missy-si-py river

OK, so it's been a long time since I did a post. I think our entire July just went by in a flash. We were so busy, going here and going there, that I couldn't sit down fast enough to document it before we were off to someplace else. I hate to do this, but I just can't wrap my head around documenting all that stuff now, so I'm just going to make a blanket statement: July was a blast!

Since it's already August tomorrow, I thought I would get back on the blogging wagon and see if I can do a decent job of documenting the rest of our summer.

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This morning's plan of going to the gym went by the wayside when Little Bird didn't get up until 9:15 and I realized there was no way I was going to make it to spinning by 9:30. I asked the girls if they would rather go swimming at Lifetime or to the swim pond but Little Bird said she didn't want to do either. (Little Pie was up for it of course, but I think Little Bird has had too much). Since it's actually not oppressively hot today, we headed to the Coon Rapids Dam. 

We talked about seeing a huge river called the Mississippi (Little Bird pronounces it Missy-si-py). We talked about how the river is the biggest in the country and that it actually starts in Minnesota and ends by Laura Beth's house in Louisiana. (They know their second cousin, Laura Beth, lives far away in Louisiana).

I think they were pretty surprised at the size when we actually showed up at the dam. They were also pretty surprised at how loud it was, but they thoroughly enjoyed themselves, asking many questions about why the water was loud, why it was brown, why it made foam, etc.

As soon as the girls realized we could walk across the dam, they immediately wanted to take off. They had so much fun greeting all of the bikers, hikers and fisherman. Little Pie complimented everyone on something: I like your bike. I like your hat. I like your pink shirt. I like your stuff. People were getting a huge kick out of her.

After we got across, Little Bird declared it was time to eat our picnic, but of course, I had left it in our car on the other side, so back across the dam we went. We found a nice shady spot and enjoyed yet another picnic lunch.

Since everyone was still in good spirits, I decided we needed a treat. I have been wanting to try the new cupcake shop in town so that's where we headed. Nadia Cakes is an adorable cupcake shop opened by a previous winner of Cupcake Wars on the Food Network. She has a shop in LA and now in Maple Grove, MN (random!). The girls were so excited. I decided we would get two cupcakes to share between the three of us. Little Bird picked a Vanilla Vanilla cupcake and Little Pie chose a Brownie cupcake with cream cheese frosting. We found the most adorable little chairs to sit at and I proceeded to cut up the cupcakes. 

I started with Little Bird's, cutting it into 4 pieces and then putting it on her little table. I turned to cut Little Pie's and after I placed hers on her table I turned back to get a taste of Little Bird's. I was shocked to find it ALL GONE. I immediately looked on the floor but the look on her face told me she had just stuffed the whole thing in her mouth! A mom and her teenage daughters had watched the whole thing and they couldn't help but laugh. I did manage to get a taste of Little Pie's delectable cupcake. Totally worth the $5.90 (for two).

Cupcake. All. Gone.

On the way home, Little Bird made the following statement: Mom, I have a new rule. You share cupcakes with Evie and I will eat my cupcake by myself. 

HA!

chores

The girls have a few responsibilities around the house. They have to put their dirty clothes in their hamper and get their jammies on before bed. They have to get dressed themselves and put their jammies away before they can eat breakfast. They have to clean up the toys in their room when quiet time is finished. They have to put their shoes away in the shoe bin when they walk into the house. 

I recently added a new "chore". I have huge problem with dirty floors. I can't stand them. But when you live in a house with two small kids, the floors tend to always be dirty. I'm so sick and tired of sweeping under the table after every meal so I decided to get the girls their own broom and dust pan so they could pick up their own mess.

While the results don't necessarily meet my standards, they do a good job of sweeping up the big pieces like blueberries, Cheerios, green beans, etc. (seriously, how do some of these things manage to get on the floor?). 

The best part is that they love to do it. All I have to do is get the broom and dustpan out and suddenly there is a conversation about using teamwork: who will hold the dustpan and who will sweep. They even walk together to the garbage can and the person not holding the dustpan opens the garbage. They declare it a job well done and are pleased when they pass my inspection. 

Now if only they were big enough to carry the groceries into the house...

besties and kids

A few weeks ago, my two besties came over with their kids for a little backyard pool party. We had two four year olds, two three year olds, a two year old and a one year old (1 boy and 5 girls!). We had a blast and while the kids don't see each other often, they sure got along swimmingly. 

Since my girls don't have any cousins, I like to think that these four other kids will fill that role, because their mamas are like sisters to me.

Can't wait to see who these six kids turn out to be!

wisconsin dells

So where were we this week when the temperatures reached a scorching 100+ degrees?

