chef to know what was in the food. Know the derivatives from the allergens, etc. I didn't think about it and managed to only have one minor issue in six days. I got to eat Mickey waffles like the kids, I got to have options (as in more than one thing off of the menu), and even heard, "Oh, that is easy" once explaining that I couldn't have "the list." So yes, doing Disney was a great thing. Since we had kids, and couldn't convince anyone to watch them for us, we just packed them in the car and drove to Florida. We did Star Wars Weekend at Hollywood Studios, Magic Kingdom, and Animal Kingdom. Every day had its highlights, and I'll post a few captioned pictures in a minute. Or you can simply scroll down and see them now. Both kids LOVED meeting the characters, though G was much more hesitant (with everyone except Ariel -- he couldn't wait to climb up on the shell with her). Both kids also seemed to love the shows (we got to see a Frozen Sing-Along, A Star Wars Rebels and the Lion King Adventure) more than the rides, with the exceptions being the teacups and the Ariel "under the sea" ride.  And we got Mickey waffles, did I mention that? They were Carolyn-free and we did that multiple times. The best were Mickey waffles with a espresso marscapone that I'm definitely going to work on when I can find marscapone in this little town (maybe a costco trip will net some). 

Being Anna and Elsa before entering Hollywood Studios

The first princess we got to meet and it was a jumping up and down can't stand still excitement

Lego R2D2, need I say more?

The coach from the new Cinderella, a movie that A and I both really liked

Getting on the Midway Mania Ride that was a lot of fun

Jim Henson's muppets keep appearing in our life, so why not a picture of us in front of some more?

Ready to twirl on the teacups

Dad and his princess in the princess hall, waiting on Elsa and Anna

Got to see Elsa first, as we rounded the corner we started shouting, waving and jumping up and down. Worth the 1.5 hour wait for the excitement shown.

With Anna

Character dinner with Pooh and friends

G slept through the first bit of it

But woke up in time for tigger

One last hug for tigger

Yes, excited kids on the shell with Ariel

Dad, Princess, Huge Sucker, Castle. What else is there?

Breakfast with Adventure Mickey, Goofey, Donald and Daisy.

G signing, "Again" because he wanted to do a lot of things again.

May wrap-up

Not much has happened this past week. I have a rare moment when I can sit and blog though so I should at least let everyone know that. Chris is showering off screaming children as they've lost the privilege of baths for bathing. The bath water kept ending up outside the bath so for the next week or so they get showers.  We are literally hosing them off with the showerhead and going from there.  They aren't to thrilled about it, but maybe they will learn to keep water in the bath.

School is school right now and work is work.  A is slowly becoming a bit better about minding, though not always. She is still the strong willed child, and we desperately want her to keep that will because in 10 years we want her to not be easily persuaded by friends, but now, accepting a "No" or "Eat" once a day would be nice. She does remarkably for a 4 year old though. G continues to be a fun toddler that toddles about and toddles into everyone.  He loves to walk around the church in the morning before stopping in front of the band and staring at the drummer. Then he starts a beat with a foot, his whole body, some hands, etc. and mostly they are all in time with the beat, sub-beats, etc. Because of this everyone at church knows him, and thinks he's the best.  Tonight at church (we had a congregational meeting) I met a few new people and they were like, "Hey, your boy is the one that watches the drums right?! He's so precious!"

Miss A is in a new classroom at school. She is having to make new friends, and rekindle some friendships from kids that were in different classes this past year since they were all over 3. (The school they go to has 1 room for 2-3 year olds, then around six for 3-5 year olds.) Her latest "new" old friend is "R." It was rather sweet when A and I went for ice cream yesterday and were talking about her week. She wants to tell R about God, and all the other new friends in her class as well. I find this to be a fantastic idea as she taught them all "Jesus Loves Me" in the 2 year old classroom. 

Chris made it through week 1 of summer term. Hopefully this week will be straightforward. Pray for him though as he is rather dis-illusioned with academia right now. Pray for guidance and what comes next for him.

Both May birthdays went off without much ado.  Now for a 10th anniversary next week! Hard to believe that Chris and I have been married for 10 years, but have and are excited about it.

Pray for us and our church as well.  There are some issues we are working through that will be trying in the next year or so. It will all work out according to God's plan, but hopefully all the people realize this and are at peace with that fact, despite what they personally think.