August 2008 Archives

What a great tradition to start: a yearly girl's only trip to the Iowa State Fair (it is girl's only, but next year, Carter J. can come, too!).  Mackenzie and Natalie came down to spend the day with us at the fair.  The great thing about going with Kenz and Natalie is that Mackenzie has about half an iota of an attention span, so we're constantly on the move!  

We met up at the house at 7:30 and we entering the fair by 8:15.  Nothing opened until 9am, so we were able to leisurely stroll around, make our daily plan, and stop for potty breaks.  At 9, we looked around the photography exhibit and then headed to get snack #1: our traditional morning elephant ear.  Then we were off to the Varied Industries building for tattoos and then to the petting zoo, stopping along the way for a sample of wine-a-rita's (Kenz, I'll make you a special batch Sunday at the party!).  The girls rode the ponies - which was a huge hit!  Then we doubled back for Giant Slide rides, which made me super-nervous.  It's really high, and Carter's still really little.  But, being a good Mom who lives up to my promises, I took Carter, and we had a ball!  Andy's going to have to share slide riding duties with me next year!  Next, we headed to the rides, shared lunch, and broswed crafts, wrapping up with Dippin' Dots and a nap on the ride home!

It was a beautiful and cool day with two of our favorite chicky's!  Summer just wouldn't be summer without our traditional Friend's Fair day!  Thanks for coming up, ladies!  We had a great day, and we love ya!

Argh, fair-going matey's!  I love Natalie's one-eyed pirate face!

Choo choo!  The girls playing on the wooden train

 What sweet besties!  Carter's been talking about Natalie all afternoon!  Our cute little cheesers posing

R O A R ! ! !

In honor of Janine, who's never been to the fair (and ditched us for a kid-free weekend!  Whatever!!), we made sure to get a quick glance at the butter cow, next to the butter Shawn Johnson.  You know you've made it when you've got a personal likeness of yourself made of butter!  Crazy!

It just wouldn't be a Nat-Carts day without the elephant ear!  By 10am, Carter had eaten probably two handfuls of marshmallows, a half a bag of Kenz's popcorn and bits of an elephant ear.  And kept saying she was hungry!

Kenz and Natalie enjoy the Giant Slide!  Weee!

Carter loved riding her pony!  She nicely petted him, smiled and giggled through the ride, and told him goodbye at the end of her ride!  I bet if we asked Poppy for a pony ...

Natalie and Carter pony-trot along

Next stop: the midway!  We wanted to ride the caterpiller kid-coaster, but Carter was rejected for being under 36 inches tall, which devastated her!  Ironically, the Strawberry Patch was also a 36-inch tall ride, and she could ride it!  Whatever!  The girls giggled and spun to their heart's content, and that's what matters!

Our sweet friend (and "big sister!") Natalie caringly helps Carter down and leads her to our next ride.  We love this girl!

The girls take a lesson in flying helicopters

Carter giggled and smiled the whole ride, not worrying about the gears and trying to figure it all out.  She just enjoyed, and it was too cute!

Mommy and Carter sharing some ice cream and loving's (that's the naughty smile I LOVE!)

Gingers!

The girls enjoy ... err ... wear Dippin' Dots!  Cheesers!  

After a delightful day alone (Andy and Carter went to help with sweetcorn.  I love them both dearly, but one day all by myself was great!), I cleaned up and met Melinda at Kelly's for our first "Greystone Girl's Night Out" event, or as Scott said: ""Saturday night at 7pm on The CW – The Greystone Girls!".

The plan was for all of the women in our community to meet at Kelly's and head to Benchwarmer's for dinner then Tonic for drinks to get to know one another.  Well, there was a little confusion among the group, so Kelly, Melinda and I had dinner, then met Terry and Diann at Tonic.  By the time we met them, Terry and Diann had befriended most of the guys sitting at the bar, who were all a hoot!  We giggled and hung out, talking about everything from crazy step-mom's to Olympic guys in disgusting unitards!  

Our evening out is hopefully the first of many to come.  We really are lucky to have a small community of great people who are a blast to hang out with!  Next month: Denny Arthur's?!  Thanks for a fun night without babies and beau's!  

Me and Terry and Diann's new bar bestie!  I don't know who he was, but he was hilarious!

The Greystone Girls: Diann, Terry, me, Kelly and Melinda

The girls with our new pal!

