lake park

We squeezed some fun out of B urke Lake Park on the perfect 70 degree day.  The train cruised along slower than the last time I held a squirmy baby Keaton as it zipped along faster than I expected.  The ice cream was an added treat.  We found a little lean to house next door to the playground.  We played while we waited for the carousel music to call us over.  We took a ride I sat in front of Keaton on a little rider and Aiden on the big horse behind him, while we waved to daddy. Then we squeezed in a little more putt putt action.

tidbits

We had some fun visitors this past week with my cousin and her friend visiting from Ohio.  They played and laughed with us as we hunted sharks from the playhouse and hunted donuts on food trucks. I tried the chicken sandwich on the old bay donut this time and my goodness, I can hardly stop thinking about it!  

Our favorite little cousin buddy called to make some faces and raspberries with his cousins on FaceTime.

So many smiles from Aiden as he could hardly contain his excitement in his new classroom for the first time!  As we left, he asked what time he could come back the next day, but he has to hold his horses until next week.  Soon enough kiddo, slow down, mommy likes spending so much time with you guys in the summer, so she's getting a little verklempt thinking of you not getting home from school until nearly 4:15pm!  

Last year's first graders left some good advice for the incoming kids.  My favorite was the be sure you have "kindness" and "cicer's" (which I'm guessing you use for cutting?  That advice was thanks to C ourtney B utts who is right next to Aiden in the alphabet.  Too bad Aiden thinks it's too inappropriate to say her name out loud…)  The best part is that these characters are some of Aiden's new classmates, since he is in a first and second grade mixed age class (with the teacher we've heard so many rave reviews about!)   

The Halloween costumes are already out?!  Keaton changes his mind frequently - this day it was 30 seconds between for sure he wanted to be a donkey, and then nah, this red hat will make me a dragon!

I made this ridic donut muffins and inside some I hide a dollop of peanut butter.  Yummo.  Another yum was ordering pizza at the pool.  These guys can kill a pizza - who knows what our order will look like when they are teenagers!?

Dinner guests from Arizone were a nice treat even though the boys decided it was time to get pretty rowdy and the wind down to bed routine was reading about disgusting food around the world.

Our froggie friend reemerged about double the size recently.  I guess living in our wood pile is a nice life.

good list

The gladiolus were everywhere and I couldn't resist this big bunch for when we had dinner guests… I'd like some even when we don't have guests.  

These guys love the Dance Dance Revolution pads we got recently.  Oh, boy Aiden is really getting the hang of it, which is good because I heard they have them during rec time at his new school.

The new stairs are beyond wonderful.  The best part is that they were complete by the time we got back from Ohio, so it was really a treat to walk in to the new look.  I felt like we were on one of those tv shows, and it really is a huge transformation. 

My fun birthday presents included a octo hook I'd been looking for (sold out in VA, but I tipped off my sister that it was available in OH), and this day dream blanket I've wanted for such a long time. It's made with that swaddler muslin layered and it's so cuddly.  

The most amazing present was from Aiden who composed his very first song for the piano called My Mom's B-Day.  He was so excited to play it for me and tell me all about it.  

As belated presents I took everyone out for pedicures - It was the first time that we all had one together!  

cousins

Keaton shared his cold with Aiden, J and me while we were in Ohio, but we still snuck in a cousin photo shoot and a visit to Build a Bear. The photographer was a miracle worker and we were pretty happy with what we ended up with given these three squirmy guys.  When we get all the photos back I'll post more of them.  Once we got to Build a Bear, Keaton only wanted the light saber accessory (we got off easy with that!)  Aiden was disappointed the ninja turtles are sold out until September, but he made a pretty cool ninja puppy.

art museum

We left behind the dino chicken nuggets at the history museum, and snuck over to the art museum cafe for lunch.  That place is tasty and gorgeous!  We even snuck a peek at the knights… and found one just Aiden's size.

natural history 2

Part two at the Nat Hist museum because these guys couldn't get enough…  The Discovery room downstairs in awesome with so much hands on fun.

natural history

We hadn't visited the Natural History Museum in a long time, so we took our science center reciprocal pass for a spin on my birthday.  My favorite Lucy impression was my mom who had it down…  These guys were excited to see the dino bones (which won't be back on display in DC until 2019 so we'll have to get our fix in Cleve!)  Mr. Slippy Socks Cam made his way around pointing out all the fun stuff.  

