Bald Eagle State Park

Thoughts from two 2-year-old brains:
Olivia: I swear I've put so much sand on her, why is she still visible?
Maggie: I love being buried in the sand. I bet if I lay here really still with a scrunched up face, I can stay out of sight forever!

I'm always so grateful when my adventurous friend (AKA, the funnest mom in the universe--you know who you are) calls me to say, "I just wanted to let you know that we are going to go to __________ (fill in the blank with any fun, kid-friendly venue) today, why don't you come along. . ." So here we are, at another state park (there are at least half a dozen within an hour of here) with a beach (not like the ocean--think huge sandbox on the shore of a reservoir--but can we be picky? We're in central PA). Seriously, it's so fun for the kids, we can stay 4 or 5 hours without anybody getting cranky. It's definitely worth all the effort it takes to get out the door with the kiddos, the beach gear and a picnic.

And finally, introducing my daughter, the Olympic freestyle swimmer:

Strawberry season

Here is a little Olivia at Greenwood Furnace, one of the State Parks that Nate is working in this summer. We love it here, it's one of our favorites. This day, we drove out and spent some time with our friend, Cheryl.



And, one of our favorite attractions: picking strawberries for freezer jam at Way Fruit Farm. I took Olivia out one day and she was so enthusiastic, she did great. She picked (and tasted) quite a bit.

Loving Logan. . .

Our trips to Utah are usually so brief and it is so hard to get in everything that we want to do. Here are a few pictures from our stay. . .


Anybody recognize the play area in the Cache Valley Mall? A nice addition, in my opinion. Olivia loved climbing all over everything, but she decided to lay down and relax on the ice cream sandwich for awhile. Yep, there you have it, that's one of the things we do for fun in Logan, head out to the Cache Valley sMall (as we liked to call it in my teenage years). It's a good thing for the great outdoors, because it seems like the list of things for little kids to do other than playing outside is pretty short (I promise I'm still a huge Logan fan, you can't beat the beautiful weather and scenery there, and we'd go back to living there in a heartbeat).

Speaking of beautiful scenery, here is a picture of Olivia with Grandma Trauntvein ("Gramma Telma" in Olivia-ese) in their backyard. We love you guys!

And the rare picture on my side of the family with 4 generations. We're sad we don't get to see Grandma Betty and Grandpa Roy more often.

So, there you have it, folks. More fun to come in the near future. . .

Alphabet song

She's actually a lot bigger than this now, but here is a video of Liv singing the ABC's when she first started (about 24 months old). Before you play it, scroll down the page to "my playlist" and hit the "pause" button. Then come back and hit play on the video and you should be able to hear her sing if the volume is up on your computer.

(video coming soon--I can't seem to make it work--suggestions anyone?)

Take Your Family to Work Day

Nope, it wasn't officially take your family to work day, but we were lucky enough to tag along with Nate this spring to work a couple of times. Of course when we go with him, he's usually pretty busy doing what he does, but this day, he was in a place where he wasn't as busy, so we got to play a lot.

So I just think she's cute in her little hat. Go Spikes (our minor league team).

So not much to say, but who wants to read anyway when you can look at this fun girl?

Elephants, ducks, etc.

These next two pictures are just miscellaneous moments from April and May.

When the circus came to town, they marched the elephants and ponies from the train by the mall to campus. We waited a long time, and it was so short. Our friend, Sage, summed it up when she said, "was that it?" when it ended. Brief, yes; fun to watch, also yes. Olivia was so impressed that she talked about it for weeks afterwards, constantly asking when we were going to see the elephants.

One day I decided that Olivia would set out to check out the Millbrook Marsh Nature Center. It is just a marsh, in the middle of the city (or should I say borough? I don't know), that has a boardwalk. There were a several ducks and other water birds, we also saw some frogs. It was good to get outside on a nice day.

And I had to throw this little picture in of Olivia and Emily in the car holding hands. It's quite the novelty for Olivia to ride in the car next to another kid. Olivia is lucky to have so many sweet cousins.

2nd Birthday

Here's a little picture of part of Olivia's prolonged birthday celebration. We had whichever of Olivia's friends we could get in touch with meet us at the park by our house for some cake and ice cream. It wasn't a very spectacular affair, but I don't think she minded--she was just happy to have some kids to run around with. Some of the guests. . .

Olivia, Tyrin, Sage and Gabe


Sadie and Dallin

Maggie and Kendra

Then later at home, a mysterious package arrived at our door, and when we opened it, something magical happened.

She turned into a princess!

Happy birthday, Olivia! Some of our favorite things about this wonderful girl:

her hugs and "love you's"

how she sings songs from Annie and Mary Poppins

her exquisite language skills (this is my way of including one of Nate's favorite things--the fact that she says, "excuse me, I farted")

her adorable smile

her determination--she never quits until she learns to do it right

her athletic ability

her desire to always have fun.

A fun trip

Olivia and I were lucky enough to be able to take one last trip to Indiana to visit Leslie and her family there. They were getting ready to move, so it was a crazy trip, but Olivia and I had a great time visiting and playing. On the way in the airport, Olivia insisted on laying down outside of the moving walkway, she kept saying "I'm taking a nap." Cute enough to snap a picture at first, but eventually really annoying and ended in a nice tantrum.


Our cute cousin Emily at their library--the Bloomington library is great for kids.

And here the kids are celebrating Olivia's 2nd birthday before we head out of town.

And after we got home, Olivia got to enjoy her first ice cream cone. Now she's addicted.

Easter!

So here she is, after finding her basket. She wasn't very interested in eating boiled eggs. She just liked to roll them down her slide. We didn't do an outdoor egg hunt because of the snow.












Yep, we had snow on Easter here. But we still made Olivia go out in the cold for a picture. She loved her hat, but didn't have patience for her pretty gloves.
I can't remember what we were doing this day, but I love it when she'll let me do pigtails. She reminds me of Cindy-Lou-Who.
After watching an episode of her favorite show, Max & Ruby, Olivia kept coming up to me with her red shirt saying "super bunny" (although it took me awhile to figure out that was what she was saying). Apparently, Max was putting on his red cape and running around the house trying to save the day, and Olivia wanted to do the same thing. She did this daily for a couple of weeks afterward.

So here she is, taking a nap with her princess.













This Easter we decided to have some neighbors over to color eggs. Everyone had a great time, but Olivia just wanted to make a mess. This is Kaitrin, Tyrin, and Charmee.






Here is Olivia with Tyrin, waiting patiently to fill their baskets with some eggs.