April DC Zoo

 

 

 

 

We've had such a busy few months with the wedding and baseball that Kenn asked for us to have a family day in DC. We decided to go to the zoo since it had been several years since we had been and there was a new panda cub!

 

We underestimated how many people would be there on Cherry Blossom weekend.

The wait to get in the parking lot took forever... its ok we got there!

We immediately went to the Panda!

Love her!!!

 Lily has a panda book at home so she was pretty excited to see her

(below is her looking at her)

 Waving at the panda

 I don't have a ton of pictures, mostly b/c it would be the back of my kids heads looking at everything.

But Lily LOVES elephants ever since my mom took us to the Circus.

So I'd say that and the Panda's were her favorite.

 

We went into the rainforest area

Lily also LOVED the little poison dart frogs. (Which are Brandon's favorite at the aquarium)

we got to see the orangutan outside on the ropes, which I think is the first time I've seen them use it.

 

Inside in the monkey house there was one that people kept taking flash photography of,

he got upset and moved away to another wall and put his blanket overtop of his head to hid.

people just went to that window and continued to take pictures. we felt really bad for him.

I tried to explain to Kenn its better to have zoo's though so kids learn to love the animals, 

so that way they protect them when they grow up.

Brandon's favorite of the day was the tigers. Its a momma and her two kids

(I think they are a year old)

Kenn got Lily (and I) a panda stuffed animal,

and she passed out right as we were getting ready to leave.

it was a very nice family day together and the weather was beautiful!

So happy spring is here!



April 2014

 

Lily @ 21 Months

Lily loves Barney, Minnie/Mickey Mouse, Hello Kitty and Elmo

Only watched Barney and the Mickey Sing along songs video on TV

Loves princesses and Frozen

(she sings parts of the soundtrack)

Loves all animals, singing, reading books

favorite thing to eat is pirate booty

Loves wearing necklaces, hates having her hair up

(Although once its up she does not rip it out)

 

last weekend was Brandon's opening day of Baseball! This is his first year of kid pitch. What that means is the kids pitch until there are 4 balls called and then the coach pitches. Brandon's first game he went to bat 3x and had two singles! (the first time at bat he tried to hit what the kids were throwing which is pretty much impossible) he's now learned to wait until the coaches pitch.

He also caught a pop up ball and got the batter out.

The day started with the parade of teams.

(Kenn took pix on his camera so I will have to post later)

Brandon was so excited to be on the Orioles this year!

 

 Lily got to meet the Oriole Bird while waiting for the parade.

See she's good if your holding her!

 First game of the year!

 

We ended the weekend with dying Easter Eggs!



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Happy 7th Birthday B!

 
 
 
 
 

Since we were going away on Brandon's real birthday we decided to have his party the week before. So that was the week of the snow storm... I was so afraid that the snow would make the party be rescheduled I didn't even think it could get worse.

 

Now Brandon NEVER gets sick, well maybe not never. the night of the snowstorm around 11pm he woke up throwing up everywhere.

This happened maybe 4x Thursday night/Friday AM

 

all day Friday he was able to keep a little food down but he was very lethargic.
He had gotten the stomach flu that had been going around school.

So now I was worried I would have to pay for a party that he wouldn't even get to attend!

Luckily he felt well enough to bounce (of all things)

At the end of the party you could see that he was done though,

he didn't even end up eating cake. He did get to go and have a good time and that's all that matters.



Brandon's 7th Birthday at the Wolf Lodge

For our Christmas/Brandon's Birthday gift Aunt Gail gave us a weekend at the

Williamsburg Great Wolf Lodge.

We left work early and drove up around 3:30PM and got in around dinnertime.

 

Brandon immediately went to check out his Cabin

 Brandon requested Pizza for dinner, so after we ate

we surprised him with a Birthday Cake

(it was his real birthday afterall)

Then it was bedtime for Lily and questing for Brandon

Part of his gift was the Paw Pass

(this is where you get to do a bunch of cool things all around the lodge)

we had never had one before so he was super excited.

First he got to get a new topper for his Magic Wand and play MagicQuest all night

 

The next morning we had breakfast,

Oliver the raccoon came to visit.

Lily has a love/hate relationships with characters.

She likes them and wants to be near them but not actually touch or be alone with one.

Below is what happens when you get too close

 

After breakfast it was off to the park

Below is Brandon in the bucket O' water

 Below aren't GREAT pictures with the kids, but its all I had with them together.

 

Then Brandon goes off with daddy to do his own thing

(water slides, the lazy river, water basketball)

 

After Lunch (and Lily's nap) it was back to the pool for round 2

Lily started to get tired so we went to do some activities

Lily colored Brandon a picture, while Brandon made a tie-dyed pillow case

He also got to make a build a bear wolf and play a 4 D video game (all included in his pass)



After dinner while Brandon did more MagicQuest

Lily and I went to the dance party and then watched the clock tower show

I could tell Lily wasn't feeling great on Sat,

Sunday it became a really bad cold.

We enjoyed our last morning at the pool, but she mostly liked watching the bucket dump water while I held her in the shallow end. (She played with her feet in the sprays of water)



 Again not many pix of Brandon b/c he's always on a water slide.

below is him running on the big maze thing.

His favorite thing this trip though had to be the lazy river.

Not to relax... he likes to go without a tube, and then push me or Daddy (on a raft)

into the water that squirts from pipes or buckets of water that dump on you.

Oh well at least he enjoyed it

We finished Sunday afternoon getting Brandon's Glitter Tattoo and our family picture

Brandon keeps telling us it was the best trip ever.

Unfortunately on the way home we hit something just as we were getting onto 95

(about 30mins into our trip)

and we had to pull over on the left lane and kenn had to put on the spare.

The kids WERE sleeping before this.

I had a mini meltdown that we were going to get hit...

Luckily kenn is amazing, put on the donut and drove us home at 45miles an hour as I was way to shaken up.

We got home safely and that's what matters. Overall another memorable Birthday for Brandon!

We can't thank Aunt Gail enough!