Who wore it better #5

Another one

 

A Fair-ly good day

Our first year where the kids outnumbered the adults.The weather was perfect! Mostly overcast, in the 70's, hugely crowded, even for a Sunday.

Ready for the Fair!


The giant slide was first. I convinced Relia to ride on her own this year, and she was so proud of herself. Felix rode with me, and he thought it was too fast.

On to the animal barns!
I asked Felix if he wanted to see the horses or the cows first. He answered "The pigs!" Okay. Once we did make it to the swine barn, he wasn't satisfied with the piglets and the largest boar, he needed to go see ALL the pigs.
Then we went to the horse barn and... dug for horse bones?


Next, the annual photobooth portrait.
No trouble waiting for the pictures to come out, everyone was well occupied.


I love how Felix sits on his Harley, crotch rocket style.


Felix chose a Pronto Pup for lunch. That's my boy.


We did a few rides

Felix regretted his choice of the airplanes. He hid behind the dashboard with a scared look on his face the whole time :(

But Relia had a great time on the Pirate ship thingy (on the bridge, in pink)


He was much happier with the cars

and the tractors



I never think of myself as a history buff, but I love when I see these around town.

On the Sky Glider (Felix hid from the camera once again)


A bungee jump for Relia while Leo, Felix and I watched Flamenco dancers

Some Sweet Martha's and then it was time to go.

The kids were all amazing this time. They did a fantastic job listening, and sticking close enough to our wagon home base. I really didn't worry about them much. Leo had a hard time because he couldn't run free very much, but that is to be expected. I was so very proud of them today.
My two favorite of our additions to the fair experience this year:
-Leo's wagon seatbelt, cobbled together from remnants of expired car seats.
-Bringing a bunch of solo cups so we could share everything on the go. Totally doing that again.

I keep thinking there is something I'm forgetting... Oh yeah

Clearly Felix was not feelin' the photobooth this time around. However, Relia nailed the silly face this year! Dare I say we may have too many kids for this? Nah. Pretty soon they'll be big enough to pop their heads in from the side, right?

And the whole history. Click on the image to see it bigger
UPDATE: Fair attendance was 236,197 yesterday (including our family). Single day record. So if there are about 5 million people in MN, that is about 5% of the state at the Fair on one day. 1 in 20! Wow!

The difficulties of gowing up in the modern world

After facetime-ing each morning while I was away, Leo now expects all photos on my computer to and wave back to him.

More of my kids

Eight!

8 years ago	7 years ago
6 years ago	5 years ago
4 years ago	3 years ago
2 years ago	One year ago
And today!

There's a reason

Tonight, Felix woke up about 7:30 and hour and a half after I put him down. Whimpering and rubbing his ears. He's been sick and waking up hasn't been something entirely unusual lately, but usually it is around midnight and FP gets the honor because he is still up.

I went in, and picked him up and rocked him. I just don't get to do this anymore, and I miss it a little bit. We rocked for about half an hour, and I probably could have stayed all night, but FP was taking time off tonight and I wanted to hang with him.

You may have a hard time peeling this next baby off of me. FP said there is a reason that the youngest is referred to as the baby of the family.

Liz

I've only known her for a short time, but she is one of the awesomest ladies I've ever met. Her passing will leave a big hole, but a lot of wonderful memories for a lot of people.
Looking for a picture, I realized that tomorrow is her 86th birthday.

Even at night?

So in thinking about this whole potty training thing (which we started trying almost a year ago), I never considered the night time situation. You see, I wet the bed until I was almost twelve. Yes. It was a physical thing, and it SUCKED. sucked rocks and sand.

So because of my experience, I assumed the no diaper at night thing was something we'd tackle much later. But a friend shared an article that was the inspiration for project diaper dismissal, and that said we should forgo diapers altogether. Even at night. -and it might be working. Some nights have been wet free, but others, not so much. We limit liquids after supper, no sippy cup in bed any more, and she is very good about using the potty before bed.

I don't know if we should just say this isn't something we can MAKE happen, so just put her in a pull-up for bedtime, or or keep trying. Would she even let us put her in something for bed?