We were in Wisconsin Dells, the water park capital of the world, enjoying some very fun, very exciting, very refreshing pools and water slides!!

Apparently we picked the perfect week to be visiting a place where all you do is swim and slide in the water. In fact, it was so hot, we did nothing but swim and slide and spend as much time in the water as our bodies would allow. 

We were all so very excited to take our first vacation, just the four of us. While the girls have been on several vacations in their very short lives, grandparents and other relatives have always been around. It was actually really fun to just be the four of us. (We love vacationing with grandparents too!!)

Rob had the whole week off from work, so we were eager to get going Monday morning. It's not quite a four hour drive to The Dells, so we planned to get there around lunch. We weren't able to check in until four, so we planned to picnic at a nearby state park and enjoy it's amenities. Unfortunately, it was just too hot to do that. We instead ate a very fast picnic and left before we all melted.

Mirror Lake State Park - It's hard to eat when you are melting.

Mirror Lake State Park - The water level was very low and all of the grass was brown and dry due to little to no rain this summer.

We decided to head to our resort and see if we could check in early. While we couldn't check into our room early, we were able to start using the pools. We quickly dug out our suits and headed to the pool nearest where our room would be. We stayed at Glacier Canyon Lodge. The place is so huge and has everything you could possibly want so we never left it the entire week.

Unfortunately I didn't get any pictures of us swimming or sliding. There was just no way I was going to bring my camera to the pool and leave it unattended. I didn't even bring my iPhone so I couldn't even take pictures with that. 

We were in the water about 4 hours on Monday, 7 hours on Tuesday and 7 hours on Wednesday. We really didn't want to try and do anything else because it was just too hot. Plus the girls would not get out of the pools so trying to convince them to do something other than swim, jump or slide would have been too difficult.

We were completely amazed at the girls fearlessness. They dove right in to the action and wanted to try everything in their sight. They went down every slide they were big enough for; some were "body" slides they went down by themselves and some were long, fast tube slides they went down with us. We got quite a few laughs from people when they heard the girls howling with excitement before emerging at the end of the tube slide.

I had purchased some swim "backpacks" at Target before we left and they were by far the smartest purchase I have made in a while. They girls wore them the whole time which allowed us to have the freedom to swim near them and only need to be within arms reach. The girls want to swim on their own so badly so this really helped them to do that. Plus they could jump in the water without us having to catch them. It made for a really fun time for all of us.

Little Bird in her "backpack" ready to get out to the pool!

The only difficult part of the trip was bringing the girls to the bathroom. I think I got a really good workout hauling girls out of the pool, taking off their swim backpack, putting their shoes on, walking them to the bathroom, pulling wet suits down and up, washing hands, walking back, putting back packs on, reapplying sunscreen, and jumping back in. And they went to the bathroom a LOT!

We were very proud of the girls for doing so well in the pools and on the slides. They were very good listeners and followed directions very well. Little Pie even thanked the life guards that were at the end of the slides. She also scolded other kids who were running on the pool decks (she appropriately walked, albeit quickly back to the top of the slides and was getting annoyed with the bigger kids who were running to beat her).

When we weren't in the water we were relaxing in our awesome "condo". We stayed in a two bedroom place that had a kitchen and little living area. The girls had a great time playing with the one toy I brought with as a surprise. They had their own room and while they had trouble settling down at night, they slept quite well. Rob and I enjoyed not having to sit in the dark after they went to bed and instead were able to hang out in the living area (we wanted to hang out on the porch but it was scorching!). 

Uh oh. It only happened this one time. Both girls slept on the bottom...we aren't ready for top bunks yet!

The girls are OBSESSED with the Sound of Music so during downtime, we watched a bit.

Watching some more Sound of Music with Daddy who has never seen it. What!? How is that possible?!?

 

We didn't have big plans for the Fourth of July. We were obviously swimming all day, but we had planned to watch the fireworks (Little Pie finally agreed to watch fireworks after I told her it meant she could stay up late). However, the city canceled all firework displays because of the severe drought and heat. That's fine with me, I'm not really keen on keeping the girls up that late. They have plenty of years to see fireworks.

We checked out Thursday morning. Before we left, the girls had to buy a souvenir with some money from Grandpa Bob. After much deliberation, Little Pie settled on a watch (so she could be like her friend Ms M, and Little Bird decided on a yellow flower ring). 

We had planned to go on a Duck Boat tour before we left town but because it was going to be 95 degrees by 11am, we opted to just take a driving tour of the rest of Wisconsin Dells. We decided that we had stayed at the best place and confirmed that we had the best trip.

We had a nice, quiet drive home and while the girls were disappointed we weren't going swimming again, I think they were glad to be home.