And, boy, do we!  We had our family outing to the Iowa State Fair this morning.  After a slow start (that's a whole 'nother blog!), we got to the fair around 10am.  It was a gorgeous day - we couldn't have asked for more!  We beelined more morning substance - an A & W root beer float for Carter, fried pickles (5 points) for me, and an Amish apple turn-over for Andy - then walked through the aquarium.  We doubled back to the "items of various industries and such" building where Carter got to see Eddie, Principal's mascot (think what I would be like meeting Brad Pitt - that was Carter meeting Eddie!!).  She got a hug from Eddie and a tattoo, and we also got a cup of fresh-baked cookies (so good, and only about 5 points).  We finally found the petting zoo, which really wasn't hard to find, and Carter got to feed the goats and pet the exotic animals.  Next, Andy and Carter completed fair tradition by enjoying a Giant Slide Ride (it still spooks me a bit!), and we had lunch, consisting of things on a stick (a corn dog, 6 points, for Carter and I and a pork chop for Andy).  We wrapped up our trip with a visit to the farm hatchery building and a ferris wheel ride.  

Another successful fair adventure!  Now, we can't wait for Sunday's girls day to the fair with Kenz and Natalie!  We saved our elephant ride to ride with Nat!!  

A view from Main Street - beautiful!

Carter enjoyed the bubble machine while I looked at homemade soaps

CARTER's treat, which Andy snatched half of: a root beer float that she loved!

Checking out Iowa fish (Iowa fishes??)

"IT's EDDIE!" she cried!  I'm not sure why she loves Eddie so much, but she does!  Kudos to Principal and their great marketing campaign!  It's working!

After looking through the Varied Industries building, we had to stop for cookies!  Carter "didn't want one," but ended up loving them!  Can you blame her?!

At the petting zoo, we got to feed the goats, and we were able to pet a camel, a monstrous bull and an elusive zebra

Iowa State Fair tradition: Andy and Carter take the big plunge on the slide!  Both love it!

They both love the slide, and they both survived it!  Thankfully!

At the farm hatchery, we just missed the actual birth of calves (thankfully!), but we got to see the itty bitty babies.  Carter loves the tiny baby lambs.  "They're soft!" she gushed to me!

Corn-fed Carter Kay!

Andy, me and Carter, just about fair-ed out for one day!

God bless all things on a stick!  I think they're better on a stick, deep fried!  Carter and I shared a corn dog, which means I could count it for half the points!

Our last fair stop: a family ride on the ferris wheel.  Carter enjoyed looking out over the fair from atop the ferris wheel, but she was very tired as our ride concluded.  She was mostly asleep on the walk up the hil to the car, and out as we packed up! 

I've been trying to get all my last-minute Carters in, as school is fast approaching.  There are things this summer I wanted to accomplish (potty training and big girl undies!), and other fun adventures I wanted to simply enjoy.  Carter's choice of the big pool was one of those adventures!

We had a great time!  It was a cooler August day (still above 80, but perfect for swimming!).  We packed up our toys, treats and sunscreen and spent the afternoon in the shallow end.  We played seahorse (THANKS, ANDY!) and water-ball catch, and she even went down the water slide ON HER OWN!  Talk about BIG GIRL!  

It was a super-laid back, relaxed afternoon.  We didn't have to rush to get to the pool by whatever o'clock, and I didn't have to keep an eye on the time to be somewhere just in time.  We had a ball - it was perfect!

"LET's GO, MOMMY!"

Cheesing around at the top of the hour all-out call

Mommy and Carter, sun-kissed gingers

This afternoon, Carter had a play date with Elisa, our neighbor girl from down the street.  We were there early (amazing, I know!), so Carter and I fed the duckies.  They weren't really receptive of her, but she didn't care!  She yelled hello, waved, and tossed whole pieces of bread into the water.  When Jerry and Melinda and kiddos Elisa and Allison arrived, it was ducks no more as Carter charged off to play with her new best friend!  We're so lucky to have great neighbors!!!

Carter and Mommy feeding the duckies and Carter!  I guess it's a blessing that she, too, loves the multi-grain ducky bread! 

Carter got her birthday gift from Grandma and Poppy: a princess tea set, like the one she and Grandma played with last time we were home.  SHE LOVES IT!  This afternoon, we had tea.  She got water in her tea pot and sugar in her saucer.  She poured me a spot of "tea" and covered it in sugar, and insisted that I drink it!  

Blaaaaaaaark!  It was awful, but she was too cute to say no to!