Vap-o-rub

Well, I guess it's VapoRub, but that isn't how I remember it.
Wanting to do something to calm Relia's cough (which really isn't that bad), now that cold medicines for children are taboo, we went old school and bought a tub of Vick's. The internet says that all the cool parents are putting the stuff on kid's feet instead of their chests now, so that is what we did. (It also says it can kill you and your whole family, so we'll be very cautious)

Our daughter gets a little too excited about the idea of anything medicine, so of course she was thrilled at the idea of foot medicine. Man, that smell takes me back. I don't remember any time it was actually used on me, but the smell quickly takes me back to our bathroom at home.

It seemed to help a little this afternoon, we'll see if it does the trick tonight.

Still crazy after all these months

I just cannot get enough thrifting. I have an hour for my lunch each day, and all of my friends are in another class that breaks for lunch a half an hour earlier than we do. I have never been one who likes to sit in a restaurant alone. So yesterday I got some lunch and sat in Wirth Park for a little while. Today, I went to the north side Value Village and only had 15 minutes to shop. I made out darn well for such a limited time.

I got another basket for our shoes. I am so into baskets lately. It started with the wicker trunk for the litter box, then I got one for Relia's shoes, a matched set for some DVDs/games, one for my bedside table, another set of 3 wire baskets that just look cool, and now this one. I used to be a basket hater (except for the ones my mom made). What has happened to me? I think it is because little hands are always grabbing for items left out on a table.

I picked up this IKEA hanging chair for Relia for $7. I have been eying it everytime we hang out in the toy department, because it looked like a wonderful cozy place for a kid to read. I hung it up on our porch on one of the never used swing hooks. Relia LOVES it. She is so cute peeking out while she swings.

Just because it is cute:


I found this clock which was marked "AS IS -For cabinet only". I thought it was nice looking, and it is super easy to replace a clock mechanism, so I grabbed it. Turns out the thing works, and has a pretty chime.

I have mixed feelings about chimes. I grew up with a chiming clock in our living room, and it never bothered me, but I know there are lots of people who are bothered by them while trying to sleep on someone's couch. My grandma had one that would not chime between 10pm and 6am. I appreciated that when I was staying there with pregnancy insomnia.

Now to figure out where to hang the clock...It is fascinating Ozzie.

UPDATE: I guess it works for a while. It stopped after 13 hours. Wonder what that is about.

Let's get crackin'

Micah's post on children and the kitchen reminded me that I have yet to share one of my few culinary talents with you: cracking eggs.

One of my high school jobs was working at the Renaissance Festival. It was truly a learning experience in many ways. My first year, yes there was more than one year, I worked the popover booth. To make each batch, we would crack about 60 eggs into a bowl and pour them into the mixer, which then got poured into a vat with a spigot.

I got a LOT of practice cracking eggs. The vat spigot took care of most of the shell, so us beginners weren't always as careful as we could have been. Only once did someone come back with almost an entire eggshell in their popover.

Anyway, if you ever come over for eggs, or are keen on watching me cook something with eggs, you will marvel at my ability to crack two eggs at once.

Monday in Willernie

Today my little darling slept in an extra hour and a half. Too bad I woke up at 3:30. Sigh

No time to be tired though, we had a big day planned Visiting Pat, Pudge and Liz in Willernie. We took the tour and were treated to a picnic lunch.

Got your ticket for the tour?

Here comes the Patty Wagon!

Going through security


souvenir photo (taken by Willernie's longest resident)

I couldn't copy this hairdo if I tried. The wind made it look so cool.

Sitting in Relia's Great Great Grandfather's chair looking out on the gnome garden

Ants on the picnic table were fun to play with

Pat said she just threw together our box lunches and a pretty jar of lemonade. I would really like to see what she does when she has time to really prepare. They were both beautiful and very yummy!

The ants go marching two by two, hurrah, hurrah

Big bites of the "apple thing" we brought. It was a little too sweet and rich for everyone except Relia

Thank you so much Pat, Pudge and Liz for a wonderful day. Pat, your house is beautiful. We didn't quite make it to Stillwater. Instead, we went home and took LONG naps. You wore us out!