New Videos

Each title is it's own video:

Two Little Monkeys Jumping on the Bed

Seatdrops

Attention Span of a Two-Year Old

Halloween Dance (Sorry it's kinda dark, it was dark in there.)

Friends & Family

Well, we are now back in MN after spending 6 days with friends and family. And I am thankful to have readily available HSI again! We spent some time with lots of friends. Isabel loves spending time with her friend Rachael and we tried to see them as much as possible. A couple days ago we had dinner with our friends Aaron, Sam & Sydney, Luanne, Lucie & Henry, and Mary & Ben and we also went swimming with our friends Mary & Ben and Jamie & Jack.

Here are a couple more pictures from Halloween festivities. She wore the witch costume yesterday when we went to visit family so that grandma and grandpa could see her in one of her outfits. The cow costume she wore to storytime on Wednesday, as it was a dress-up Halloween theme. It seems like everywhere we went, whether she was dressed up or not people gave her stuff for Halloween. The library gave her fun stickers to make her own jack-o-lanterns with, today they gave her a cookie when we stopped for lunch at Subway, the sausage factory gave her a snack size bag of sausage bites, the timeshare we stayed at gave her a bottle of bubbles. And today it's finally Halloween and we will do a little bit of trick-or-treating and then take her to the Halloween party at church. We have been celebrating Halloween for a good strong 2 weeks now.

Well, on Tuesday my new niece was born. Her name is Jayden Rose. We went to visit her & her parents (& grandma & grandpa too) on Thursday. Jayden was 8 1/2 pounds and 21 1/2 inches long. Auntie Phanie went through many, many hours of labor & delivery to get this little girl. I should be pretty thankful that Isabel came as quickly and easily as she did. This is Isabel's first girl cousin. She has 2 boy cousins on daddy's side who are much older than her and 1 boy cousin on mommy's side. She is much closer in age with the cousin's on mommy's side.

Stay tuned for some new videos to be posted. I am uploading them right now and will post them in a new post when they are all live.

Wednesday

Well, the picture below is daddy in his Halloween costume. He went to a Halloween party on Saturday night and we are going to another one this coming Saturday.

We visited some of our friends here yesterday. In the morning we went to Midwest Twisters (oh, I forgot to attach that photo, I'll get to it after I post this.) In the afternoon we went to visit our friends Sofia & Tommy. They were with their grandparents since their parents are traveling this week. It was nice to see them and for the kids to play together. That evening we were joined by our friends Luanne, Lucie, & Henry for dinner at Chili's. It was so nice to see them. The girls get along so well.

Today we went to a Halloween storytime at the Delafield library. So, Isabel got a chance to wear one of her cosumes again. This afternoon we have plans to see some more friends. And tomorrow we plan to head to Sheboygan to see our new baby cousin. Auntie Phanie had a baby girl named Jayden Rose, who was born last night.

Halloween '08

I just wanted to post a couple of pictures quick. I am in the lobby of the hotel trying to do my email & blogging while entertaining Isabel. Not an easy task. The top picture is her wearing her fairy princess costume while playing inside a tube at the M&T halloween party. The other picture is with her friend Rachael & one of Rachael's friends as they head out to the Halloween parade. After the parade we had a Halloween feast at John & Lori's and then went trick or treating. We are about to leave now to go to a gymnastics open gym.

Dancing Feet

Tonight we met our friends Kyle, Carrie & Gavin at a Halloween dance for young kids. Isabel loves to dance, so this was perfect for her. She wore her witch costume. As she danced she kept picking up her dress. Good thing I kept her skirt on from earlier.

Tomorrow morning we head out to O-town week. We will be busy with Halloween activities there as well. So, all those costumes will get some good use out of them. We will also get to spend some quality time with friends and family there, which will be nice. Unfortunately, I won't have readily available access to the internet. So, I may not post much on here or be able to check my email often.

Just Kickin' Back

This has been a day of moving slow (well, slow for me.) Isabel & I stayed in our jammies until a little after 10am. Then we took a bath, painted our nails and ate lunch. Before that she helped me make scrambled eggs with a side of ham and fresh apple juice (from the juicer.) After lunch we went into the art room and painted these gourds/pumpkins for Halloween. She thought that was fun.

As for the last couple days, well, Tuesday we did gymnastics & ECFE as usual. We also went to the doctor for a well-child check for Isabel and flu shots for both of us. Yesterday we went to our chuch moms group, then had a playdate & lunch with mommy's friend Kwisin & her daughter Kayleigh and then hung out at home most of the afternoon until the evening when we ran out to do a little shopping & grab a pizza for supper.

