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Just returned from a great trip out to see my brother and his family. It was wonderful. We celebrated my Godson's first communion and enjoyed time with the whole family. My mom went with me, which was great! How often do you get to go on a trip with your mom as an adult? It was really nice and the traveling was all very easy. All 4 planes arrived early and the drive from the airport to Jeff's was amazingly beautiful.

And now we are home. I had started to miss the kids and Jim. Laura was super glad to see me but Adam has a huge grudge against me. He really latched on to his Daddy while we were gone, which is so great for both of them. I can handle a little cold shoulder. I'm sure he'll get over it soon, right?

And Adam has really latched on to Gramma Ann, too:

Recycling a birthday balloon

Mother's Day

Painting

I had a really good time cleaning these sweet, chubby little hands.

Doll crib

Laura and I saw a fancy doll bed at a garage sale. I made the comment that we didn't need to buy it, we could just make one at home. Well...of course she remembered that off-handed comment, so we spent one afternoon coming up with a design. It was nothing like my original plan, but Laura had very specific plans and really articulated them well to me, so we could put this together.

I cut the slats into a cardboard box that I literally remember being in Jeff's closet 30 years ago, holding vacuum packed wheat so we wouldn't starve when the end of the world came (I still have 5 cans and a grinder, just in case...). And Laura used marker to color the remaining cardboard.

(she wasn't in the mood for a picture)

Eggs, eggs, everywhere!

The latest count on the duck eggs is 6. Can't wait to see them waddling around!

And I recently bought a couple ghost shrimp for our aquarium, and look! One looks suspiciously pregnant. The other has a completely transparent abdomen, so I'm guessing we'll either have baby shrimp soon, or more food for the beta.

Throwing rocks in OK

I found these pictures of the kids throwing rocks back in OK. Cute stuff and good memories.

Laura's puppet show

Another long one...

I apologize for the wobbly camera; Adam was helping me.

My monkeys

Dodge Nature Center Farm Festival

We decided it was too cold to go to our planned Cinco de Mayo celebration, but since we were nearby, we stopped by Dodge Nature Center. It turned out to be the day of their Farm Festival. More $$ than planned, and we were still outside in the cold (and intermittent sleet), but it turned out fun for all.

A red horse

Jim said this is the same tractor his grandpa had. Cool!

Finches on our front porch

They've already grown up and flown away, but I found this photo on my camera today.

Score

A fantastic, quiet 10 minutes in our house...

Musical stairs

Adam update

Adam's been a busy kid. His newest feats:

He currently says: light, Daddy, out(side), up, down, book, ball, hi

He currently signs: Daddy, ball, hi, open, shoes, closed, hat, hair, diaper change, eat, water, yes

He points to noses, eyes, mouthes, ears, elbows and toes on request.

Sleeping is going GREAT (knock on wood)

He's interested in using blankets at night and says "cuddle up" whenever he sees one. (Actually it sounds like "up", but I think that's what he means.) He prefers his big flannel one that Uncle Bob and Aunt Kate made for him last Christmas.

He likes slides and says "wheeeeeee" anytime he sees one.

He is really into specific books anytime of day (Goodnight Moon, Tails, Blue Hat Green Hat, Toys, I Can Clap, Toes Ears Nose, etc)

He likes puzzles, especially the one with all the little doors and magnets that go inside.

He likes dogs a lot and barks when he sees one.

He likes cats a lot and says meow when he sees a picture of one.

This morning, he started crawling around pretending to be a dog, copying Laura who was pretending to be Jill.

He still loves to carry around several thin things like puzzle pieces, magnets, etc. Yesterday it was green tea packets. He'll carry them around all day.

Laura's Gulf of Mexico Cleanup Plan

Laura and I were talking about the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico and she offered a solution. Here it is, the best that I can describe it:

Put up a wall to keep all the birds in Minnesota until the oil is cleaned up.

Lay down a flat fence to keep the fish down in the water, then use a vacuum that doesn't need any hands to suck up the oil.

It sounds like she really understands what happened and has the right idea for fixing it. Coincidentally, we recently mixed some oil and water to see how the oil floated on top.

She really wants me to send her plan to the people doing the cleanup to let them know how it should work. She said, "Hurry, lets go send it now because the fish are dying." Aside from hoping that she doesn't have oil spill nightmares, I am going to spend some time thinking about how to answer her request to send it to someone. Maybe posting it here will be enough to satisfy her. But maybe not. Maybe I'll send it to FEMA? Or whoever is doing the cleanup. We will probably both learn a lot through this.

And Aunt Kim suggested putting oil on a feather, and then cleaning it with dish soap to show Laura how they will help the birds. I think we might do that tomorrow.

Wildlife Update Update

I noticed that I couldn't see the duck egg anymore, so I poked around in there. Voila! There are now 2 eggs and they are covered nicely with straw. We're back on!! I also just saw the ducks land in the neighbors yard again for some food. I'm so glad. Now I have to make myself leave them alone.

But really, what are they doing here? There isn't water anywhere nearby for the ducklings to walk to. Maybe we should put a kiddie pool the front yard? The neighbors would love that!

Wildlife Updates

Some sad news that was almost happy. When a repairman came to fix our front window, he was surprised by a duck flying out from under a bush by our front door. Apparently she had started a nest and we found 1 egg.

Unfortunately, she hasn't been back. Bummer. I very, very briefly considered incubating the egg ourselves, but I thought long term about the result of that science experiment - our very own mallard duckling. What do we do with that? Nope, not gonna happen. So the sad little egg is sitting there waiting for its momma and I am desperately hoping she will come back to try again. It would be so fun to have little ducklings living in our front bush. Sigh...

The birds in our wreath on the front porch grew up and moved out before I got a picture. From what I could tell from checking on them regularly, sans camera, one fell out of the nest early on and the other 4 survived jam packed into the tiny little nest. Hope they return next year!

Laura's camera

I finally downloaded Laura's pictures when she filled it up with almost 700 shots. These are the most notable. She obviously had some help with some of them. I left out the page by page documentaries of several library books.

Did it ever actually look like this? Is it really going to do that again? Say "no", please!