Rewind...The Air Zoo!

Over spring break, my favorite of our many activities was the day we visited the Air Zoo. The Air Zoo is this great museum/theme park in Michigan. You can learn about rockets and airplanes. They had rides, interactive activities, and some really neat restored planes to look at. We spent most of the day there and had a great time.

 

These pictures are a little out of order. I took pictures with both my iPad and my camera and they just kind of uploaded randomly. I don't care to fix it so we're going to roll with it. Here we go:

 

Here's Clayton learning how to navigate the space shuttle:

 The kids (mine plus my friend's two little boys) sitting in the airplane hangar.

 They had four rides that were free with the price of your admission. This airplane ride, a ferris wheel, an anti gravity ride, and a big hot air balloon swing ride. The rides were unlimited and my kids took full advantage! I was worried that they wouldn't let Sammie ride, but it wasn't a problem at all! Win!

The kids on the airplane ride. Also to note: Clayton is the sweetest big brother ever. He was so protective and good to Sam the whole time.

 Noah:

My kids with the Earth:

 Sweet Sammie.

 Josie (who was definitely dressed for clubbing).

 Learning to work in space:

 In the lunar module.

 Hanging out with the car of the future.

 Noah seeing what it might be like to take a shower in space (we never did find out why there's a vacuum in the shower...hmmm).

This was a game(?). It had a turntable that you stood on while those colored dots spun around. I suppose the point was to not lose your balance. I lost. That thing made me so dizzy.

Anti gravity ride (that's the only ride I didn't take Sammie on - not because they wouldn't let her, I was just worried that she'd wriggle out of the safety bar). Notice Clayton's hands up. Boy's doing it right!

Josie the pilot.

Sammie loved this little helicopter. (They had this whole toddler area with these free little grocery store rides - Sammie was in heaven here.)

Clayton and Josie learning to land a space ship.

Sammie's just adorable.

It was a fun day with this wild bunch.

My girls on the ferris wheel.

We spy Clayton and Noah!

The kids loved sitting in this helicopter and pretending to fly it.

Love this shot!

I feel a little sad that we haven't heard about the Air Zoo before now. We definitely would have gone more often (because although it's in Michigan, it's really not that far from our house). It was well worth the drive and the price. I'm trying to figure out a way to go one more time before we move! It was a great day with fun friends in a fun and new place. I've got some jr. astronauts and pilots on my hands now!

Rewind...The AG Fair!

Another rewind post. This time about the AG fair. The AG fair is one of my favorite South Bend traditions, for several reasons: 1. It's free. 2. It's fast (we don't have to be there all day, in fact, it takes an hour - tops). 3. It's highly interactive. 4. My kids love it.

 

This year is our last South Bend AG fair. I am pretty sure that Jerome will have, if not this exact same thing, something close to it. I hope they do at any rate...because the AG fair is my favorite. A few pictures of the day:

 

Josie "milking" a cow.

Sammie "milking" a cow.

Learning how to rope a cow.

Love Sammie's 'barely there' face.

Silly boys.

Riding the tractor.

Going fishing.

Okay, this was the cutest thing I may have ever seen. Bunnies on leashes completing jumping courses. Adorable!! I may have squealed like a teenage girl at a Bieber concert watching this. I now, of course, want to own little bunnies who wear leashes and jump over things on a course.

I love the AG fair and am going to miss it next spring. It's really low key and nothing fancy so there is no real reason why I should love it so much, but I really do. Count this as one of the many things I'm going to really miss about South Bend when we're gone.

Rewind...April Fool's Day!

I'm going to try to do some catch up posts here over the next few days. So much seemed to happen so close together and I'm behind (again)! So let's just dive right in, shall we?

April Fool's Day was fun this year. The boys really understood what April Fool's Day was all about and I just had to live that up.

I started the night before by toilet papering all of the kid's bedrooms. The boys were confused when they woke up in the morning but all the kids thought it was hilarious and no one wanted to take the toilet paper down!

Then, while everyone was at school, Sammie and I made "juice". Really, it was jello, but it looks legit, right?

The kids had some interesting reactions to this refreshing "drink". Once they got it figured out, they loved it though and thought it was a really awesome prank! (And you'll notice that Sammie's milk is blue, that was another prank. I dyed the milk blue in the morning. Again, my kids thought I was an evil genius!)

Noah and Josie snuck upstairs for a while. Then they told me that I better hurry to my room. They "toilet papered" my room! Hahaha! I may have created little monsters.

For dinner we had grilled cheese sandwiches...or did we?? It's toasted angel food cake with yellow/orange frosting. Man, I was on fire this year!

There were a few other pranks (I put toilet paper in the toes of the kid's shoes to make them think their feet had grown, etc.) and I think we all had a really good laugh this year. I made sure to let my kids know though, that a prank is only funny if EVERYONE involved thinks it's funny. We don't prank to hurt someone, physically or emotionally. I think they get it. Now I better start thinking of ways to up my game for next year...

5...the celebration!

She woke up to a modest stack of presents and was allowed to open one before breakfast.

Spoiler: it was a Lalaloopsy doll that Justin had gotten for her a couple months ago. He was working all day on her birthday and wanted to see her open it before he left. She loved it.