Baking Bread

We also made some homemade bread today. You will see from the (just under a minute) slideshow that she helped every step of the way, except using the mixer. She has some fear of the mixer and when I use it she runs out of the room yelling "Get Out of the Way!" I am not sure what all that is about. It is good bread and I am trying really hard to save some for daddy. I really like homemade bread. I rarely make it from scratch though. If I have it, it is usually forzen stuff from the grocery store.

You can also view the (just over a minute) video of Isabel kneading bread.

Making Shakers

Well, today we made some shakers. I had intended to use different containers, but I must have give them away when I thought we were making a permanent move. So, I saw I had some empty plastic eggs to use. We filled 4 eggs with dry beans, dry rice, sand, & pennies. Then we taped each shut with some colored electrical tape and decorated with stickers. She can tell which is the pennies & beans, but the rice & sand sound a little similar. This was a fun little activity and now she is carrying around her shakers in a purse.

*Updated*

We also played Karaoke Revolution (number 3 & later I did a couple songs on number 2) this afternoon. She stuck with me for 4 songs and she tied to sing along and would dance. Then she started playing in her play tent and then started "making food" so we could eat supper after mommy was done singing. Even though she was done participating after4 songs, she would clap her hands and say "Good Job Mommy." after each song I finished. It has been quite a while since I had played KR and I didn't do as well as I used to. I forgot how hard it can be. It was fun though.

*Updated Again!*

Last night we played & read her with her Leapfrog Little Touch Leap Pad and used her Animal Dance book/card/cartridge. It was fun to use that. We had not used it in quite some time and was a good reinforcement for different aspects of music & dance. Actually we had so much fun playing with it that she didn't want to go to bed. Normally she goes to bed pretty easily, but we went up early last night and we listened to one of her cds that had Ring Around the Rosie, Pop Goes the Weasel, as well as others on it. So, there was a lot of dancing & singing.

You know - it would be hard to avoid music for kids or anyone really. Music is everywhere. All cartoons aimed at preschool age have music in them, many toys have music in them, nursery rhymes are everywhere. We listen to music in the car all the time and are usually going somewhere everyday. We sing at her ECFE classes as well as at storytime. We sing to her every night at bedtime (as well as read.) We actually sing quite a bit throughout the day, spontaneously. There is music at church. And even her Little Leaps game (which she is playing right now) has music in the backgound. Even think about the music on baby swing & infant bouncy seats & on some exersaucers. Music is everywhere.

Music Lessons, Week 3

Well, I requested a few more things from the library, which include:

* Maisy Makes Music (video)

* Forever Young by Bob Dylan (book)

* I Say a Little Prayer for You by Burt Bacharach & Hal David (book)

* Greatest Songs of the 70's by Barry Manilow (cd)

* The Artist's Album featuring Leonard Bernstein (cd)

I read about this book, Say a Little Prayer by Dionne Warwick, but our library system didn't have it, but through my search is how I came up with the one by Burt Bacharach.

I requested the Bernstein CD because this past week I bought tickets to the Minnesota Orchestra to go to the "Bernstein Beat". It is part of the Young People's Concert Series, which means that Isabel is going, as well as mommy & daddy and we are taking grandma too. I also requested a free poster, once we get that in the mail we can talk abot more instruments, but here are the details:
A poster featuring EVERY musician in the orchestra and a seating chart showing orchestra instrument locations! Call or email to order your free poster: youngpeoples@mnorch.org or 612-371-5671.

The books I already requested & reading have been well received by Isabel. She knows all of the instruments in the books, which is awesome!

This week I plan to print off a few more coloring sheets:
Violin, Xlyophone, Barney & Music, & Barney & Trombone.

The musical instrument we are going to make this week is different kinds of shakers. I will use 4 bottles that are the same, but we will decorate them each differently and put different things in each one (beans, rice, sand, something metal like maybe some washers) so that we can talk about the different sounds each one of them makes.

Finally, I am hoping to get the Karaoke Revolution going this week.

I did look up when concerts are for our school and we need to wait until Nov. & Dec. for that.

Tomorrow, Laugh, Love, Learn will post their suggestion for the week and week three is book club, so then maybe we'll get a few more ideas of books to order from the library.

Fall & Halloween Stuff

Well, I had the pictures posted earlier and am now getting around to the text.