We tried to spook Aiden by having PopPop go behind the Homo sapiens frame and be really still.  Aiden wasn't quite sure until he poked PopPop's face and he announced, "Please don't touch the displays!" ;)

this guy

Man o Man, do I miss this little charmer guy!  We're on the move to NOVA campaign!

bday

Huge thanks to my parents for hosting a fun painting party for everyone on my birthday.  The new deli on the main drag in DTW was our host complete with yummy treats and lotsa wine.  The artist got us geared up, and it was fun to see what everyone picked to paint!  My mom even thought of the boys and brought some fun art for them too.  J and Keaton turned in early that night (because Keaton brought the cold to share with everyone that I'm still getting over), but Aiden stayed around to play six year old art critic.  It was especially flattering when he told Julie he wanted to go all the way back to VA to get his piggy bank so he could buy her beach painting from her ;)

willo

We left our construction guys (new stairs are beyond awesome, I should post pics) early Saturday morning, and cruised straight to Willo-beeee!  We made really good time, and as we arrived we passed the parade kickoff point and they were just starting!  By the time we made it to the end of Waldamere the first float was passing by and showering the kids with candy.  It's like every kids dream right?!  We collected a big huge batch of candy!  The funniest part was we were so surprised to see my uncle in the Grand Marshall car and right behind him my sister and nephew dressed as a Gilligan Island character Thurston Howell III (for the contest to honor Gilligan's real life wife who was leading the parade, Dreama!)  Thurston ended up winning that costume contest against two other kids (including Aiden dressed as an impromptu Gilligan in his red sleeveless, hat, and his custom lei)  After the jeep portion of the parade geared up we made our way to the kid's zone where my parents and cousins were all helping out as the Heart of Willoughby.  Aiden's favorite treat from last year was back, the make your own cookie station.  It was a perfect day in good 'ol Wlby!

skating

Summer skating ended with a fun Movie Magic program. All the kids skated to a favorite movie theme song. Aiden was originally signed up to skate to Ghostbusters, but there were three kids in line for that song, so he switched to Star Wars. His costume was easy peasy so I can't complain. The late edition of the light saber was fun for him (this was the first time he was on the ice with it), but I think he was concentrating so much on waving it around that it may have slowed him up a bit. My camera kept going off when I was trying to zoom in, so I have a few snippets of Aiden's main part. It's fun to see the other kids in the group skate too.

Skating Movie Magic from LB on Vimeo.

tidbits

Fun mini shots:

Another fun playdate at the library meeting room with Keaton's school.  This time it was Camp Coop with tents galore, picnics, puppets, and a scavenger hunt with binoculars.  Aiden set up the fun little cards with animals all around the room and kids had fun finding them.

Cowboys and dogs running loose in the house!  Aah, that is one cute pup.

More pups at the Barker of Seville puppet show with really fun stick puppets and even a giant elvis dog costume ;)  The guy that owned the company (for over 40 years!) told some fun stories about knuckleheads as an intro to the show... always good to get there early ;)

More fun being library rats at another library...  This guy read all the Wimpy Kids this week and last, and can't wait for the next that comes out right after his birthday ;)

bounce

We had a day long pass to this bounce spot, where they took a lunch break and headed back.  Keaton was able to climb with all the big kids.  They liked playing with me, but they were even more excited when some other kids arrived.  It was so nice that it wasn't crowded!

good golly

Ms. Molly!  She played all sorts of games with food and fitness.  Then topped it off with balloon "wands" which of course every kid makes into a sword.  It was such a treat to run into one of Aiden's old school buddies.

putters

These guys like a good 18 around another new course.  Keaton practiced his flag hoisting skills after the kids in front of us showed them how they come out.  Aiden kept us moving right along with one hole in one!

peaches

These growth spurt guys were tiiired after a sleepy car ride out there.  Keaton even fell asleep in my arms on the tractor ride out to the peach patch.  We avoided the goopy, spotted peaches and managed to get a decent batch (we will bring you a bunch PopPop!).  Those little kids that can squirm into the unreachable spots really helped.

farm

We had a great time playing at the farm with our old friends.  A fun spot full of fun stuff!

tidbits

Little bits of life I'd like to remember:

We found the food trucks near Tysons!  We only had to search for over 40 minutes, but hey, we don't give-up easily when there are potential donuts as rewards.  The boys were my eyes as I drove around trying to find this huge groups of trucks - It was funny because they weren't really sure what a food truck looked like, but boy they were sure when we finally drove around the corner and found them!  They were out of the peanut butter glazed donut once we got there ;( it's popular for a reason, so we will be back!  In the meantime, I snapped these picks of a satisfied Aiden with his cinnamon glaze and and skeptical Keaton with his creme brûlée - which I loved but he thought the crispy edge was burnt, but wanted to lick out all the cream.