Then it was birthday breakfast on the special birthday plate (which she'd been talking about for weeks! Man, that birthday plate is genius. Whoever made that thing years and years ago is probably the smartest and best mom ever...).

Hands down, my favorite part of her birthday. Noah was so excited to help her celebrate her birthday. He stayed up the night before and wrote her a card. He then wanted to read it to her before he got ready for school. It was so very sweet. These two can fight like cats and dogs, but I'm starting to see more and more of these tender sibling moments between them. I hope it's a glimpse of the relationship to come between them.

Here's the note: Dear Josie, happy birthday TO YOU. This is a present for you. Then he drew her a picture of her celebrating with all the girly things she loves. THEN before he went to bed the night before her birthday, he found his old 5 year old birthday shirt and layed it out on her dresser for her. My heart burst wide open.

After breakfast she got to open her birthday shirt (which wasn't my favorite this year - by a long shot, but that's what I get for waiting until the very last minute to make it) and posed in front of the birthday sign - with her new Lalaloopsy.

She loves to pose!

Showing off the 5 on her shirt (which she loves, so I suppose it's a win).

Then she asked if she could open another present. I relented and she opened this snazzy pair of high heels from her Grammy and Grandpa.

A hit for sure! She wears them constantly and points out to everyone that she is wearing high heels (they're only about an inch high, but she walks in them remarkably well - certainly better than I walk in heels).

Then she convinced me to let her open one more gift before we left to run our morning errands.

I have a friend from HS who makes these amazing princess dresses. Seriously, amazing. They're every day wearable - not just dress up dresses (because, let's face it, sometimes girls will wear these dress up dresses as every day wear anyway). They're modest and machine washable and awesome. I ordered her two - Rapunzel and Cinderella. I'm so glad I did. She loves them.

Here she is, trying to figure out which one to wear first.

And modeling her new shoes.

After our errands we went out to lunch - birthday girl's choice. Since McDonald's is currently carrying My Little Pony toys in their happy meals, this was a no brainer for Jo.

We let this deliciously dimpled minion tag along (elbow dimples anyone!?!)

She's looking so grown up!

After lunch we came home and found several packages on our doorstep. She was allowed to open the one from Aunt Missy and Uncle Jared and her cousins first. It was projects!! A make your own headband kit and a make your own pillow kit. This is a girl who LOVES a project so these were absolutely perfect!

Then she opened the one from Grandma and Grandpa Lee. It was a cute shirt/skirt outfit and some new Minnie Mouse pajamas. She loves the outfit and pajamas. (My boys are very bored when they get clothes as gifts, but not Josie - she get so excited and wants to try everything on and model it - so funny).

This is out of order, but here she is modeling her princess dresses. I love them almost as much as she does.

Me and the birthday girl.

After presents it was on to the big birthday activity. We dropped Sammie off with a friend and I took Josie and her friend, Eavan, to this place called Club Tabby. Club Tabby is this adorable little girl's only salon where they do makeovers. The girls get a makeover and then they have a stage/runway where the girls can strut and dance and look at themselves in the mirror. They also have a lot of dress up clothes/hats/shoes the girls can try on as well as microphones the girls can use to sing along to the endless loop of Disney songs that are playing. Basically, it was Josie's dream come true.

Getting a little pre-makeover runway action.

I die.

Watch out Bob Fosse! Josie Smith is heading for Broadway!

Here she is waiting for her makeover at the pedicure station (she didn't actually get a pedicure, but she loved sitting in the big, sparkly, pink butterfly chair).

Her friend, Eavan, after her makeover. These two are two peas in a pod. Eavan told her stylist, "I think I would like green in my hair. I think that would look fabulous." Ha!

Josie getting her nails done (she wanted red and pink alternated with glitter on top).

And getting her beautiful princess hairdo (at first I was very nervous about the hair color, but it washed right out - no problem!).

Love this picture.

Getting her makeup done.

Each girl got to take home a little goody bag with their make up in it (it was just eye shadow and lip gloss, but still - exciting). Josie has been liberally applying lip gloss ever since.

These two. Beautiful! I had a great time taking them to do this. Just watching them get so excited was so fun for me.

Eavan working her runway magic.

After makeovers, we headed to a local cupcake place. As our luck would have it, they were serving a pink cupcake with a candy princess crown and pink sparkles that day. Score! Also lucky was that there happened to be tons of older women in the shop at that time and they all fawned all over these two girls.

Here's a good shot of the finished product of her makeover.

After cupcakes, Eavan came and played at our house for a while. After she went home, we (the boys were with us by then) picked up Sammie and went to eat dinner at the hospital with Justin where Josie got to choose whatever she wanted for dinner! (Which is funny because whenever we eat at the hospital she can eat whatever she wants, but somehow it seemed like a bigger deal on her birthday.)

The birthday girl with her daddy.

Then we came home and cleaned up a bit and waited for Justin to finish his shift so he could join us for cake and ice cream!

At the birthday girl's request we had chocolate cake with cherry frosting.

Yum!

After that it was time for a shower and bed. She was so happy. She had a great birthday. I'm so glad. I love that she had a great day and felt so celebrated and special (she's already planning her 6th birthday). She's one in a million and we're so glad she's ours.

Happy birthday Josie. You are going to rock 5 years old. I just know it. I love you!