Today we met grandma & grandpa at the MN Zoo for HallZOOween. Isabel wore her cow costume and they gave out trick-or-treat bags and some treats. She played for a while in the Kids Den, which was kinda fun. You can see her donning the scuba gear that was in there to try on. We had never gone in there to play before. She lasted 2 hours until it was major meltdown time. She got about a 20-minute nap on the way home and then rested for another half hour and that was it for naptime today.

This evening we went to a graduation party for our friend Rebecca who got a Master's degree today.



This picture is from Thursday. We were raking leaves in the back yard & filling up 70-gal. pumpkin leaf bags. Now we have some Halloween lawn decorations.

We've been doing storytime on Thursday nights and Isabel enjoys that. She really likes when they get to stretch & "get the wiggles out" and then when they get to sing a song and get to go put items on the board that were handed out to the kids. This week it was stories about bears and they had different colored bears to put up on the board. When Isabel's bear colors were called she would run up there and place her bear on there and then "correct" other bears that other kids put up there upside down. She couldn't just let them be upside down and had to fix them. She got that from her mother.

Friday we went to playgroup at a nursery in a local church in the morning and then in the evening we went the Haunted House fundraiser for her gymnastics club. We went through the Haunted House as a non-scary group, but she was still scared. It wasn't too long, so it wasn't too bad. They had 2 different bounce houses there that she absolutely loved.

How to Make Scrambled Eggs

If a two-year old can do it, you can too. Actually, she has been making scrambled eggs with me for the last couple months. She has gotten good an cracking the egg, although when she opens the shell she still manages to egg on her hands. And sometimes she forgets to open the egg shell over the bowl, but usually she gets it in the bowl. She loves cooking with me.

So, the window installer came today and even though we have new windows in, the job is not complete because Lowe's forgot to send along the lumber that was ordered & paid for to finish it. Plus they installer broke the inside trim and we weren't sold any new stuff. Oh, and they never sold us any window wraps and on the 2 new windows they need wraps, the 3 replacements can just use the old wraps. We will have the roofer people out on new wraps. We are not doing this through Lowe's. Lowe's has inconvenienced me so much for these windows. And pissed me off too. Oh, and one of our new windows has a torn screen, so I have to wait 10 days for that to be ordered & get in. I made sure I let the manager I called to complain to today that they lost out on the roof replacement (which we did have them quote) because they have screwed up this window deal so much. I made sure he knew it wasn't a small house and that the roof replacment on house, carport & gargage was near $20K. Hopefully they realize that you need to treat every customer & deal with promptness & respect, because screwing up a smaller deal can leave you out of a really big deal. We didn't go with our third (potential) roofer because they were taking so long and wouldn't commit to an actual quote & give us anything on paper. I don't think so.

So, now I need that drink tonight. I am starting a little group of women that will go out on the Third Thursday (on The Town) TToTT. So, tonight we are going out to Applebee's I figured if we all have iton our calendar and know to expect it a certain day every month that we will be much more likely to get out and do it.

I also prepared 36 cups of apples w/ sugar to freeze for future use. So, that's enough to make 6 apple pies. I still have another large bag of apples to do something with, but I am getting a little sick of peeling & chopping apples.

Today & Yesterday

Well, yesterday we went to gymnastics class as usual and then did grocery shopping. As far as our music theme, we did coloring sheets of a Drum and a Treble Clef and of course we listened to Rafi in the car. She really loves the Rafi cd and she asked me to play "Old McDonald Had Band" over & over for 4 times.

Today was a busy day. We went to that new church and tried out their Moms Group. It's 1.5 hours long and the first half hour is eating & socializing. Then for an hour is a bible lesson. I had never done a bible study thing before so I wasn't sure how all this was going to go, but it went well and all the women were very nice and wasn't all preachy & boring. I plan to go back next week.

Then this afternoon Isabel made another maraca, but this time it was a gift for her friend Cole from playgroup. She also made a card for him. I let her use a bunch of foam stickers along with markers to decorate both. Then this afternoon we went to a birthday playgroup at Cole's house. She had a lot of fun there and enjoyed dressing up in his cowboy boots, cowboy hat, riding his rocking horse and playing guitar. She was a little traveling musical cowgirl.

Tomorrow we FINALLY get our last windows installed. Yeah! Now I won't have to put plastic on any of the windows this window. Now we just need to finish up stuff with the roofer and get that replaced yet this fall.

