Random January Happenings

Lots of other fun things happened January besides our Wisconsin trip!  Here are all the pictures:

I've been taking Ian to story time almost every week.  He loves it! There's a 25% chance of him sitting on my lap at each song, but most of the time he really gets into the song! He loves the stories and especially the bubbles!

When the action of a song calls for a "stop", Ian always stops and then falls to the floor! 

Ian really gets into the music! I love watching him have fun.

Gabe got glasses! He had his eye appointment at the end of December when it was determined that his vision was poor enough that he needed corrective lenses.  We picked up his glasses in January.  He doesn't wear them much, even though he should.

haha silly Ian!

Isn't he adorable?!

Some random pictures of Elisa:

Elisa, on a Sunday evening enjoying some cookies and milk.

Elisa and her friend, Kassidy at a sleepover at our house.

Being silly at a pack meeting where Erik said a few words about his career and gave the kids hats and masks.  I wasn't there during his spiel.

Elisa, just before going to sleep.  Isn't she so pretty?

Here are some cute pictures of silly Ian:

Walmart.  Ian is horrible at Walmart.  I refuse to take him now since the last 2-3 times he's with me, he throws a gargantuan fit about some toy, and its usually a toy he already owns.  Anyway, here are a couple cute pictures of Ian in Walmart:

He insisted on sitting inside the storage bin.

He found a motorcycle bike.  I think its a pretty awesome ride.  He already has tricycle and a little Thomas the Train bike, otherwise I might have considered getting that for his birthday.

Sometimes Ian's nursery teachers take pictures and post them on the ward FaceBook page.  Here's and adorable picture I stole.

Sometimes I take Ian to the mall.  He enjoys playing in the play place, and on this car.

Ian sometimes blows bubbles when he is upset.  Here is Ian blowing angry bubbles because I told him it was time to go! Haha!

Can you guess who took this picture??

And some other random things, such as our new sink! We hated our old faucet that didn't turn, and we decided we might as well up grade the entire sink while we're at it.  So bye-bye ugly old silver tacky sink, hello big beautiful black sink.  It is nice to only have one drain to clean out:

Silly Gabe arranged the rocks he found in our back yard into categories: 

Elisa's Butterfly Field Trip

 A few months ago (this past January), I had the opportunity to go to the Butterfly Wonderland with Elisa on a school field trip.  I had never been there before, let alone even heard about it so I made sure I went! I was expecting to pay full price ($24 for me and $16 for Ian-yikes!) but when I told them I was with the field trip, they gave me a steep discount--I think I only paid $10 instead of the $40. 
Anyway, it was a really neat field trip.  I enjoyed seeing the variety of cocoons, but the actual butterfly garden was my favorite.  There was so many beautiful butterflies flying around! I was hoping one would land on Elisa, but none did for long enough for me to get a picture, except at the very end, just as we were about to walk on, a small one landed on her! Ian was slightly scared of the butterflies when they got too close to his face. We spent the rest of the trip looking at various exhibits (I guess they weren't that exciting because I don't even remember most of them) and then the whole class went to a nearby park to eat lunch and play.  While at the park, her friend Kassidy wanted to have a playdate, and since I couldn't take her home with us, he dad said he could drop her off.  So I took Elisa home and then Elisa had a fun play date with her BFF.  Here are the pictures: 

The cocoons.  So many of them!

 Beautiful girl, silly expression, and weird lighting.

 Ahh! A butterfly in her hair! She didn't even notice, nor did I get a good shot of it.

 

 She made a little friend!

 

 One of the exhibits.  Look at those two cute little faces!

 A close-up of the month cocoons.

 A cute little caterpillar and a beautiful butterfly!

 Having fun at the park!

Elisa and her friend Kassidy, being goofballs!

Wisconsin Dells, Day 4 (& 5)

 We were approaching the last few days of our trip.  There were still lots of fun things to do! We spent our last morning in Wisconsin Dells at the indoor amusement park, this time our activity was concentrated at the arcade, although Erik and Elisa tried out the climbing wall once more.  We also tried laser tag, which I did not think was that fun, but the kids liked it.  Erik only bought $10 worth of arcade games, which got spent really quickly.  I think $20 should be a minimum at arcades.  We got enough tickets for each kid to buy a few very small somethings at the prize counter:

     

Gabe and Elisa at the laser tag

 Ian loved all of the arcade cars, even though we didn't put any money into them.

 This Kalahari mascot, an elephant, came up to Ian and tried to say hi.  Ian refused to have anything to do with him!

 One last glimpse of the huge Ferris wheel.  I thought the kids would want to ride it more than they did...

Erik had previously set up an online reservation to see Mr. Marvel's Wondertorium. After packing up, we headed over.  I was surprised to see that it was at someone's house.  There were four others there to see the show besides us, which I initially thought would be awkward, but the guy (Mr. Marvel?) was very professional and rehearsed so it wasn't really awkward at all. I really liked seeing all of the oddities he had in his collection (shrunken heads, walking fish, 2-headed turtles, a replica skeleton of an African woman with a "stretched neck," tiny shoes for shaping feet for Chinese women, an albino black bear).  I could have looked at those all day! He personally knew some of the side show "freaks" so it was really cool hearing stories about them. 



 

Gabe was chicken during a lot of the show. So much so in fact, that Mr. Marvel worried that the kids didn't enjoy the show and offered our money back.  Which we refused because I think the kids really did enjoy the show, and even if they didn't Erik and I certainly did!

After playing with broken glass and laying his face in broken glass, Mr. Marvel invited a member of the audience to stand on his face.

Mr. Marvel balanced a sword on the tip of a knife and walked over an audience member.

The kids really liked this trick--gigantic bubbles!

Fire-eating

After Mr. Marvel, we stopped by a fudge shop in downtown Wisconsin Dells and bought some day-old candy that was pretty good despite being a day old.  Then we stopped for lunch at Hot Dog Avenue and ate what else but hot dogs for lunch.  We were officially done in Wisconsin dells, now on our way to Waukegan, IL. to see grandma Julie!

Awww, all tired out from a day of fun!





We had a nice visit with Grandma Julie. I didn't take pictures because my phone was dad.  We also saw (great) Uncle Tom as well.  We didn't have too long of a visit, but we did get to go to Louie's restaurant for some yummy food.  We stayed at a hotel in Grayslake for the night, and then headed back to my mom's house once again until we had to catch our flight.  We enjoyed some smoked sausage and my mom sent m home with a bunch of candles and makeup.  The kids liked looking at her parakeet and her cat. It was fun seeing my moms rental house, although it would have been better to be at my house that I grew up in.  We did drive by to see it though, and my Grandparents house: 



My Grandparent's old house.  Painted blue--what?? And Yuck!

My old house.

My room was the window on the right.

Some pictures with Grandma:

Then it was time to leave, too soon! I wish we could have stayed longer with my mom.  Now back to Phoenix, where our life awaits us! It was so much fun going to Wisconsin and to Illinois.  What a memorable trip! I hope we can go again some time.

 





At the airport we saw a famous snack store "Nuts on Clark." I begged Erik to buy something there. He got us some cheese popcorn, caramel popcorn, and chocolate covered pecans. It wasn't cheap, but it was definitely worth the price.