Playing with my Cousin

Cousin Logan (A.K.A. Lovey) came to stay the weekend with Lauren and me while Paul, Josh, and Shelly attended to business in Alabama where Shelly's dad lives. I kept the kids occupied, but that still meant an enormous amount of energy on my part. We went to Chuck E. Cheese's for dinner Saturday night after Lauren got up from her nap. Let me tell you that at 4:00, CEC's is hopping! Lauren enjoyed watching Logan play racing games. (We won some mad tickets from Deal or No Deal--see them in her hand!) Logan rode a ride that took him up in the air!

We played in toddler land for a bit. Logan squeezed himself into the fire truck while Lauren took a spin with the Tele-Tubbies.

On Sunday, we went to church. Lauren barely made it through the first hymn before she was escorted to the nursery. (Poor Logan worried about her!) We finished our service, collected Lauren, and went home to make our noon meal. While our meal was baking, Lauren, Logan and I made up an afternoon snack. We looked for a fun, kid-friendly recipes so we could all participate. We took bananas, smothered them in peanut butter, rolled the bananas in crushed Oreos and sprinkles, and froze the treat for 2 hours. The kids enjoyed their snacks. There are two left in the freezer for tonight!

We went to Southside Park in Newton to play. It was very crowded, so the kids tried to find activities that didn't have so many rowdy kids arounds. Logan tried to launch off of his horse. Lauren loved the duck, then wimpered.

Logan loved pushing Lauren on the swing. Lauren didn't mind. They watched the other kids.

After 15 minutes of play, we went to another school park without other kids and climbed, ran, and slid to our heart's content. I took the kids to McDonald's after because it was so late that dinner would have taken forever to cook. Overall, we had a nice weekend and enjoyed our family time.

Incidently, even with a 2 and 7 year old running around, the house was neater and cleaner than when Paul is in the mix...

The Past Month

August 18-- Lauren was given her 1st Cabbage Patch kid from Aunt Suzy. Aunt Suzy picked this one out because it had a carrier/car seat, just like Cara had been traveling in. Incidently, Lauren named her baby "Baby Cara". She LOVES to haul her around! (Cara the babydoll, not Cara the real baby!)

August 22--Lauren loves to help me around the house, and doing laundry is no exception! She likes to sit on the side of the washer and put clothes (and her toes!) inside. She got a little too over-exuberant one day and fell INTO the washer! Paul and I were in hysterics. Lauren was a bit panicked until she saw us laughing. Then she joined in.

August 23--Lauren's Uncle Luke was in NC with Aunt Sherry and Trisha visiting friends. We got together in Winston-Salem for dinner since they were so close! While we were waiting, Lauren went through my purse and tore it all up. Here she is, holding a mint hostage, only later to say, "Hot!" and spit it out.

Running away from us to check out customers on the patio.

Daddy not getting the hint to take a picture of the two of us, so we tried on our own.

Lauren snuggling with Uncle Luke. Everyone enjoyed the character that she is.

August 29--Suzy's two boys celebrated their 4th and 2nd birthdays together half-way between their birthdays. Paul volunteered to make their cakes. We ended up with a chocolate chip cookie field sprouting some vegetation between the hilly cakes. Didn't Paul do an AWESOME job for only his 2nd cake!!

We also made mini-cupcakes for the boys. Paul put their names in the cupcakes. This was how it was all set up for the guests to see!

September 3--The BEST night I've had in a LONG time!! We went to a preseason game in Charlotte to watch the Panthers play the Steelers! The Steelers scored a touchdown within the 1st 2 minutes and 40 seconds of the first quarter! We were so pumped! We weren't sure if there were more Steelers fans or Panthers...

Here's my boy, Heinz Ward. He's always so happy that he's hard not to love!

And the final score...

September 5--Lauren just looked too cute. She always has these great smiles and happy looks, but it's so hard to get them on camera.

Lauren can put on her own shoes! She did this for the first time on Sept. 4 with her crocs without ANY help! Then on the 5th, she took her brown dress shoes and did the same thing. When I turned around with the camera, she'd already put on her shoes and was fastening them!

I just want to eat her up!

We made a cake later that day for Aunt Pie (a.k.a. Aunt Shelly) because her birthday was on the 8th. Lauren was excited to help, but then she was more focused on eating the cake batter...

What a mess!!

Grandpa Freddie came over on the 6th to visit since Lauren took a really late nap and then we were at Verizon for over 2 hours the Sunday before...Lauren climbed right up on his lap with her Jack-in-the-box to play!