A Beautiful Start to the Week

It was such a nice day today that I dragged the girls outside every chance I could get. While they might have been reluctant at first, it definitely put everyone in a better mood. At least until this evening when they were so tired from playing outside and skipping rest that they were ready for bed before we even left for MiniM.E.'s evening Tae Kwon Do.

A New Do

Today LittleL.G. insisted I cut her hair like BabySlimJim's. I'm not sure what prompted the desire to be hairless. Possibly BabySlimJim's attraction to her golden locks. Or maybe the dislike of having me detangle the nest of hair she makes while sleeping. Or my constant nagging about putting her hair up, only to have her take it out after fifteen minutes (along with a good chunk of hair). Whatever the reason, while I feel like it's her hair and it will always grow back, a buzz cut seemed a little extreme. After researching some short hairstyles, we agreed to try something in between to see if it was short enough for a couple weeks.

she seems happy- I'll take it!

Just a Thursday

The beginning of the week had us so busy and with last night's late night, everyone was tired... well... almost everyone... 

Our special treat for today was a playroom-Olympics-watching-camp-out. The girls were so tired they couldn't even stay awake until the Olympic coverage started!

Playground and Summer Weather Wednesday

Since today was supposed to be in the 70s we headed to our favorite downtown playground to meet up with a friend MiniM.E. hardly gets to see because of school. While it was warm, it wasn't quite as nice as the girls make it look in these photos. We started playing on the playground equipment but by the end of the morning everyone was making ice cakes frosted with mud and they were all soaked from the puddles!

In the afternoon, this guy seemed interested in playing outside.

So we took out the rollerblades

And floated some paper boats on the awesome "rivers" made by all the melting snow

Later in the evening it was owl prowl- and what a perfect night for it! It was too dark for photos, but we did hear an owl (or was that a dog?!?!).

The funniest part of our day was this promo they were running at Stewart's, where we stopped for ice cream. If you took your photo with the sasquatch and some jerky you could enter to win a gift card. But LittleL.G. didn't understand that it wasn't real and was terrified so we had to turn the cut out around while we ate. MiniM.E. couldn't resist the photo op!

Play Date Tuesday

Our long-lived play group has had a hard time finding time in our schedules to get together since Molly's friends are both in school and can't really meet until after 3:30. We tried meeting up at the community center where MiniM.E. and A. took dance in the fall, which worked, but was a bit stressful and also... at a community center. And now we are all taking a music class together, but it doesn't leave us time for chatting or for the kids to play.

So we were all so excited to just hang out and spend the day together. We played inside, we played outside, we rode bikes, and played in the snow. It was so nice and so relaxing and the kids all had a blast.

The World Awareness Children's Museum

It is break week. Since we are homeschooling, in the past we have tried our best to leave for break week to avoid the crowds at all the kid-friendly places. But this year, MiniM.E. has missed her friends that are in school so much that we wanted to stay around to have some play dates with the kids she never gets to hang out with anymore.

Today we met up with some friends at the World Awareness Children's Museum for their Chinese New Year festival. While the noise and excitement were a little much for our friends, and they had to leave early, we stayed and played for a while and had a good time playing even with the crowd of people.

This afternoon we went outside to play one last time (hopefully?!?!?) in the snow before the warm weather comes mid-week

A Weekend with Uncle Billy and Aunt Donya

We took Thursday to recover, then on to more excitement! Friday night Uncle Billy and Aunt Donya drove up from Long Island to spend the weekend with us.

We kept them busy Saturday by taking them to Dinosaur BBQ for lunch and then to the New York History Museum in Albany.

There was even a carousel on the fourth floor! (Though the highlight of the trip was definitely the four flights of escalators!)

To make our day even crazier, on a whim on the way back from Albany we decided to drive completely the opposite direction to go to the fireworks at the Winter Festival at Lake George. I wasn't sure how the kids would handle it after a big day and lots of driving, but the girls LOVED it!

Sunday the girls, Daddy and Uncle Bill and Aunt Donya went to see Peter Rabbit at the movie theater while BabySlimJim practiced his crawling at the play area.

Thanks for coming Uncle Billy and Aunt Donya!

White Water Bay: Take 4!

It keeps getting better and better. We went with friends again, which definitely makes the experience more fun.

After the moms and kids arrived, the dads met us after work and we stayed and played at the waterpark into the evening. 

 

The kids had so much fun playing. After a bit of downtime...

We ate dinner at Johnny Rockets. While it was certainly not stellar (which was expected after our previous experiences) LittleL.G. certainly enjoyed her brownie Sunday for dinner, and after we ate I took the kids while the other grown ups dealt with the mediocre service.

After dinner it was "kids go crazy time" while the grown ups tried to watch some olympics. Once the kids were tired enough to sleep, we tried to stay up to actually watch but I guess we were tired too because we fell asleep right away!

The only part of the trip that was a little tricky was this morning. BabySlimJim and MiniM.E. were up early, but LittleL.G. missed her rest, went to bed late, and is a bit under the weather so she needed extra time to sleep. And our family friends are late risers. So we left the room and roamed the hotel for what ended up being hours... At least BabySlimJim didn't know any better, and MiniM.E. was a good sport about it.

After eating breakfast and packing up, it was on to more playing!

Late afternoon it was time to call it quits before everyone melted down. It was a great couple days and just what we needed after a hard couple winter months. See you next year White Water Bay!