Tuesday: happy birthday Joshua!

The birthday day started with a donut!  It was a plain one, but Joshua still enjoyed it.

It continued with his first pony ride at Meijer.  Unfortunately, Isaac took the picture and covered most of it with his finger.  Joshua also got some toothbrushes.

We got ready for the birthday party throughout the day.  We hung up streamers, but my one picture of them wasn't very good; I'll try tomorrow.  We also frosted cupcakes.

Joshua ate at the kids table.  He likes watermelon the best right now, so he had quite a bit of that.

He had lots of help opening presents.

Cupcake time!  The wind blew out the candle before we finished singing.  Oh well...it would have been too hot otherwise.

Ready, set,

go!  Joshua ate all the frosting off and some of the cake.  He mostly made a mess with the cake.

He also got his first taste of ice cream.  He wasn't a fan.

There was also a new water table...but we had to wait until the bigger kids finished playing first.  He didn't seem to mind though, so neither did we.

Then Joshua crashed.  Perhaps too much sugar?  But it was bedtime anyway, so we put him to bed.

Monday: 52 weeks

Today started with Isaac running "really fast".  It happens when he puts his arms behind him like an airplane.

I tried to get Joshua's normal weekly pictures, but he wasn't cooperating.  All he wanted to do was bounce with his arms out and do pre-somersaults.

Isaac got his quilt too.  Or, did the quilt get Isaac?

Being silly.

Wrestling.

Last Wednesday: Children's museum

The men of the group went to see a movie while the rest of us went to the children's museum.  It was quite nice; the boys could have probably spent the whole day there.

The museum had a place for crawlers.  Isaac enjoyed it too, but it was nice to have a contained spot where Joshua wouldn't get run over.

There was some fishing.

And some trains.  Joshua really got into the trains and didn't just take apart the track as I had expected.

I really like this picture.

There was a nice dollhouse to play with...it had an elevator which fascinated Isaac for quite a while.

There was a place where you put eggs down a hole and they came out the bottom.

This tree told stories.  However, the one we had was kind of boring.  Isaac remembered it though, because as we were going home and listening to books on CD he started talking about trees.

Joshua in the crawling area.

More fishing.

The tree again.  (Sorry, it's a bit of work to get everything in exactly the right order.)

The eating set up for the kids.  It was interesting to hear snatches of their conversations, as they can communicate but have no filters.  They "discussed" rules quite a bit.

The guys ate at the bar.

Joshua ate at the table.  He almost fell asleep this night, but we woke him up.

They had a power wheels and Isaac loved it.

Joshua got in on the wheeled vehicles too.  He enjoyed it more than the picture shows.

We let Isaac take Joshua for a spin.

Matching clothes...with the wrong son.

Last Tuesday: Burritt on the mountian

Most of the group in front of the mansion.  "Mansion."  It was pretty small.

The upstairs room.  There was a mineral display there, although I couldn't figure out why.

Isaac and Marshall went to the playground halfway through the mansion tour.

In the "blast to the past" area there was a maze to show paths of how slaves would get to freedom.  Notice the lack of tall people with short people.  It was easy to lose them, but there were enough of us that it didn't matter too much.

By the goats.

All the kids!  We finally got a good shot...we actually got several.

Isaac liked looking at the train pictures.

Oh, a different good picture.

Our luncheon dessert.  It had been a long time since I've had astronaut ice cream.  It was surprisingly creamy.

Isaac really wanted me to take a picture of this card.

Floating boats and sticks down a stream.

It was rather hot by the end, so Joshua didn't have all the straps connected in the carrier.

Sunday: home

We got home today around 1pm.  The drive went really well...not much construction and the boys either slept, played, or watched something.

We hired a babysitter for a few hours tonight.  I realized that getting home after a lot of driving means that Ben and I just want to crash and Isaac (and Joshua) want to go crazy.  And since we had saved a lot of money by not flying, we could splurge a bit.  It worked really well and we might have to do it again.