Three weeks with the Cousins

Merryn and Annalise have been visiting Grandma for the last three weeks with their Mom (and Dad for part of the time). We have had a fabulous time playing with them and are sad to see the vacation come to an end.

Here’s a little bit of what we’ve done… hopefully I haven’t left out anything major, or gotten the details too messed up. Thanks to record high temperatures (all over 100 this week) we've spent a ton of time at Grandma's pool, and the children have LOVED every minute of it. All of them have made HUGE progress in the few short weeks that we’ve been together, trying new things and gaining confidence and strength in their abilities!


Thursday, 29 June - Everyone arrives safely and stop by for a few minutes to play at our house.

Friday, 30 June - Dinner and swimming at Grandma's. Grandma gives each child a pair of their own swimming goggles! (It took us a while, but we finally figured out how to get Sam's goggles to stay on his face without him looking like the Hunchback of Notredame.) And everyone also now have their own lounge chairs, complete with drink holders, for the deck.



Saturday, 1 July - Breakfast at Wheatfield’s, Dinner with Rita & David in Kearney, and fireworks at Sharon & Bills

Monday, 3 July - Family Pictures at Picture People, Lunch at Rainforest Cafe, and more swimming

Tuesday, 4 July - More Swimming, dinner, root beer floats, sparklers and fireworks

Thursday, 6 July - Sam goes to the Zoo with Merryn and Annalise while Rebecca and Emily are at horse back riding camp.

Friday, 7 July - Spanish Story Time at the Library with Aunt Elspeth and Merryn. Heard "Don't Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus" and "No Matter What." read in both Spanish and English.

Saturday, 8 July - Swimming at Grandma's - Emily goes down the pool slide for the first time this summer. Rebecca starts to practice floating on her back and doing the back stroke.

Tuesday, 11 July - Swimming at Grandma's - Emily goes down the pool slide all by herself! Rebecca practices doing a summersault in the water.

Wednesday, 12 July - City Band Concert in the Park, Children's concert.
Picnic dinner in the park. Ice Cream at Sylas & Mady's. Rebecca, mint chocolate chip; Emily - chocolate; Sam - Berry Sorbet - just like the little kid sitting outside the ice cream shop. Thanks to Aunt Elspeth who stood in line with the girls and Merryn for ages, everyone got a balloon figure from our favorite balloon man (we met him earlier this summer at a bank opening). Rebecca got a butterfly hat, Emily a Barbie doll, Sam and airplane hat, and Merryn got a doggie she could wear on her wrist.



Friday, 14 July - Slumber Party at Grandma's for all the grandkids

Saturday 15 July - Sam's 3rd Birthday. Spiderman Party at Grandma's with a few friends, swimming, dinner and visits from Grandma Muti and Grandpa Art, Suz and Joe.

Monday, 17 July - Rebecca's last t-ball game. Temperatures at the beginning of the game hovered around 100 degrees so Merryn and Annalise enjoyed the first inning with us and then headed for home.

Tuesday, 18 July - Swimming and dinner at Grandma's - Merryn introduces Sam to the Little People Wal-Mart truck and store ... it was very difficult for him to choose between the toys and the pool, but the pool finally won. Gonna have to look for that one to add to the Little People collection. Rebecca and Emily organize show using cheer's Emily has been learning in her Cheerleading class - they teach Sam and Merryn the cheers and attempt to square dance (not sure where that came from?).



Wednesday, 19 July - Swimming and dinner at Grandma's - Merryn and Annalise's last night before flying home. Spent time in the pool, Rebecca and Emily spent most of their time going down the slide or jumping off the side of the pool. Gotta love Speedo life vests!

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We'll be heading to Merryn and Annalise's house in August ... 9th - 15th. Peter, Paul, and Mary will be performing at Wolftrap that weekend, and we've got tickets to go and see/hear them in concert - pray for decent weather please! We are really looking forward to spending sometime in the DC area and to see the cousins on their turf for the first time!

Happy Birthday Brother!

Today is Uncle Joe's birthday and so in honor of my children's beloved Uncle, here are just a couple of my favorite tribute pictures of him with them.

Potatoes and Aquanet

Monday, 3 July 2006

GR's friend Dime spent the weekend with us for all the 4th of July festivities. Part of his goal this weekend was to construct a Potato Gun – something he’s been planning for years. He spent a lot of time researching designs and perfecting them, purchased the materials needed Saturday and then used Bob's workroom to construct the gun. Between the two of them, they got it working and this afternoon after testing it, they let us ammeters have a turn firing the beast. It was so cool!

Once they determined just the right amount of hairspray (aka accelerant) to put in, the potatoes were easily able to clear the tree line! I have video of Sam shooting the gun, and as soon as I find a way of cutting the size down a bit, I'll post it. So you can experience the sound of the gun going off, and the distance the potatoes traveled.

Horsey, Horsey, On it's Way

Wednesday and Thursday, 5-6 July, 2006

For Rebecca and Emily's birthdays Grandma signed them up for a two-day horse camp at a ranch in southern KC. They had an amazing time learning about the different parts of a saddle, how to brush a horse, clean a bridle and saddle, how to walk around a horse and how to ride a horse.

The camp was for 3 hours each day and they were with 7 other kids (1 boy and 6 girls). They broke the kids up into three groups of three... one group would ride, while the others did a craft or worked with the gear. All of them really enjoyed the camp, and we had beautiful weather for those two days (low 80s).

Sam really wanted to ride a horse too, so while the girls were at camp, I took him to the Deanna Rose Farm (about 100 streets north of this ranch) and he got to ride a horse too.

We're looking into places a little closer to home so the girls can do some more horse back riding. They were very upset when the camp was over and want to make sure it wasn't going to be their last opportunity to ride horses.

Here are pictures of the girls with their horses... Emily has Bob, Rebecca has Dapper and then there's a picture of the pony Sam rode at the farm.







After their first day, Becca and Emily insisted on taking an apple or carrots the next day to feed their horses. Since I didn't have any carrots, the girls took apples. Emily took two apples with her (I'm still not sure why) and when we got to camp, everyone had something to feed their horse, except the little boy - either he didn't hear he could bring something to feed his horse, or didn't remember to tell his mother - anyway I asked Emily if she'd be willing to let him have her 2nd apple so he'd have a treat for his horse and she happily agreed to give it to him. His mother was so grateful at Emily's willingness to freely give her son her other apple.