delightful labor day.

sandee and kids invited us to check out a cool park on sunday. i suggested we go for labor day instead and take a picnic. it was a date.
monday the 6th we packed and enjoyed a lunch of corn chips and salsa, cheese sticks, watermelon, raspberries, a jello cup and water. yum.

here are the girls with the their beatles lunch boxes. they love to carry them.

after we ate we played!

the swings are always a hit and they had the most comfortable swings i've ever been on.

this park has lots of cool things! most of them spin and make you dizzy. i loved that stuff when i was young. i wish i didn't have such motion sickness issues now. even doing a somersault puts me over the edge, as i found out the other night. :(

this thing is like a skate board on a half pipe.
cool suspended reclining chair that sways.

these spinning cups are hilarious! when you try to sit up to get out, it spins you more. flower was spinning so fast she was starting to get scared so i came to her rescue.

triple teeter-totter.
river couldn't get enough of the fast spinning!

cousins.

this thing turns in circles as well. but it goes high and low which makes it harder to hold on.

more spinning. sandee started spinning her so fast she almost flew off because she was barely able to hold on! pretty funny.

this things spins like wild too!
more reclining chairs. the kids kept switching places and begging us to take their photos.






we had such a good time. we spent two hours playing then came home and crashed for naps. :) at least river and i did. i believe flower decided to play with my phone/camera. :)
it was nice to get out in the middle of the day and enjoy cousins, lunch in the sun and play in beautiful weather in a very cool park.

spirit of boise balloon festival

on saturday the 4th we took advantage of kg having the night off and went to ann morrison park. we wanted to be a part of the balloon festival which sounded like lots of fun.
first we enjoyed some live music while the girls danced.


then we got a huge plate of fresh cut french fries to share, some water and a big bag of cotton candy. yum! after the grease and sugar overload we walked to some of the balloons. they were just filling up this balloon. it was so big.


sharing her cotton candy. :)
then we found a comfortable place to kick off our shoes and wait for the main event, the lighting of several balloons.
they started to fill them!
this one was my favorite. so colorful.


and they're all up!

and then they started to make them glow. it was beautiful.

flower loved the one with the heart.
there's the bsu balloon for my family!
they lit them over and over and the darker it got the more beautiful it was.
as you can see we slowly made our way out of the park and home. it was a great night in the park as a family.

oink oink.

flower is loving school. this cute little puppet pig is the first thing she's made and brought home to show. :) i love seeing the things she brings home.
prior to school our family schedule was as follows; i went to work from 10-2. kg had the girls. he'd put river to bed at 1 so he could finally go to bed. flower would watch tv and read until i got home at 2:00. then we'd eat lunch and get ready for them to come back to the office with me until 6:00. our new routine is as follows; i still go to work from 10-2. kg keeps river and flower is at school from 8:30 to 11:45. she is dropped off at the clubhouse with me after school. we do her homework first thing, then she eats lunch and then she gets to play on the computer, watch tv, or play 'office' until 2:00. kg has river and feeds her lunch and then puts her to bed at noon and then he goes to bed. this is allowing him to get a little more sleep than he did before. river sleeps till 2:00 when flower and i get home. i then feed them a snack and get them ready for emily's. so far it's working well. both kg and river sleep better with flower out of the house. :) at almost 2 years old, this is the first time river is only taking one nap. and it's a little tough on her to make it clear to noon. prior to now, she was still taking two naps a day. she would go down for a nap at 10 or 11 for an hour or so and then sleep again for an hour or two later in the day. and still go to bed at 8 and sleep for 12 hours! i'm so grateful for good sleepers! the girls now go to bed at 7:00 pm and sleep till 7:00 am since flower has to be up earlier for school. so far our new schedule is working and the school year is going well.
one thing i'm not loving? flower's new little attitude. holy smokes. she is so defiant and sassy. she talks back, complains, whines, spits and stomps off and is sometimes unbearable. it started as soon as school started. i sure hope this doesn't last long or she may not make it to the end of the year.