Baseball and Thanksgiving Feast at School

While Kevin and Lewis worked on leaves this weekend, I worked on cleaning and organizing some things inside the house. Among the things I uncovered was Lewis' baseball glove and ball set that Papaw Carter had gotten him last year for Christmas or his birthday (I forget which one). I think it was a bit big at the time, so I put it back for 'later'...and now that he's found it, he is obsessed with it!

So obsessed, in fact, that he's slept with it the past three nights:

I think all three mornings when we've gotten him, he's still had it on his hand, ready for action. Like, 'Put me in, coach!' Thankfully it's soft and doesn't appear to cause him any discomfort from sleeping in it. :)

He likes to play catch, too. At first we played in the basement, then upstairs in the living room, and now outside. He makes us put on our gloves, too, and we toss it back and forth a few times. He's got the throwing thing down--the catching part and how the glove works, we are still working on.

Today was Lew's Thanksgiving feast at school (which we had told him about), and he seemed pretty excited to see us when we walked into the gym to eat lunch with him. Mama and Dada at school!? Each of the classes was responsible for an item (rolls, turkey, cranberries, mashed potatoes, and pumpkin pie), and we enjoyed a nice little meal with him and one of his teachers and another mom/boy from his class.

  

Happy Thanksgiving!

Playdate at Carlton's and Raking Leaves in the COLD!

Last Friday we went out to Carlton's house for a playdate--it had been a few weeks since we'd seen them, so it was good to be able to get together. The boys played really well together and seemed happy to see each other again. :)

 

 The ever important business of tower building

 :) Carlton, ready to work!

Lewis found Kitty

I know if he had his way, we'd have a kitty cat at our house. If it weren't for the two dogs we already have and the mild cat allergies Kevin and I both have...thankfully this Kitty was very friendly and let Lew get his cat fix. 

 :)

Carlton pulled Lewis to the end of the driveway, and then Tonya pulled them both to the end of their road. Then the boys got out and pulled the wagon back to the house, I believe.

Over the weekend Kevin and Lewis worked on leaves, and from start-to-finish, there was probably a 30 degree temperature swing, downward. Saturday they were out in sweatshirts, and by Sunday they had to have on coats, hats, gloves, etc.

 Hitching a ride on Saturday

 All snowsuit-ed up for Sunday :)

With a perma-wedgie to boot.

The snowsuit is a 2T, and I doubted we'd even be able to zip it up but we did! It was probably six inches too short in the legs, so we rigged up some sweatpants and boots to make up the difference. After all of that, he didn't really want to be outside in the cold after 15-20 minutes, so he hung out inside with me while Kevin finished the leaves for the year (yay!).

Today there is a wintry mix happening--I see snowflakes falling outside my window. :)

Trip to Cincinnati: Day Two (EnterTrainment Junction and Newport Aquarium)

The second day, we headed to EnterTrainment Junction. It.was.awesome! We (adults and Lewis) could have spent hours in there, looking at all of the details. They broke up the history of the railroads into three main time periods and included every last detail in the model displays:

:) 

There were some buttons you could push to make the trains go, and in this first room, Lewis would move his step stool over, stand up on it to watch the train go by, and then rush down and over a few feet away to do the same thing--not wanting to miss a second of face-to-face time with the trains as they went by. It was hilarious to watch him move and try to catch up with the trains. 

 Riding a reeeealy slow train ride

This was in the kids' play area--there was also a big, tall structure with tunnels and slides that he spent a little bit of time in.

 He was saying toooot-toot here. :)

 

Watching the cargo being loaded onto the big rigs :)

He stood there for a good five minutes and just watched. There were so many cool scenes throughout the museum--early American settlements, 1950s towns, I think (which was my favorite area), and then modern cities. There was also a full Coney Island amusement park display with working rides that was so cool. It was amazing, the detail and creativity that went into all of it.