"Drink it, Mommy!"  How come it's always MOMMY who has to drink it, eat it, read it or kiss it?!! 

This evening, we had the great fortune of meeting all of our neighbors.  We hosted a BBQ at our house, since we are the "anchor house," having been here the longest (nearly a year!).

Nearly everyone in the development showed up.  We had little kids, ranging in age from 17 months to 4, running in and out of the house, playing and giggling!  Their parents (our neighbors) hung out in the back yard, introducing and getting to know one another.  We're really lucky that our development has 7 younger couples, all who seem to be at a similar point in their lives as we are. And it's fantastic to know that Carter has a network of really cool, kind kids to play with!  She is infatuated with Lilly and Elisa!  She also told me she likes "those boy, you know ... Zane and Cal,"  and told me, "but they're boys!"  Yeah, I know ... stay away from them - boys are always trouble!

Andy, Carter and I got ready to host our shindig, grilling burgers and hot dogs, making dip and getting ready for everyone

The view from the kitchen:  Carter and Elisa share the double swing, Kelly pushes Lily, and Melinda watches as little Allison takes off, inevitably trying to escape from adult view!  I chatted with Collette and Diann in the kitchen, keeping an eye on the boys in the play room.

Andy and the guys hung out around the table, having a couple beers and talking "shop" about theater rooms and guy stuff.  Andy got to show off his theater, which always makes him smile, and there was talk about a Wii Guitar Hero gathering!  We're IN!

This evening, we got to have an adult date night with some of our crazy, sometimes inappropriate but always fun friends.  No Wall-E or Mickey, or big-girl potty, and no cartoons.  Just some adult conversation and giggles.  How great!

We met Lance and Stephanie, Jim and Heidi at Appare Japanese Steakhouse.  I was more than a little worried about my first experience with authentic Japanese food, but there's no way dinner could have been any better!  Andy and I split a chicken and shrimp meal (I ate chicken, he ate shrimp, duh).  Lance ordered a round of Saki bombs, minus one for himself (thanks, Lance!).  It's a crazy little drink and ritual, if you haven't had one.  A shot of saki balances on two chopstick atop a glass with about three drinks of beer.  You count to three in Japanese, pound the table, and the saki falls into the beer, and you drink it. Andy's backfired, and mine didn't fallimmeditely.  With the "botched bomb," Lance figured we should try it again later.  We ordered and our cook came to prepare our meal at a grill at our table.  Lucky me, I got to be the one being picked on at the table (it's all good - I make a good scapegoat!).  I got to flip the egg (poorly) and be the laughing end of his funny cookery shenanigans.  Our food was ready and delicious, and round two of Saki bombs went much better.  Heidi, being the last to finish, got a "bonus" penalty shot.  Lucky girl ;)

From there, we proceeded to The Funny Bone Comedy Club in West Des Moines. The opener, a local guy, was okay, and the girl (the head-liner's wife) was a hoot!  Horribly inappropriate, but hilarious!  Ralphie May was the headliner, and again, inappropriate was hilarious!  This kid is hooked on Iowa Peaches and Cream Sweetcorn (can you blame him?!!).  His schtick was so funny!  I think I left with a busted gut (maybe that was because of the Saki bombs ... I don't know ...).

We had a great night!  Thanks to Lance for chauffeuring us around and setting up the night out, and to everyone for putting up with us.  We had a blast, and we can't wait to do it again! 

The culprit: my Saki bomb.  It was kinda cool, though!

Andy and I get the lowdown on how this whole Saki bomb deal works. 

Saki bombs away!  Andy and I pound the table to drop the Saki, with no luck, while Heidi and Stephanie enjoy

After I made some comment about how cool it was that our chef could spin an egg on the grill and flip it in the air, he let me try.  I, of course, sucked!  My first flip landed with a crack on the grill.  Attempt two was barely better, rolling near Lance.  He was good at flipping and catching his egg (why do you have to steal my thunder, Lance?!  Huh?!  No bueno, dude.  No bueno!)

That's our dinner, up in flames.  He called it a volcano, because the onions were stacked biggest to littlest, then littlest to biggest (like a volcano) then set ablaze.  Cool huh?!  

He also flipped us tiny chicken bites to catch.  I went first (of course I did) and actually caught mine!  Jim caught his, too.  Heidi and Stephanie struggled with the amazing pet trick, but Lance and Andy did a pretty good job, too!

Andy and I at the end of the night, tried, full and ready for bed!