The Accidental Boilermaker

It's our third touch-a-truck!  I think it keeps getting better and better.  And this year Oma and Grandpa were with us (my parents came over to help Nate fix up our deck).  We saw Curious George. Evelyn and Jameson each got a free book from an organization called Hope Books whose mission is to get books into the hands of as many kids as possible in Fort Wayne.   Both kids climbed into a garbage truck. And then ran up and down an empty semi trailer. They checked out the inside of a stretch limo. They stood on a bulldozer blade.  They also got to put their hand print on a snow plow. You would think climbing into trucks, pretending to drive, and honking the horn would get old after a while. But you'd be wrong. It's was pretty cold and windy outside, almost too cold for free ice cream.  Almost. We finished up riding the tricycles. Jameson couldn't really pedal, but Evelyn did a good job. ...

The zoo is open!  Maybe you heard about the baby giraffe that escaped yesterday ?  Well, we didn't see her today, but we saw lots of other animals. We picked Evelyn up from school and headed right for the zoo.  It was a cool, overcast day which is perfect for the zoo.  It wasn't busy at all.   Several animals are still indoors; it's still too cold for them to come out.  But there were still plenty to see. We got a nice up close view of the leopard. I was surprised the giraffes were out.  They really don't like the cold weather.   We ate lunch right by the zebras. Must pretend to be a butterfly. The orangutans are always a favorite.    One of the tigers was moving about.  Usually they are sleeping and hard to see. Can't miss an opportunity to climb on the komodo dragon.   By the time we made it to Australia it had started to drizzle, but Eve...

Evelyn's class particpated in the Tin Caps baseball reading program and as a result she got a free ticket to a game. Families can buy additional tickets and then they seat everyone from the same school together.  We sat with Evelyn's friends Adeline and Leighton. We (somehow) made it through the whole game and the Tin Caps won 8-2! Evelyn got her face painted and also got a pink balloon sword. We picked up a blue one to bring back to Jameson. Unfortunately, his popped almost immediately. So I took him to get a new one (they were free) but there weren't any blue and he only wanted blue and threw a tantrum.  Then the balloon and face painting people left so he didn't get a new one. Which made him even more upset. It was hard to explain that his tantrum and unwillingness to compromise on color was the reason he didn't get a new sword because well he's two. But he eventually calmed down and we were able to return to our seats and Evelyn shared her pink...

The butterfly exhibit is back at the botanical gardens.  Evelyn and Jameson did a great job being patient and gentle with the butterflies and were rewarded by getting to hold several in their hands. Some up close pictures of the butterflies. What rosy faces!  With the bright sun, it was super warm inside the butterfly tent.

Jameson had his first soccer lesson today.  Overall he did a good job. He didn't want to participate in every activity, but he did listen to his coach and stayed focused. Evelyn also did a good job.  She was content to sit and watch and cheer.  And cheer she did. The whole time I could hear her yelling "go JJ," "kick the ball," "good job!"  It was really sweet. I hope she is always her brother's biggest cheerleader.  I'm not sure why the kids put on the pennies, they don't scrimmage.  It was still cute.  Go soccer shots!

Amanda, Isaac, Joshua, and Aunt Celia came down for the last weekend of spring break.  Our big activity on Friday was ice skating.  It seemed like it took forever to get skates on 7 people! A nice lady took a group picture for us before we headed out on the ice. This was Isaac and Joshua's first time skating and they both did great.  The first time you do anything isn't easy, but they both persevered, would fall down, get back up, and keep going. Despite being spring break, the rink wasn't very crowded.  The kids skated for about an hour before deciding they were done.   Relaxing with Aunt Celia so the adults could skate on their own for a bit. On Saturday we went to McMillen park to play on the indoor playground.   The light game is always a favorite. Sunday morning we took a trip to Tom's for donuts before everyone had to leave for home.