Great Day for a Fair Day!

Today was our day at the Iowa State Fair. It went wonderfully! The kids were amazing! The weather was good, but we're all a bit pinker (especially my face). There wasn't a single problem to speak of with the kids all day! And it was a full day since we left about 7:45 this morning and didn't get back home until around 4:30 this afternoon. Laura nursed (mostly) discreetly when we'd stop for Evan and Kendra to do/watch something. Evan and Kendra never bickered about anything other than a few very brief spats when one of them would have both Terrible's Casino necklaces instead of them each having one. My mom went along, and the extra person helped more than we can imagine. Not only did it even out our adult-kid ratio, but it also gave us two extra hands when trying to wrangle 3 children, a stroller, and a wagon onto the shuttle bus.

I took along the camera but got very few pictures since the camera was well buried in the bottom of the stroller under the diaper bag and such. But here's a few pictures when we were back to the van and ready to head home.

Evan holding the diaper bag in his short Kendra-free wagon ride from the shuttle bus back to the van. Kendra didn't make it through the shuttle ride back to the van. She slept on the bus and the whole way home.
Laura, however, was still in a great mood when it was time to go home. She even had half the people on the shuttle turning to watch her giggle turn into a full out guffaw on the way back.
Our day at the Fair was great! We won't go again until next year, but it renewed my faith in how great my children really can be!

And, as a side note, this is what Laura learned on Thursday morning:

5th Time in 29 years

Today is the 5th time in 29 years that I have missed the first day of the Iowa State Fair. Am I a little bummed by that? Yes. Am I almost giddy about going to the fair tomorrow? You betcha!

Here is a picture of Evan from his very first Iowa State Fair:

And this is a picture of the battle wound he came back with from his very first Iowa State Fair:

In Peace, Sleeping Soundly, and Maximum Capacity

In Peace

Today I was sitting feeding Laura. Evan loves to bother Laura while she's eating. He doesn't seem to mind that his bothering Laura often results in Mommy getting bitten. Today I asked him if he could please let Laura eat in peace. A few seconds later he came back over and asked "what's 'in peace' mean?". I said "without being bothered". His reply? "I'm going to unpeace Laura while she's eating."

Sleeping Soundly

This afternoon when I put Laura down for her nap, she had been crying for several minutes (note to those of you who don't know Laura: She's an amazingly wonderful baby who sleeps spectacularly well, and her cry is pretty mild), so I went to peek in at her. I took the camera along so I could get a picture of her first time pulling up since she had been trying to do that earlier today (she has not accomplished it ... yet). She was not trying to stand up; she was laying down whimpering. So I changed the camera to video and actually got a video of her falling asleep! Note the big asleep sigh right before the end!

Maximum Capacity
Sunday afternoon the kids got to try out their new little pool. Evan and Kendra loved it!

Laura got to wear a swimsuit for the first time. (Notes about the picture: 1) I can't figure out how to crop the picture so it's closer up of Laura, 2) look at the cute baby in the swimsuit, not at the horribly unflattering picture of the mommy...)

Then we decided to let Laura try out the pool. We learned that Laura does not necessarily care for cooler-than-bathwater pools, and that a 3-year old, 2-year old, and 8-month old might possibly exceed the maximum capacity of a 40-inch pool.

I did it!

So, I've finally started a blog. Chad and Evan went to wash the van. Kendra and Laura are napping. I sat down with a bowl of ice cream and started a blog, while ignoring the 2 big baskets of laundry that still need folded.

In all of my lurking around on other people's blogs, it seems that the first thing you need to do is say why you have a blog and what its purpose is. The purpose for my blog is to share pictures and stories about what Evan, Kendra, and Laura are doing at whatever age they are at the time. There might be minimal information that Chad or I want to share, but mostly it will be about the kids.

To explain the title: I thought of a lot of ideas and really didn't like any of them (except for one which included our last name, and I wasn't sure I wanted to do that). So I went with Cherish These Days because it seems like people tell me all the time to cherish the days when my kids are all little and ornery and cute and at home all day. Hopefully the title will remind me to cherish it all, and hopefully the blog will be a good way to record things they do that I do cherish and want to remember as they grow up.
Now, to learn how this all works...

Well, I've figured out how to add a picture. Above is a picture of Laura, Evan, and Kendra from a couple weeks ago.

This is all for my horribly boring first blog post. I'm not sure how often I'll update it, but that doesn't matter a whole lot since no one knows about it yet ... even Chad. Feel free to comment and comment often. I think that will probably be my favorite part, reading people's comments.

Thanks for joining me as I start this new hobby that I don't really have time for!
Lynnette

P.S. I'm not really sure of the level of "privacy" I'm going for on here. I'm obviously not going to be posting our address or phone number or anything. I'm avoiding last names and things like that for now, so please be considerate if you do post comments. My feelings about how much "identifiable" information I want to share will be determined as we go along.