Yesterday we headed to Bear Hollow Wilderness Trail. Basically, it was a free zoo! yeah for free!! :) They have about 10-15 different animals along the trail, in their natural habitat, just fenced in. It was awesome! Not only was it free, it was all shaded, too! Can't be that in this humid place! At the end of the trail there was a lake. We named it 'turtle lake' because we saw sooo many turtles swimming there. After the walk around the lake we found some picnic and playground areas and had some fun! I made pb&j's for us and made sure to pack Grady's differently so I'd know which one was his, because of his honey allergy. (I accidentally bought pb with honey in it, so he has to have the other pb.) Well, he reacted to it, so I think we might have a peanut allergy on our hands. I've always said I don't have time or patience for people with food allergies, so I guess this is my punishment! Anyway, we had a lot of fun. Then we headed to an orchard I found online to get some peach ice cream...
And, seriously, when in Georgia, one must consume lots of these...
Today, we did a little bit of fishing! Well, sort of! My kids have some practice reels, so they practiced, but Gramps says that Winni is ready to fish for real! She is sooo excited!
Gramps wasn't sure if he could handle all 3 kids on the boat by himself, so Grady stayed with me on the shore. He didn't like that much!
He eventually got to go out on the boat too and had fun...until Winni hit him in the head with the oar. oops! Now that the kids know there is a lake at Gramps, I think we'll be spending more time over on the bank throwing rocks in!
My internet connection is being really slow tonight. I have a few pictures from today's activities I wanted to share, but I don't have the patience for it! So, for now, go check out videos of OUR HOUSE!yeah!! The kids and I won't get to see it until we close on it, but Walter will be checking on it weekly and keeping us updated through pictures and videos. We are so excited...if you can't tell!
Today was Abby's birthday. Abby is Walter's little brothers daughter. She is a cutie!! We were so happy we got to be here for her birthday! It was lots of fun, but super hot!
Grady slept through most of the party, but didn't miss out on the cupcakes, thanks to Gramps!
Oh, and a little riddle for the day...
What do you get when you put 2 women, in June, in the heat of HOTLANTA when there is a kiddie pool nearby??
We made it here and are having fun! We rested today a bit since we didn't get in til 1:30 this morning. Well, I rested. Walter power washed the outside of the house and did some edging! When Nana got home from work it was cool enough to play outside. So, she planted some flowers while we played around!
We also pulled out the 4-wheeler and went for rides. My in-laws have over 20 acres of land with a 3 acre pond on it. So, we plan on exploring it! They also have chickens and ducks. They had fun collecting the eggs with Nana tonight. Walter hooked up the misting fan and we all ended up sooo dirty! Nana has a fun bear claw tub and my kids LOVED playing in it!
So, we are off to have some muggy, sweltering fun!
Our temporary housing has run out. So, we are off to Gramps and Nana's in Georgia for a little bit. I hear it's hotter there than it is here! Wish me luck!!
Everytime Malachi begs to come into the hosue, he quickly retreats to his bed or asks to be let back out! Grady will not leave him alone. He hugs him, cuddles him, rides him...I think it's cute, but it makes him hairy and I hate that! Malachi will let him poke and prod him for a few minutes, then he's done.
We take Malachi for a walk at least 2 times a day, and we fight over who gets to hold the leash, aka being drug along by Malachi! It helps the kids get up the hill faster!
So, I probably totally bought into this scam and it's probably just kool-aid, but my kids think this is great! I've been trying to convince them that they aren't brushing their teeth good enough and need my help, well Trae does! So I bought it...
and my kids think it's great!
There was a better picture of Trae, capturing his face...but check out those lashes! uh! Wasted on a boy!!
Time to get scuurubbing!
Grady, although he doesn't get in on the Agent Cool Blue action, LOVES brushing his teeth! He begs me to get his toothbrush out all day long!
Why do I feel I need to blog everyday?!? Well, a few reasons...
1. I feel like I need to! For myself, and for those of you who seem to be functioning just fine without me! :)
2. I think I secretly feel like I'm on vacation, a long one, and have to document it all!
3. So I can realize that, somehow, I'm actually surviving this! Even without daily contact with Julie or Kari. I'm pretty surprised myself!
4. So I don't forget me...I mean, so you don't forget me!
5. Cause it's my drug...of choice. No diet coke at 9 AM for me, just a good old fashion (catch up) blog session!
Today was boring! We had McDonald's for breakfast, which put me into a comatose state until about 2 PM, at which point I was able to function enough to get us some lunch. Not doing that again! Oh, and I've started packing...again! We head for GA on Thursday! Wish my in-laws luck, we will be with them for 2 weeks! :)
So cute! Once I realized that the paint was going to just wash off that shirt, I decided to not finish it, completely. It should look something like this...
But, once it's on, you get the idea...
And the rocks, they spell out 'DAD R O C K S' cause he does! Winni decided we needed some more rocks, so she painted the 4 little ones up in the corner and added the 'W' to the one! I'm pretty impressed with her ability to paint letters, at least that one! She's a smart little one!
Oh, and in case you are wondering where in the world that last picture was taken :) it's in our new kitchen! And, here is the latest on the outside...
Shingles and lots of siding! woo hoo! They will start putting up the sheet rock on Wednesday! yeah!!
Also, of course HAPPY FATHER'S DAY to my dad and Walter's! We sent them some edible rocks! My kids colored on the boxes we put them in. I hope they know that they do rock, and we love them!
