Zoo

The weekend after our Niagara trip my mom took the children to a very special breakfast at the zoo for Smithsonian members only.  She bought tickets well in advance and planned to take her grandchildren by herself for a special morning at the zoo and she documented it on her iPhone.

They had a fantastic time and from what I hear my children saved all their good behavior for Grandma.

Only a Grandma would stand in a face painting line for 40 minutes to get the best face painting EVER.

According to my mom, Jack was the darling of the zoo.

My mom bought them those stuffed animals at the zoo and they have each become attached to their respective animals.

Jack insists that his stuffed cheetah is a tiger and he calls it "Roar."  He sleeps with it at nap time and bed time.  It took a few times of him asking for "Roar" before I figured out what he meant.

Stuffed Panda.

Real Panda (below).

Thanks Mom!

My cool sister

My sister helps me to keep me aware of any new popular things I should know about.  Like the new Korean song "Gangam Style."
She introduced me to the song and I watched it on you tube after 400,000,000 other people had already watched.  My sister posted a video of her son dancing to it, so I had to do the same here.
My children LOVE this song.  This is the first time they are hearing it:

Niagara Falls

We went to Niagara Falls a few weekends ago for the Mighty Niagara half marathon that Jim and my dad ran.  Before the race we went to visit the falls.  It was a stormy morning, and a little cold and rainy.

Then we went on Maid of the Mist and Jack was furious that we put a plastic poncho on him.

That's Canada behind us.  We don't have passports so that was as close as we got to Canada.

Then Jack cheered up.

Then the boat came to pick us up.

Lilly and Jack weren't crying but they weren't thrilled with the boat ride either.

Then the sun came out and we could actually see the falls.

Below are the American Falls. It wasn't as sunny in America.

More boat pictures....I don't want to spoil it for anyone but no one vomited on or off the boat. Win!

The other side of the American Falls.

More pictures later...

Pinkeye

I still have two weekend trips that I would like to post about, but it is taking me longer to sift through pictures than I anticipated.  In the mean time I would like to give you a glimpse into the past two days at my house courtesy of my phone pictures.

Tuesday afternoon Jack woke up from his nap with a fever of 102, out of the blue.  Wednesday morning Lilly and Jack woke up with fevers and various pains, including but not limited to a suspicious swollen/pink eye.

(At the doctor.)

I took them to the doctor and the doctor explained the diagnosis in complex medical terms.  It sounded to me like a complicated head cold accompanied with pinkeye for Lilly.  I didn't really believe she had pinkeye, look at her eye, it's really not that bad. However, I canceled piano lessons and music classes and stayed home in bed watching cartoons ALL DAY.

Thursday morning Lilly woke up with zero puffiness, no visible pink to her eye, and no fever.  I took her late to school but Jack was still sick so I canceled more piano lessons and we watched more cartoons in bed.

While Lilly was at school I found rotting squash and zucchini in my cupboard that I had forgotten about and spent 30 minutes cleaning and disinfecting and trying not to vomit from the rotting flesh smell. Meanwhile Jack REFUSED to take a nap so we watched more cartoons.

Lilly came home from school and told me that her eye was hurting all day.  She then asked if she could paint her own nails by herself without my help.  I decided to allow her that freedom and not interfere.  Also, Jack and I were still busy watching cartoons.

We then spent 30 minutes cleaning up nail polish, which was a very difficult thing to do.  Side note- I did not get angry at all about the nail polish and we laughed the whole time cleaning it up.  This was a superior parenting moment that I am bragging about.

While we were cleaning up the nail polish Jack was screaming for milk and I told him he needed to wait which made him very upset.  Once I resurfaced from the bathroom I saw that Jack was either trying to help or acting out in anger because he didn't receive his milk.

After I put the children to bed Lilly called to me that her eye was hurting and I went into to check on her to find her eye super pink and puffy and she had a fever.  Glad to know I sent her to school thinking the doctor was wrong about pinkeye.

This morning Lilly woke up with more eye pain and a fever.  Jack woke up super congested.  Hence we are home for the third day in a row.  Someone might go insane.  Hard to say who will be the first to crack.

On the upside we got 2 new windows installed this morning.  I love getting new things installed and it makes me want to have everything new.

One new window in the kitchen...

As you can see through my beautiful new kitchen window, it is a sunny and lovely fall day outside. Not the best day to be home sick.

One new window in our bedroom to replace the previous rotting window.

The window in the kitchen is the most exciting.  I didn't take a before picture, but imagine a window from 1972 with rotting wood and holes to the outside that allow in bugs.  Actually imagine that for both windows.

New windows are very exciting and give me hope that the children will be healthy soon and we can rejoin the outside the world again.

Picture update.

We had several pumpkins pop up in our garden this year. 1 large pumpkin good for carving and 5 small pumpkins. Of course by "we" and "us" I mean Jim. Either way it is very exciting to have pumpkins growing in your yard. I love pumpkins and fall and Halloween, coupled with Jack's birthday at the end of October, it just might be my favorite time of the year.  

Jack and Lilly were very excited about the pumpkins on the porch.

Then the sky was beautiful, Jack took a nap, Lilly ran for president, 

and the spiders took over Danville. 

(That is my way of addressing all my random pictures in one post.)

Can you see the crazy webs in between the trees below?  Because we had a mild winter the spiders have taken over the town.  The exterminators said it is the worst spider hatching season they have ever seen. Isn't that gross?  

Luckily I am not really afraid of spiders or I would be having a nervous breakdown.

Webs in the chain link fences all over town. (These web pics are phone pictures.)

Jim found one of the spiders responsible for all the webs.

This why Pennsylvania needs winter!  The end.

Gettysburg

My mother invited Lilly and myself to a fashion show tea party at Gettysburg.  She planned to attend the tea with her book group and she invited us to join the party.  I forgot my camera and we didn't think to use my mom's iphone until the end.

There were three courses, tea sandwiches, scones, and dessert.  Along with tea in pretty cups.  All served outside on tables under a tent with white linens.  Very pretty.

During the tea party there was a civil war fashion show.  They had 8 or so women dressed in full hoop skirts who walked around and gave detailed information about how the women of the civil war era dressed.  The women of the civil war era wore long sleeves and 7 layers in the summer.  They claim that they were cooler than we were today because the layers were away from the body (by a giant hoop skirt) and they wore 100% cotton which is much cooler than polyester blends.  I just don't believe them.

(This woman is dressed in her formal ball gown attire.)

While Lilly and I were at the fashion show Jim and Jack checked out the Gettysburg museum and cyclorama.  I admitted that I might one day want to look at the museum and maybe the battlefield.  Maybe.  If you think I am bitter and hateful about the civil war, I am.  We spent many a childhood vacation at historical locations, a lot of them being civil war battlefields and I just can't get on board with visiting under my own free will.  However, I feel it might come soon.

Either way, we had a great time at the fashion show and Lilly loved it all.  Grandma bought Lilly a special porcelain tea set as a souvenir and Lilly loves the set.  We have already had several tea parties at home.  Lilly and I both agree that we would like to have a hoop skirt sometime in the future.  My sister and I used to call them puff dresses and seeing a reenactor in a puff dress was always the highlight of any historical trip.

It was definitely a great introduction of Gettysburg for Lilly and hopefully she can be a mature adult and enjoy historical outings, specifically involving 19th century U.S. history.

September update.

September
1. End of the day of the first day of school.
2. Jack and Lilly meet at the end of the day of school.
3. Blue moon.
4. New bike from papa.
5, 6, 7 Jim gets old.
8. Jack asleep.
9. Lilly's cute face.