I'm Leaving On a Jet Plane...

We enjoyed Granddad's visit although it seemed much too short. He flew over to visit us as a mini-vacation and because he knows how hectic our schedule gets when we are in Baton Rouge because we always feel so rushed around between both Stuart and my family. It was nice getting some quiet quality time with him at our own home.

We headed to Baton Rouge to spend the 4th of July weekend visiting with the rest of the family. We headed out bright and early to get to the airport. Nicholas was proud to have his own suitcase which Grandmother Owen had given him a while back. He didn't want any help with it at all.





We arrived in plenty of time to grab some Starbucks and watch the planes.





Granddad Owen was excited to be able to fly back next to Nicholas. He talked all about the plane and explained what was going on as we went along. He talked about how cars look like little ants and Nicholas commented that the little white cars must be the termites! The flight was short and all went well.



Once we arrived, Stuart needed to get a rental car. It was funny seeing him rent a car from Thrifty Car Rental since he worked there for so many years when his dad owned it. It was where he was working when I met him back in college. We told Nicholas about it but he didn't seem too interested. I guess all kids go through having to hear their parents reminisce about the old days when they really don't care to hear about it :)



We headed over to Grandmother Owen's house and picked up Uncle Steve Owen for lunch at Drusilla's Seafood. We had a nice lunch and got to catch up on what has been going on with everyone.





When we dropped Uncle Steve off at work again, we couldn't just leave the Rainbow property without at least playing on a few things! Uncle Steve was happy to play too, as always! He's just a big kid at heart.



We took Grandmother Owen back to her house and spent some more time with her. She said that she had a gift for Nicholas to open each day that he was there. Nicholas got a little laptop computer that teaches phonics. He loves it and seemed to naturally know how to play the games on it.

Just Hanging Out

We spent today just hanging out around the house. I had to go get a new cell phone and start packing for our trip to Baton Rouge. Meanwhile, Nicholas and Granddad just had good ole fun together including eating fresh watermelon! Who doesn't love that!

We had dinner at Cantina Laredo and believe it or not, we were too stuffed for our after dinner trip to Starbucks!

Of course, I had to get a picture of Nicholas snuggled up in Grandad's lap as they read bedtime stories!

Granddad is here!

Granddad Owen comes to visit us once or twice a year. Nicholas absolutley loves these visits. He likes to wake Granddad up in the morning, show off his toys to him, and play with him non-stop. This visit was no different. Nicholas even tried "riding horsey" on Grandad's foot like he used to as a toddler but he has gotten too heavy for that ride now.

We welcomed Granddad last night with a trip to one of his favorite restaurants here, Mikado's Hibachi. Yum and Fun all in One. Wow, I just made that up. We always have a great time watching the chef prepare our food right at our table. Nicholas even knows the sequence that they follow and reminded our chef about the onion volcano that he still needed to do!

This morning we needed a little wake up call so we headed to Starbucks. I love to just sit and talk over coffee, even if it is decaf. It's a little hard to relax with Nicholas there who loves to chat with the man next to him who is trying to work on a presentation or something. However, we all had fun.





Nicholas loves their Strawberries and Cream Frappacino. It's a pretty good strawberry milkshake if you haven't tried one before. However, he kept getting "cold headaches" from drinking too fast. When he gets them, he puts his hands on his head and then comes over to me for me to "warm" up his head. I've tried to explain that this doesn't help it go away but there's just no convincing him.



Today we took Granddad out to try his hand at Letterboxing. He is good at figuring out clues and we thought he would like this. He did! Our first clue took us to a cemetery in Argyle. The clues were great and easy to follow. Nicholas followed them well and found his way to a tree stump. He then had to think about which was the left and right sides of the stump in order to know where to look for the hidden letterbox.



He picked up the box and Granddad helped him open it. Inside was the log book and special rubber stamp. We stamped our logbook with their stamp and made a note about the date and location. Then we used our own stamp to stamp their logbook so the owner would know that we had visited their letterbox. We discreetly hid the box back where we had found it. On to the next box which wonderfully was in the same cemetery!

The clues for the next box began at a historical marker and a bell so we took a moment to learn a little about the area and the cemetery.



The clues then directed us to the back of the cemetery behind a gravestone shaped like a podium. The clues suggested that we stand at the podium and "talk" to our audience. Granddad was happy to oblige! Silly Granddad!



We followed the rest of the clues but had trouble with the last one. There were lots of brush around and we just couldnt' figure out which was the "small patch of bushes" where the letterbox was hidden. We looked all over but eventually had to give up.

We headed south for our next letterbox hunt to some property owned by the Corps of Engineers. This location has three letterboxes on it so we were sure to have good luck here.



We had a good time on the hike but the brush was apparently much more grown up than when the box was placed back in January as we soon lost the trail we were following. We made it through the tall brush with Nicholas riding on Granddad's shoulders. It took us a bit but we were able to meet up with the clues later on and Granddad found the old hollow log we were looking for. However, there was no box to be found.

We really didn't mind too much since we were having fun anyway.

Nicholas discoverd some animal tracks and some "whole grain wheat" (that's really what he called it too)...