She is 43, again! :) So, in honor of my mom, Elise and my family headed to Gardner's for a little BBQ. Davis Gardner is my mom's cousin. Apparently, her favorite! At least, that is what every one of her cousins tells me. :) We had fun with them. They just live down the street about 3 miles from our current location. They have lots of grandkids, but they don't live very close. So, they have lots of toys that need to be played with! We had fun and enjoyed our time. I'm realizing that I don't have very many pictures of Elise, but she was there! The pictures I do have are action shots of her playing with my kids, but I don't know that she would appreciate the angles, so I stuck to the good pics! :) But, she was here and we had fun with her and this afternoon she left us! Now, I'll go back to being the 'no fun' mom! :)
After we cleaned the cars we headed to McDonald's, the one with the play place! yeah! I'm always so jealous of those play places. I secretly wish my child will call for me to help them, with something unpainful, from the top floor of the play place so I can climb in and help them. Well, today I read the sign, it's for kids up to age 12...and their parents!! woo hoo! So, I decided it was time Grady took a tour of this place!
That's me and my kids at the top! :)
After my fun, I sent Walter up. Why should he miss out on the fun!?!
Now, who says graduates are no fun!? We are loving having him around more! :)
Today we worked on our Father's Day gifts! It was so fun! I've never really let my kids paint like crazy, but today I did and I/we loved it! We started by painting rocks that we collected down by our lake and at our new house...
Then we painted feet and walked all over a t-shirt!
We made sure to use washable paints, which works great for getting it off the kids...but not sure the shirt is going to last long! hmmmm...guess we'll just have to frame it!
It was finally a nice, sunny day so we headed to the pool! We forgot to take any pictures to document the wonderful mothers we are for getting into that FREEZING cold water! But, I'm telling you we did get in and it was sooo way cold! I kept trying to convince the kids that it would be so much more fun to go and swim in our warm tub, but my kids weren't falling for it. Especially Winni! However, she got out to go potty and when she came back she thought the water was colder than before and requested that we go home and swim in our tub. So we did!
It was sooo much warmer, but not so much swimming! We did have fun making faces, though.
As you can see, Winni has the facial expressions pretty much figured out. However, Trae's faces just went from super grin to small grin!
The other night I was trying to blog. I started uploading pictures and it was taking FOREVER! So, I headed to bed to let it upload while I got my 'beauty sleep.' My husband decided to help me out. He pushed publish, and, well, that's what you saw for my last post. Turns out it was completely backward. While Elise is a good fisherwoman, she aint THAT good! She can't exactly catch a gold fish with a bowl. I mean, she hasn't tried. She probably could, but that's beside the point. What I was working on was this...
Tuesday night my niece, Elise, came to see us. She drove the 5 hours trip from Connecticut...and it only took her 8 hours! Poor girl! Her car over-heated in traffic in the Bronx of NYC! Luckily she was able to get someone to help her fix it and she made it to our house in one piece! So, on Wednesday we started having some fun!
We started on our 'Father's Day' crafts! Nothing helps you be a better, more creative mom than having another mom/mom-to-be in the house. It helps a lot. So we headed to Michaels and bought the goods. Just for a little background, we have turtles. We had 3 when we moved out here, but quickly we came down to 1 when 2 of them got out of their temporary cage and we haven't seen them since. One thing we like to feed out turtles, on occasion, is fish. They love them. It's fun to watch the turtles chase and catch the fish. My kids know all about the circle of life now. So, anyway, Walter decided to reward the last turtle for staying with us by feeding her fish. After 2 weeks there was still 1 fish left. Our turtle started acting weird and looking sick, so we decided that maybe the fish was making her sick. That's when we decided to let the goldfish go in our lake. And, that is what these pictures are of. Elise releasing the fish... a little different from catching a fish.
Saying good-bye to the fishy...let's name her Shakira! (notice, I name everything Shakira, therefore, there are too many Shakiras in our family...so we can't name the baby that!)
Bye fishy fishy
And, she's off! FREEDOM!!
After the lake, and because an extra mom around means more fun for everyone, we headed to the mall to ride the carousel. Winni has been wanting and asking to ride this carousel every time we go to the mall and I just can't do it without help. Well, I had help, so we took on the challenge. It was fun!
If you can't tell by the look on my face, I don't do well going round in circles. So, one ride was enough. But, I survived! And my kids loved it! Grady screamed as we took him off the ride. He could have stayed on all day, if you couldn't tell by that smile on his face!!
Today we headed to Chestertown to show Elise 'the goods!' And...we have shingles!!
Our neighbors told us about a beach that is not too far from our house, like 20 minutes, so we got some Subway sandwiches and headed to Betterton Beach! As soon as we had our lunches in hand it started POURING!!
We enjoyed our picnic in the car and as soon as we were done, the sky was blue and the sun started shining. We had so much fun!!
Grady is a little crazy when it comes to the beach! He headed straight for the water over and over and over again! By the end of the afternoon he was soaked! We didn't bring swimming suits cause it wasn't going to be warm enough, but it was and my kids made the most of it! I am so excited to enjoy this beach a lot more!
After our fun adventure, we met Walter for dinner at Annie's! It was recommended to us by some people at church. We decided to try it out and it was yummy...and fancy. With a live piano player and all!