Gymnastics

Well, here she is in a new gymnastics outfit. It is a little long, so she can grow into it over the next year. When we get to class we will take off the skirt, socks & slippers. She just wears the leotard and footless tights. I signed her up for another session because it is going well. Today is the last class for session one of the season.Each session is 6 weeks long. I hope it continues to go well.

Making Maracas

This afternoon we made maracas. I took a paper plate, folded it in hald and stapled the sides leaving a small opening at the top. She decorated her maracas and then we inserted a funnel at the top and poured dry beans down in it to fill it up 1/8-1/4 full of beans. I stapled the top and we were finished.

A Rainy Monday

Well, we didn't make it walking because of the rain. So,we stayed home and she helped me sweep. I am not sure how much help she really is, but she pushes around a broom and listens to me when I ask her to stay out of my dirt pile. So, I guess that is helping. We also did some coloring pages that had to do with music, a french horn & a microphone.

We also listened to Peter & the Wolf cd that is the story w/ orchestra. There was too much time in between pages to keep her interest, so after a few pages I just had to read the rest of the story while the cd played in the background. It was mainly music anyways. I could see that this would be a good Children's Theatre production though. I was looking at what the Children's Theatre in Mpls has to offer, and it might be fun to go to see something there. They do have something geared towards preschoolers in April of 2009 and tickets go on sale in January.


Well, this picture of her creating her own t-ball game. She took the cats' scratching post and put a ball on top and then wouldhit it off a cat wand toy. Oh, the cats don't really have toys anymore, they are all used by Isabel. They don't playwith their toys much anyways. The dog is a different story, he plays with her toys and knows they are her toys and only plays with her toys. Whenever Isabel has the notion to play with one of Molly's toys we have to tell her no.

Here is a little video of Isabel reading Don't Let the Pigeons Drive the Bus. I know for some it will be hard to understand what she is saying. I guess that is one of the benefits of being with her all the time is that I understand most of what she is saying. Daddy does a good job of understanding her as well. Plus it helps that we have the book in front of us. She will "read" first and then I will read next.

Oh, another thing I keep forgetting to mention, but you may have noticed from the pictures is the lack of Paci (that's what we call her pacifier). We had been slowly weaning her from Paci for several weeks and she only had it at naptime and bedtime, but then we finally said no more and got rid of it completly. She didn't fuss too much. We told her it was time to be done with it and she didn't need it. She tried to convince me she loves Paci, but that didn't fly. The consequence of
not having her mouth plugged up is that she is talking so much more, hence the reading stories to us. Paci used to help put her to sleep right away, but now she is chatty through all her stories & songs and is a little squirmy and takes a little longer to fall asleep.

Next I plan to tackle the potty training thing once & for all. No more doing it when she feels like it. A lot of the moms in my WI playgroup seemed to do it cold turkey and just stayed home for several days or a week while they worked on it. And it seemed to be what was needed. So, I think that is what we will have to do. She was going on the potty this summer, but it was justa crazy summer and it didn't stick. So, the plan is after our trip back to WI at the end of the month we will work on it.

Pumpkin Carving 2008

So, this evening we carved the pumpkin we bought from the pumpkin patch. Actually, daddy did all the carving and we helped a little with digging out the insides. Isabel didn't care much for the seeds. She was pretty grossed out by them. But she did help out little bits here and there.

This morning we went to check out another church. This one is called River Valley Church. It seems like the best fit for us so far. Actually, I think it may be the last church we are checking out. The have a Moms Group as part of their ministry groups, so snce Isabel & I are free Wednesday morning we plan to go check that out.

Yesterday we just did stuff around the house and in the afternoon daddy went to help grandpa install and overhead microwave and teach grandma about Facebook. That evening we had our friend Carrie, Gavin, & Kyle over for dinner.

Tomorrow, we are meeting some other moms in the morning for walking club, weather permitting. In the afternoon, we are hosting playgroup here.

Right now one of daddy's & Isabel's favorite books is Don't Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus. She has it memorized and can "read" us the book. Daddy seems to enjoy when I check out Mo Willems books from the library. Another book that Isabel "reads" to us is Old Mother Hubbard. And she is really enjoying Zin Zin Zin a Violin, as part of our music theme.