I found some pretty wildflowers...



And Granddad made friends with a grasshopper!



We had to give up on the last two letterboxes because my pregnant self couldn't stand the heat for much longer. However, from a distance, we did see the tree in the shape of an arch which housed the second letterbox at this site but we didn't go hunting for it.

We got cleaned up and when Stuart got home from work, we headed out to Babe's for dinner for the best chicken in the Metroplex! Nicholas seemed to enjoy flirting with our waitress. She even invited him out on the dance floor with her when the wait staff all danced to The Hokey Pokey!







Here's Nicholas and Daddy picking out songs on the old fashioned juke box.



We rolled our full bellies out the door and headed home - tired, full, but happy. Nicholas wanted to show Granddad how to play Lego Star Wars so the guys stayed up a while goofing off.



But it didn't take long for everyone to find their beds and crash for the night.

Working with Daddy in the Kitchen

Nicholas loves to work with me in the kitchen when I'm cooking. However, this weekend, he got a new experience of helping Daddy in the kitchen. But they weren't cooking. They were installing new kitchen countertops together!



We emptied out the cabinets underneath the countertops. Then Stuart started pulling out the old ugly pink colored counters. Nicholas loved having the cabinets empty so he could play in them!







At one point, as Stuart was working on attaching the new countertops, he needed to put some weight on the counter while he secured it to the cabinets. Nicholas had been playing knights and castles (note the foam sword in its "holster") but he quickly volunteered to be a weight for Daddy.



Daddy had some saw horses set up in the living just to hold the counter pieces up off the floor. However, that was too exciting for Nicholas to stand and he ended up climbing up on the new counter and pretended to saw and sand it with his little plastic tools. What a hard worker he is!



Nicholas has always had one dedicated cabinet in the kitchen for his toys. It started out having toys that he could use to "help" me cook. Now it is more of a collection place for all kinds of toys, pine cones, etc. I took this picture of the cabinet before we cleaned it out to work on the countertop above it.

Party at Win Kids

Today we went to a birthday party for Nicholas' friend, Reese, at Win Kids. What kid wouldn't love this place! There are trampolines, tumbling mats, foam block pits to jump into, balls, swings, parachutes, and all kinds of fun!



Nicholas' favorite part was the giant swing. There were three swings attached together so he got to swing with Emma Rae and Reese. The swing went increcibly high and all three of the kids were grinning ear to ear!

Mad Science

We went to a special library show today hosted by Mad Science. I love their programs! They teach science in fun and exciting ways. Today we learned about dry ice, flash paper, and other cool things. I love that their programs are always very interactive and hands-on.





After the show, Nicholas enjoyed hopping from mat to mat as he pretended to step on rocks in a river filled with crocodiles. He can have fun with anything :)

Just Can't Measure Up!

I have tried to have Nicholas involved in the whole process of decorating his little sister's room. However, today I don't think I taught him much - except what not to do! With the nursery walls painted pink, I ventured to try to put up a wallpaper border around the top of the room. Yes, I could wait until Stuart got home to help me but I'm pregnant and in the "nesting phase" so I'm just too impatient to wait around for help!

So I talked to Nicholas about how I would measure the walls and cut each strip to length so that I would tackle one wall at a time. Then I showed him how to soak the strip in water to activate the pre-pasted goo on the wallpaper. Of course, he loved dunking it in the water and making a mess! Then I started putting the border up on the wall while he watched. It was very frustrating trying to get the piece to stick to the wall, make sure it was straight, and smooth out the bubbles all by myself. Just as I would get a section perfect, I would have to climb down from the ladder, move the ladder over a few feet, and then sadly watch as all the work I had just done came peeling off the wall. Needless to say, Nicholas got bored with this part and abandoned me. I soon heard the television on in the other room. While I don't usually condone using the TV as a babysitter, I could tell that this would take a while and the little guy really couldn't help me with this part.

I finally learned that once I had a section looking just the way I wanted it, I needed to hold it in place for several minutes to be sure that the paste had set enough to allow me the few minutes I needed to scoot the ladder over and climb back up to keep going. The first wall was just a tiny bit too short but it was in the corner and I knew I could line up the pattern with the next piece so that it didn't show up much. So I measured out the second wall and cut my strip of border. After much frustration, I got it across the entire wall only to find that it was about an inch too short!



This would be harder to hide and although I probably could have winged it, I decided to peel the whole piece off the second wall and start over. Nicholas came to check on me from time to time and he always seemed amazed that I was still working on it. I was amazed at how long it was taking too! I tried to talk to him about persistence to turn it into a teachable moment but he was totally bored with my whole project and didn't seem to care. A few times I called him in to help me if I dropped my smoothing tool or needed him to hand me something else. He is a very good helper. In the end, the border turned out just the way I had wanted it to.



However, I'm afraid Nicholas didn't learn much from me except what not to do when it comes to measuring! Oh yeah, he also learned about some new products from commercials he watched on TV. Later in the day he told me, "Mom, you should get the new Kaboom! It does the hard work for you!" Maybe I can hire him out to be the next spokesman for Kaboom!