After dinner family tennis is great on mild days.  This summer is spoiling us with such great weather.  Now if we can just keep the bugs away…  Keaton runs around with his backpack playing ball boy while we try to avoid hitting him.  Aiden after so many weeks in tennis clinics really plays.

The make and take crafts at AC Moore are pretty fun.  The sculpy monsters the boys made looked just like Lego Mixel guys.

Play dates with Keaton's school continue - this time with a fun visit to the school playground. The bike path around the playground was hopping.  We also went to a fun neighborhood street party for National Night Out where the boys made friends very quickly with some new neighbors. Keaton is just like Aiden making friends with all the big girls that take good care of him.

We had a weekend of comedy where I went to a long-anticipated Seinfeld show at the Kennedy Center with my friend.  He was even funnier than I though he'd be with all new to me stuff.  Dinner on the Terrace ahead of the show was such a treat too!  Then I impulse purchased a very last minute single seat for J to attend the Jim Gaffigan show just up the road at Wolf Trap.

We had an invite to try out a new toy prototype at the Think Fun factory.  Aiden was thrilled by the laser challenge and very interested in the homemade parts they used for the test drive.  He was even more thrilled when they took us to the room full of all their games and told the boys that they could pick out whatever they wanted!  We took home three fun games including the brand new Robot Turtles which is a huge hit already.  It teaches kids the basic principles of programming and I think Aiden is really their target audience and it's amazing how Keaton catches on… I love games they can both play.

mr. baby chi chi

Keaton is giggling at this funny new helium booth app we found. Oh my, giggling non stop for a loooong time! I think his Aunt Lulu would be proud.  Whenever he gets cuddly and giggly like this in the morning he calls himself Chi Chi, and during these videos he upgraded that name to Mr. Baby Chi Chi.

My Movie 3 from LB on Vimeo.

Rough Transcript:
Bear Voice Keaton: I'm a baby Chi Chi and I like to touch my head.
Look at my mama's face she's so cute, gag ga ok gotta go. ok blah blah
I'm actually doing it harder - watch this: Bwahhh!

Ooh, mommy, I got a good one, My name is Mr. Baby Chi Chi - and I like to goo goo gaa gaa
Look at my mama, isn't she's so funny? I can't even stop cuddling her because she's so interested.
Are you so interesting mama? Um…look what she's doing...

Squirrel Voice: Goo gah gah, ok, I know this voice is like so funny, but I don't know if it's actually working, but I do know what it is, I'm actually doing it harder - so watch me: Hacky biggie Bwaah
Ok, Hi guys, My name is Keaton, and I don't know blah blah

Blah, blah, I like to dance around, blah blah
I like to use flashlights under my arm and then light my mama  taaadaa!  Hey! I'm actually…

Robot Voice: I like to shake and dance…I like to freeze dance... (unintelligible robot voice)

teds

Still waiting somewhat impatiently for the Ted's to open at Mosaic.  Months and months of coming soon!? I told J that they are probably working on all that wood paneling, but I'd eat there without it ;)  We hit the one at 14th street right around brunch the other day.  There are so many fun brunch places around there they have street music pumping.  The boys love the idea of dancing down the street ;)

tidbits

Some more bits of tid:

The end of season banquet for tennis where Aiden won a new racquet in the raffle.  He was pumped that it was red like his old racquet.  

These brothers continue to enjoy the library (where Keaton insists on thumbing through chapter books, and then tells Aiden is a "good one")  Aiden's been working hard on this giant marble race structure. We'll see how long it takes to finish.  Who doesn't love a costume for the pool?  Aiden got a new snorkel and Keaton this turtle getup which even has flippers for his fingers!

Giggle pusses are milking time with daddy.  They wrestle/hurt each other less if daddy wrestles with them.  Ice cream, chalking, comic book guys, and mall fun zones are favorites.

stories in art

It had been a while since we'd ventured in for the Stories in Art at the National Gallery.  This was the first time that Keaton was able to participate right along with the big kids.  He was so excited to raise his hand and actually get to tell her the shapes he saw in the Pantheon painting.  It was a Roman holiday themed topic with Iggy Peck Architect as the fun story.  It is a good warm up for Aiden's Italian classes at school this coming year.  

cousins

The cousins had a chance to play at Kid Junction for a long time the other day.  Everybody loves that place!  Thanks to Aunt Jess for sending along some fun photos.