Lesson in Music, Week #1

Well, we already incorporate a lot of music into our day, every day. So, we needed to expand on it. We sing a lot every day and always listen to music in the car and sometimes turn on music when we are playing in the playroom. Music & dancing is always a part of Isabel's Friday morning ECFE class. So, what did we do to learn/experience something new, well....
* We made up a new song about a bike ride.
* Had a jam session with daddy on the guitar.
* Checked out 5 books about music from the library and have been reading those.
* Played toy instruments with mommy & friend Gavin.
* Explored how sticks make different sounds on different objects.
* Listened to a new (new to us) CD by Raffi.
* Listened/Watched the animated songs (link in previous post) online.

So, I think we had a pretty good week. Next week & this weekend we plan to start watching the Baby Einstein video "Meet the Orchestra", color some music coloring sheets, and make a homemade instrument. Plus, we'll keep doing what we have always done and the new stuff we experienced this week.

Thursday ctd.

So, this afternoon we went to Oak View Nursery & Pumpkin Patch. It was really a lot of fun and they have a lot of activities. They had these 3 wooden cutouts for pictures. Isabel thought that was fun.



Although I think her favorite is the straw bale pile with a huge pile of leaves. She loved jumping into it, as did many other kids. They also had a playset there, a wobbly ladder (with straw pile under it to fall into), a small haunted house, an inflatable haunted house, activity table (to paint pumpkins), gift shop, & snacks.








They also had a haunted trail and corn maze. It was all very tame, but Isabel is starting to get into "It's scary" and is afraid of little things (like ladybugs) that she was never afraid of before. But she was fine as long as it was daylight and she was holding my hand. We did have a lot of fun.

Thursday

Click picture to enlarge.
Well, since I finished up making jelly rather quickly this morning, we had plenty of time to take a bike ride to the park and play. We had a lot of fun there. Some of the new things we did there was climb to the top of the hill and roll down. Although we both stopped several times because it is a long hill and we were getting quite dizzy. We also went into the tennis courts and we would throw the ball back and forth to each other and then she started kicking it around. What's so nice about playing in there is that it has a hard flat surface which makes it easier to run on and is also gated all around, so the ball can't roll to far away. And when there is a wind like today you like having those boundaries.


This afternoon w are meeting playgroup at a pumpkin patch. So, we will buy a pumpkin to carve sometime next week. Since we will be visiting friends & family the last week in October, we want to carve it s that we have some time to enjoy it. And we'll probably go to the library for storytime afterwards.

Tomorrow we have her other ECFE class in the morning and then in the afternoon Carrie & Gavin are coming over for a playdate.

Wednesday

Well, we went to SRP yesterday to meet someone from her gymnastics class for a first time playdate and they didn't show. We stayed and played anyways and had a lot of fun. Since the theme of the month is music, we took sticks and hit them on different surfaces (picnic tabletop, picnic table legs, 3 different spots on an outdoor grill, plastic slide, chain-link fence, & those talking tunnel things). We sang Baa-baa Black Sheep as we tapped in beat on each surface. I then talked to her about how they sounded different. On Monday when we went to the park, we made up a new song about going on a bike ride. She has been enjoying when I make up new songs for her. Also, yesterday afternoon on the way to/from our ECFE picnic & games we were listening to Raffi in the car and realized their is another verse to Baa-baa Black Sheep, basically you just change black to white and boy to girl, everything else is the same. We listended to that 3 times and then at bedtime when we read stories and sing songs she asked me to sing Baa-baa White Sheep 5 times in a row. She tried for a 6th time but I told her to pick something else. We also picked grapes yesterday with mommy's fried Trudi and went to Lowe's to buy paint for Isabel's big girl room.

Tuesday

Well, since the power was out for over 3 hours on Tuesday, it kinda changed our plans for lunch & play. We ate cheese, crackers, & apples for lunch since we couldnt cook anything. Isabel went to get me the camera because she said she wanted pictures with cheese and crackers. Such a funny little girl.

As usual we had gymnastics in the morning and an ECFE class in the evening. Although next week we do not have eitehr ECFE class due to MEA and parent/teacher conferences.

October Theme: Music

So, I decided to go along with this blog, Laugh, Learn, Love, and do the themes of the month. For October it is Music. What a fun theme. Isabel has really been getting into playing musical instruments or tapping along while I sing. She has been singing some songs with me as well, which has been fun. And she loves to dance. Last night we were marching to a song and she thought marching was kinda fun. But what I am looking forward to is I am going to get out my Karaoke Revolution game and play that with her. She won't know the songs and can't read the words, but she will loves dancing around and pretending to sing in the extra microphone. And maybe she can play some Guitar Hero with daddy and I could even get out the DDR if I feel up to it.

