Father's Day

Happy Father's Day! I will be a bit mushy and say that I am happy to have married such a great guy and the kids have such a wonderful dad. He illustrated that again this weekend, which kind of felt like a marathon of fun for the kiddos and incredibly exhausting (but also lots of fun) for the two of us.

Our fun-filled Father's Day weekend started out with "grandpa's day" breakfast with my dad and mom. We figured we'd better get to Dad early so he could spend the rest of the weekend working (as usual!). Then Katy helped her grandpa find his present - which was a new backhoe seat that had been hidden in the back of the car. Sam also got his present since it had been stored at Mom's house too. It had been "hidden" in the garage for at least the past 3 weeks but he didn't spot it until the day before Father's Day LOL. The highlight of the morning came while we were standing outside chatting. Dad had been telling Kaitlyn that he wanted to have a water fight with her, then had to explain what that was. Then she wandered off and we continued chatting. Next thing we know, there is Katy squirting Dad with a squirt gun! :) (which she had found in the basement and filled all by herself) Haha Dad - you got your water fight!

We went home for Ty's nap and Sam put together his new smoker while Kaitlyn played with some neighbor kids. Then it was off to the pool. The kids LOVED it. Usually Tyler is the quiet one and one of us holds him while we all follow Katy around. But he warmed up to it really quickly this time and even got daring enough to jump off the edge - well, Tyler's version of jumping which is sitting on the side, holding my fingers and sliding in. And once he discovered how fun that was he didn't want to stop. He also had fun in the lazy river and playing with the fountains and even laughed when Sam took him down the big slide. Kaitlyn did a lot of jumping off the edge too. She also loves the kiddie slide and went down it over and over, the lazy river, and the sprinkler that sprays her when she hangs on the rope. We spent much longer than usual at the pool and only quit because we were getting close to naptime. We had lunch at Dick's (thanks Dana! she saw Sam and comped our food), followed by ice cream cones since the kids had eaten so well. Usually eating out is a struggle but they just gobbled it up. Tyler was so funny with the ice cream. I was letting him share my cone and he didn't know how to lick it so he would close his lips and get some ice cream on them, then use his hand to smear it into his mouth. So I started sticking out my tongue out at him before each lick until he would copy me. But then he would forget and I'd have to stick my tongue out again. Oh the things we do as parents! :)

Thanks goodness for naptimes because we all needed a rest by that point. Then we were off and running again to do our weekend errand/grocery run. We must have been charmed this weekend because the entire day we didn't have any major melt-downs or whining sessions - woohoo!

This morning found us heading to Midway for breakfast with Sam's family. Kaitlyn played a rousing game of "I've got your nose" with Orvil and Krystal. We checked out the tiny hummingbird nest on top of one of the lights on the porch that now contains 2 tiny eggs (I think they look like jelly beans) for the 2nd year in a row. And after convincing Kaitlyn that Orvil was kidding and they wouldn't really lock her in the monkey cage, we were off to the zoo. Where we had a grand old time, of course.

Kaitlyn checked out the map first thing and decided she needed to see the zebras. Which happened to be at the far end of the and we ended up doing the quick tour version for most of the time. Though the alligators (she has been fascinated by them recently), the elephant, and the penguins did catch Katy's attention. She didn't seem to care for the monkeys though. Tyler watched everything intently from the stroller or Sam's shoulders. After seeing the zebras Kaitlyn's attention switched to the giraffes, then inexplicably to the snakes (eww). We were reluctant to go into the reptile and small animal house but it turned out to be Tyler's favorite part. He ran from one exhibit to the next looking at everything and even tried to climb into a couple of them.

We also had a ride on the new carousel, which would be another favorite for both kids. Kaitlyn HAD to ride a zebra and was very anxious the whole time we were standing in line that she wouldn't get her wish. Once Tyler realized we were in line for the carousel he couldn't wait and started kicking and screaming when I picked him up until the line started moving. They both enjoyed the ride, then Tyler threw another tantrum when I made him get off. Last stop was the train ride but we had to take a few minutes on the way there to let Kaitlyn get squirted with water by the elephant statue.


Everyone was exhausted by the time we headed home. Sadly our charmed weekend ended on the ride home and Tyler cried for about 20 minutes before falling asleep when we were only 10 minutes from home. Kaitlyn fell asleep about that time too but woke up when we stopped the car. The first thing out of her mouth (in a sleepy slur) was "I'm not tired." :)

Well, that was certainly a more detailed account of the weekend than I had planned! But I hope you enjoyed it, and that everyone had a wonderful weekend as well. Happy Father's Day to all you dads out there!