Girls' Weekend in Chicago!

This weekend Mommy, Esther, Miriam and Grandma W. went to visit Aunt Karen in Chicago.

Miriam:  I liked doing a butterfly puzzle and playing a game.  I liked the zebras at the zoo.  I liked playing in the car and the bus and in the house at the children's museum.  And I liked the climbing thing at the museum too.  I liked riding the bus in Chicago.

Esther:  My favorite things were eating ice cream at breakfast, going to the zoo, and going to the children's museum.  I loved riding the carousel at the zoo!

We rode the bus all around!

We went to the zoo!

Grandma bought us souvenirs at the zoo!

We ate ice cream at breakfast!

There was a map of Chicago on our 

table at McDonald's on Navy Pier!

We went to the Chicago Children's

Museum on Navy Pier.

Juan met us there too!

Miriam loved taking in the sights on the bus!

We also stopped at a playground!

We made homemade popsicles!

We had a really fun weekend in Chicago!

Boys Weekend - Day 2

Day 2, reported by Peter:

We went to the Tiger's game. And the White Sox beat the Tigers. And I was so unhappy with the White Sox for beating the Tigers. I watched Herbie and the Cars movie on the way to Detroit. If only Aunt Elaine had been in Detroit, she could've gone to the Tiger's game with us. And on the way home we stopped at Applebees for dinner!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

And then when we got home, we caught fireflies in the back yard!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Daddy put them in a jar and I put them in my bedroom. Fireflies are my favorite kind of beetle.

Boys Weekend - Day 1

Peter and I successfully completed Day number 1 of our boys weekend. Here is the report, dictated to me by Peter.

We went to Craig's Cruisers. I did the race cars. And I did the semi-truck video game. I raced a motorcycle race game with Daddy. We did the bumper boats and a little bit of my shorts got wet. And I got even more wet when we shot our water rockets that we made. We raced in the Go-karts.

We went to Real Food Cafe for breakfast! Yeah!!!!!!!! We ate ice cream at DQ at 10:00 in the morning!!! Yeah!!!!!!!

For Day 2, we are going to a Tiger's game with Grandpa K!!!!!!!!!!!! Yeah!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Playworld!

Today Esther had her friend Sarah over, and we were hoping to go to the Meijer Gardens.  Unfortunately, the weather did not cooperate at all, so we went to Playworld instead.  The kids had a great time running, jumping, climbing, and getting really tired!

Camp McCaul

For Christmas this year, we made the decision with Jeff and Renee to have the cousins over for sleepovers instead of buying each other toys.  Really, this is also a gift for the adults because we each get a night to ourselves!

Renee dubbed our kids' sleepover "Camp McCaul," and they even got t-shirts!  They thought those were pretty cool.  They had fun watching a movie and eating popcorn last night, and today they got to have pancakes, went to a park, played outside, and decorated mugs.  They had a great time!  We're looking forward to having Ty and Cassie over here in August.

While the kids were there, Casey and I enjoyed a stay at the Leonard at Logan Bed and Breakfast right here in the Heritage Hill area of Grand Rapids. It was a beautiful place, and I would highly recommend it!

Cousin Fun!

Today we got to have Ty and Cassie here for the day.  The kids had a great time playing together, especially outside in the kiddie pool!

Happy July 4th!

Since Jeff had to work on Saturday, we decided to postpone the annual July 4th post-parade brunch until today.  We had a great time hanging out with Jeff, Erin, Anna and Elizabeth!  We enjoyed our yummy brunch and played.  Erin had fun red, white and blue nail polish, so the girls did manicures and pedicures while the boys played with pop bottle rocket launchers and went to the park to fly airplanes. 

In the afternoon we played outside for a while and then headed to the pool.  We picked up a pizza for dinner, and then went to Culver's for ice cream with Grandpa and Grandma K.  What a great holiday!

Planes, Planes, Planes!

Yesterday I bought the kids some rubber band powered balsa wood planes. It also caused me to finally purchase a few parts for my radio controlled airplane that took a rather "hard" landing a couple of years ago.

Since Peter and I were having such great luck with the rubber band planes, he and I decided to take the "big" plane for a spin. It was a little windy, which makes it tricky (and gives me excuses to explain any hard landings), but other than a "taxi-ing" issue which directed the plane into my car....it all went fairly well.

Peter has already decided we will be out there again tomorrow......and he is wondering when he gets to take over the controls.

Boys and their toys.

Below picture taken by Peter.

One happy kid.

Cooling off Poolside.....

July 4th Parade

For some reason Kentwood chose to do their July 4th parade on July 2 this year.  It was a beautiful morning and we enjoyed the parade with our friends Erin, Anna and Elizabeth (unfortunately Jeff had to work), and also Grandpa and Grandma W. 

We enjoyed seeing my Uncle Carl and cousin Chuck in the parade again too!