I think it will be fun to make some of our own instruments. Isabel loves to do projects & crafts, s combining the two will work out nicely. I was thinking that the three of us could play some musical chairs too. I am also going to call Javalive(a nearby coffee shop that sometimes has live music) and see if they have anything coming up. I had been wanting to take her there to listen/see a performance.

**ADDED TO POST**

Well, I have made some requests from the library to aide in our musical theme:
- Melissa & Doug Band in a Box (toy)
- Zin! Zin! Zin! A Violine (book)
- Musical Instruments from A to Z (book)
- Mozart Find a Melody (book)
- Sergei Prokofiev's Peter & the wolf (book & cd)
- Mole Music (book & cd)
- Baby Einstein: Meet the Orchestra & First Instruments (DVD)
- 101 More Music Games for Children

Here is a fun website (SillyBooks.net) I found that has animated sing-a-long songs. That will be fun to use.

And here are some coloring sheets I will print off to use (not sure which ones, so I will just post the links and decide a the mnth goes on):
http://members.coloringplanet.com/gallery/cgi-bin/imageFolio.cgi?direct=Music
http://www.coloring.ws/music1.htm
http://www.freekidscoloring.com/music/

Playing in the Leaves

So, I rake what leaves we have already ( I know LOTS more are to fall) so that we could have a big pile and could jump in it and just have fun playing in the leaves.

We didn't too much else today. We went to check out a church and during the sermon stopping the slautering of babies (abortion) and slaughtering the giants of homosexualit and all the screams of Amen from the congregation, we got up and left. Wrong church for us for many reasons.

Isabel did take a nap with me, which was nice. She is not good about napping/sleeping together because she thinks it's a slumber party and wants to bounce around and tickle and just have fun. But we laid down, sang some songs, and then fell asleep.

And all three of us did go grocery shopping too. Yup, that's it. That's what we did today. Now we are grilling some brats & hot dogs and will eat them while we watch football.



Click on image to see it larger.

Apple Picking Picture

Well, Isabel & I cored & sliced 13 apples (it's all that would fit into the dehydrator) and put them in the food dehydrator. When the thought to do that popped in my head I remembered that would also be a good idea to dry my oregano. I have oregano, chives & sage in my herb garden that come back every year. And I am out of dried oregano & chives. So I think I will dry some of those in my next dehydrator batch. I may also freeze some of them (in ice cubes) as well to use in soups so that I have some freshly frozen herbs on hand.

So, I think this afternoon we'll go harvest the oregano & chives since we were nipped by some frost last night and I don't want to tempt mother nature and have her ruin my herbs that I have plans for. I am also hoping to get some grapes to make some jam with. Yesterday one of my friends asked me if I wanted any, as her daughter had a bunch at her place that she wanted to get rid of.

Apple Picking w/ Playgroup

We went apple picking with our playgroup today. Even though we have some apple trees here, there just isn't a good selection this year. We had 4 apple trees and one was lost in the storm in July, another has ripe apples at the beginning of July (so it's too late for that one), another one had many of the apples blown off, and the 4th tree was struck by lightning and has a big dead branch in it w/ rotting apples attached that will have to be removed. So, our apple selection here this year is slim. Anyways, it was fun to go somewhere else to pick apples & get bigger ones, as our are always smaller apples. Now to decide what I will make with them. I am sure daddy will like it if we make an apple pie and I was thinking I may make & can apple sauce with the rest. Although it could be fun to use my dehydrator and make apple slices too.

Oh darn. I forgot to chage the size & location of the photos. Well, just remember that you can click on them to enlarge them, which you'll probably want to do with these.

This morning we joined some friends from our new playgroup at the MN Zoo. We had not been there since June last year, so over a year. Of course it is too big to see enough of it in the short time we can be there before naptime. It is really a zoo that you need a good 3-4 hours at and we only had 2 hours plus lunch time. We could have stayed longer, but she was tired and she fell asleep about 5 minutes into our ride home. Tomorrow we are going apple-picking with playgroup and Friday we are meeting the playgroup at a park.


I got a lot of decent shots of Isabel today. Even though she slept for about 35 minutes in the car, I think she is down for the rest of her nap. I sure hope so because she was kinda cranky when she was falling asleep and we are getting together with some of my friends after naptime. There won't be any kids there so she'll have to entertain herself with what I bring along for her to play with.