They also had a special winter/Christmas train area set up, so we went through that:

:)

At one point, we came upon Mrs. Claus who had just made some chocolate chip cookies, and before we knew it, an elf was taking us to see the big man, himself (which we didn't realize was a part of the tour):

 He willingly sat on Santa's lap, but he seemed most interested in eating the cookie rather than talking to Santa. I think he did get out that he wanted a big green tractor, but he did so very quietly and was ready to continue on his way. :)

Finally, we headed down to Newport for some lunch and to visit the aquarium:

 Turtle in grass!

 

 Petting starfish, sea urchins, etc.

In these next two, we were in a room with a big tank at the front of it (kind of like watching a movie, if the movie was a fish tank with big shark rays in it...). Lewis made himself right at home and went and sat among the other kiddos during the presentation:

 

 :)

 Baby Alligator

 And the big one!

 

 Frog Bog with Gramma

 Fish! Above and below and everywhichwhere!

I love his double finger-pointing--I think he does that when he's excited about something.

 Hey, shark ray!

 

 Looking out below, too

 Petting a shark with Gramma

 Flashback at the penguin tank! 

The top pic is from our trip with the Okrzesiks in 2011. :) Such a little guy he was!

And again, in the little lookout portals. :)

The aquarium doesn't take a super long time to get through and there were a LOT of school kids there. And it's a bit expensive. But otherwise, we had a nice visit--I think Lew's favorite was the big alligator, and Gramma bought him one at the gift shop on the way out: 

 Which he proceeded to use to chomp off half of Papaw's index finger :)

And trimmed some shrubs

 One last stop at Coldstone for some ice cream, and we were on our way home!

It was a fun mid-week trip! It felt like a weekend, so this weekend has felt like an extra bonus--as will Thanksgiving break this week!

Trip to Cincinnati: Day One (Museum of Natural History and Science and Children's Museum)

Last week we took a one night trip to Cincinnati. Kevin had some days to use at work before the end of the year, so we decided to go up and do the Cincinnati Museum Center (history, natural history, and children's museum, in one) and Newport Aquarium. My parents joined us in the afternoon of the first day, and we decided to add on a visit to EnterTrainment Junction the second day since it was just a few minutes from our hotel. It was a fun little trip!

First, some pictures from the Museum of Natural History and Science. The focus was mostly on Earth/space science, dinosaurs, etc. so it was a bit over Lew's head, but it was free with our Science Center membership, so we decided to go ahead and check it out. They did have a huge sandbox area and there happened to be a banjo player playing children's music and Christmas music while we were there, so it worked out! 

 Listening to the banjo player

 Piling in the sand...

 And then making it rain! :)

 

 Checking out a huge geode

 Crawling through a cave tunnel

 Reading about what it means to be an astronaut

 Playing dinos with Dada :)

 

Petting a wolf :)

He was freaked out by it at first, so we were giggling as he very cautiously approached it and petted it.

We took a break for lunch and then decided to go ahead and buy tickets to the Children's Museum. It was really great--all age-appropriate. Lew had tons of fun.

 Found the water table, first thing, of course :)

They have a cool play structure with trees and a tree house and lots of tunnels and slides and ladders connecting it all--we had a hard time keeping track of just where he was in all of it, but he had a blast.

 

 Going up!

 They had a mini town with gas station, grocery, vet, construction site, doctor's office, etc. that was a lot of fun:

 Filling up his tank :)

 GRAHAM CRACKERS!

A current favorite food.

 Filling up his cart

Watching Lewis and Kevin fill up the red bucket with rocks

 

Watching as they dump the load of rocks into the dump truck 

:)

After the children's museum, we headed to our hotel to meet up with my parents. We went swimming and then to dinner and IKEA.

 Lew trying to drown Gramma? Haha.

 Hitching a ride on a dolphin Papaw

 

:) Dad used to do that to us when we were little--you lay straight as a board, and he lifts you up and tosses you into the water. Lewis loved it...'Again?'

Next, day two...