Flint Hills International Children's Festival

Today we spent the afternoon in downtown St. Paul, at the Flint Hills Children's Festival. There was great outdoor music, a fantastic parade, and lots of activities for the kids. We also went to a show at the Ordway, called "Birdhouse Factory," which was full of cool acrobatics and circus acts.

watching the parade

No children's festival is complete without tattoos.

Guess who was a major sponsor of the event?

This was Karl's first visit to the Ordway.

Laura's Busy Day

Laura had a jam-packed day today. First, she performed with her reading class in a play called, "The Shoemaker and the Elves." Laura got to play an elf named Polly. Then her music class put on a talent show. Laura played an arrangement of "Ode to Joy" on the piano, and also did some stand-up comedy with the help of her joke book. After school, she went bowling with her Girl Scout troop (she almost wouldn't go, since she usually has piano lessons on Thursdays, but she settled down when I rescheduled her lesson for Monday ("Yay! I get two piano lessons next week!"). After dinner, it was off to the first week of soccer practice. Whew! What a day!

Laura was a shoe-making elf. Here she is hammering on a shoe.

Playing piano in the talent show.

Laura told jokes from her famous knock-knock joke book.

Karl hung out with his friends during the show. They were the loudest laughers and clappers.

In my rush to get two kids ready for soccer tonight, I forgot my camera, so you'll all have to wait until next week for the big soccer post. Karl is especially excited for soccer because he's finally old enough to join a team! He played his heart out tonight, and even scored two goals! He couldn't stop talking about soccer all the way home. Soccer, soccer, soccer until he fell asleep in a lump, and is probably dreaming of soccer right at this very moment. Laura? Oh, she thought soccer was fine, but you know, it's not like piano lessons or anything...

Memorial Day in Sandstone

We had a great weekend. On Friday, we went to the Children's Theatre to see "Ramona Quimby." On Saturday, we went out for pizza with my parents. Yesterday, we went to a neighborhood BBQ, and the kids got to stay up LATE! (Luckily, they also slept late today, so Mommy and Daddy could recover.) Today we visited Mike, Lamiae, and their new cattle in Sandstone. Angie, Jason, Colin, and Justin were also there, as well as Mike's friend Mark and his sons Cole and Trey.

Laura and Karl agreed that their favorite part of the day was getting a ride in the six-wheeler. We drove out to visit the cattle in the pasture, and as soon as we drove up they started moving in to get a better look at us.

The kids also got a good look through the fence. We stood there a long time, trying to figure out who was starting at whom! The cattle seemed just as interested in us as we did in them!

Colin, Justin, Karl

Mike and Angie

No, Karl is not throwing rocks. He's throwing acorns. I have no idea why.

After such a busy weekend, the kids were worn out by the end of this afternoon. Even Laura was dozing during the car ride home...

Another Preschool Alum

Karl graduated from preschool tonight, and boy does it feel good to have guided and supported both kids through the rigors of early childhood education. It just fills our hearts with pride to know all our efforts paid off and that our kids made it! What? There's more? But he has a diploma! I thought we were done!

Ok, well, I guess we have more work to do. Anyway, here are some pictures from the grand event. Way to go, Karl!

Karl with his teacher, Miss Julie

Karl and some classmates: Ben Hanson, Karl, Montgomery Palmer, Katelyn Buehring, and Alexis Ertz

Water Park of America

Today we met Angie, Jason, Colin, and Justin at the Mall of America's indoor waterpark. Wow, was it fun! There was a huge kids' area, a wave pool, lazy river, hot tubs, and lots of water slides. Our favorite was the 10-story family raft ride, in which we all piled into one huge inner tube raft and went on a wild trip down to the bottom, screaming happily in Jason's ear the entire way. It wears you out, though--I don't think I've ever climbed so many steps in my life as I did today. On the way home, Karl finished the Dilly Bar he was eating, said, "I'm done," and promptly fell asleep (it took maybe 20 seconds--tops). Unfortunately we couldn't take pictures of the really fun stuff, since out camera would get wrecked, but we did the best we could...

The waterpark actually wasn't too busy, but we did get stuck in a brief logjam in the lazy river (actually it was a group of teenage boys who were trying to plow through, but we thought it was fun because it made us go faster!).

Karl and Colin warmed up for the big rides by going down the small rides in the kids' section.

Laura found out that she's much braver now when it comes to water rides. She had a blast going down one of the big inner tube slides, and decided that she just might be able to tackle the big waterslide at the Rush City pool this year!

Matt and Justin were the only two who stayed dry today, but they had fun watching all the action.

These kids will be sleeping quite well tonight!

It's almost 9:20. I'd say that's a respectable bedtime. (yawn) Good night.

A Busy Weekend

On Friday, we made a grand trip across the border to Wisconsin. Karl had been talking a lot lately about visiting Uncle Dan and Aunt Peggy because they live in Wisconsin, and Karl doesn't remember ever visiting the state. When he heard that my parents were going there for a visit, Karl begged to go too. In the end, we all tagged along, so Karl got to realize his dream of riding through the Wisconsin countryside (the rest of us didn't care about Wisconsin; we just wanted to see Baby Wyatt). When we (finally) got there, Karl and Laura went for a ride in Dan's "Rhino," so the trip qualified as a success.

Little Wyatt had fun hanging out with his older cousin.

On Saturday, Laura and I went to a Mother-Daughter banquet at my mom's church with Angie, Jennifer, Connie, and Mom.

And yesterday we celebrated Mother's Day at Angie and Jason's. All the kids had fun running around in the backyard. Here's one shot of the action:

Did you know I'm the luckiest mother in the world?

Great Day for a Road Race...

This morning the kids and I had another race in the Elm Creek Park Reserve. I ran a 2 mile race (that turned out to be a 2.25 mile race when one of the racing volunteers pointed us down a wrong turn), and the kids ran a half-mile fun run.

Yay! I won my age group (30-39 year-old women).

Karl sizes up the competition at the starting line.

Laura gets ready to go (no we did not run the whole race holding hands).

Finally, the kids' race is about to start...

Karl comes in for the big finish...

...and leaped over the finish line (in chalk on the ground) as he finished strong!

And here comes Laura!

After such a hard run, we skipped right over the apples and went straight for the cookies (that's an oatmeal raisin cookie Karl's holding-- it's the snack of choice for running champions).

It was a gorgeous day for a race. We can't wait for the next one!

Brownie Laura

Last night was the "Court of Awards" for the Rush City Girl Scouts. Laura got all the patches she earned this year as a Brownie, and after the awards ceremony was a magic show (Matt wanted to leave before "Magic Norm" took the stage, but it's a good thing we didn't, because both Laura and Karl were enthralled with the performance.)