Wednesday, July 25, 2012

Our Hero Dinner Adventure

We don't eat out much (due to my weird diet restrictions) but when we do it tends to be at a sandwich place.   Normally for our date night, Char and I go to lunch every few weeks instead. This time we thought it would be fun to bring Heidi Anne with us. 
We picked her up and she wanted to know what's for dinner. We told her we're going out to eat. She replied with "Yeah, I love picnics!" I deiced that's when you know you don't go out to eat very often, much less take Heidi Anne with us.
Our sandwich place of choice was Logan's Heros. Don't let the small size fool you, this joint has some of the BEST subs in the valley. They have got to be one of the yummiest sandwiches you'll ever have!
Heidi Anne was so excited she was jumping up and down when we ordered dinner. She got to choose the booth we sat at. Heidi Anne and I shared a turkey sub - right in half. She almost ate her half of the sub. 
(Char got something with beef or ham-when I can't steal bites of something I tend to not pay attention to what he gets). 
She kept talking to the other people seating around us how good her food was and how much fun she was having at her "Dinner Adventure". I say the trip was a success. Heidi Anne is growing up right before my eyes. One thing I absolutely love is that she still finds adventure in every day to day life. 

Saturday, July 21, 2012

Heidi Anne's Birthday Bowling Adventure

Side Note-My family doesn’t really use the whole “Aunt” or “Uncle” thing.  Heidi Anne calls all my siblings just by their first names and her kids do the same with us. Char’s siblings use the Aunt thing. I guess I feel like being “Aunt” makes me sound so formal (okay, being honest, it also makes me feel so old.)

Aunt Millie
Back to Heidi Anne's birthday. 

After a little nap, Char’s youngest sister, Aunt Millie, came up for Heidi Anne’s birthday activity. Heidi Anne picked bowling-she had a ball. (Bad pun-I know)

Heidi Anne was jumping up and down as soon as we got into the alley. She got a purple bowling ball, which she shared with Momma, she got to use the bowling ramp with the bumpers, and she got the second highest score. She told me proudly that she didn’t get any “Utter Balls!” (gutter balls). The alley we picked wasn’t exactly the best by a long shoot. The good news was we didn’t have any other real plans for the day and Heidi Anne could have content to spend the whole day there.



To top it off we got her a ice cream cake. She’s never had one before. We went to Cold Stone where she picked a mint chocolate chip and chocolate cake. I learned that mint chocolate chip is her favorite ice cream.  It took us nearly a week to finish it off.
 She Loved This Cake!
I wondered at first if this would be as fun and memorable as a traditional birthday celebration. I am comforted by the fact that she keeps telling people about her “Bigger, Bigger” birthday where she got to see cars, a teddy bear, and bowling with Aunt Millie as if it were yesterday. 


Birthday Girl and Her Bear


My sister has this cool tradition of doing a family activity for her children’s birthdays. The birthday kid gets to choose the activity. I love this idea, it removes the focus from presents to makes it a real celebration of the children in the family. I love that idea so I tried it this year with Heidi Anne. It was awesome!

            Heidi Anne has been so excited for her birthday. She was doing a countdown to when she would be “bigger bigger” or as most other people call it-4. She wanted to go bowling and a teddy bear. How can you say no to a little girl wanting a Teddy Bear?

After Crusin' we took her to pick her own teddy bear. It was the first time she’s been in a toy store (not an aisle at Wal-Mart). She had so much fun just looking at the different toys or playing with the display. Naturally, the teddy bears were in the back of the store. Ever try to get a little girl with ADD to the back of a toy store, when you have a husband with ADD as well?
Heidi Anne's Favorite Car 

I think we played with every display, let me tell you, it was so FUN!! Somehow we made it to the back of the store. Heidi Anne was faced with soooo many teddy bears. With Daddad’s help she finally found her perfect teddy bear ( she also found a little ballerina bunny to go with Teddy Bear and to be friends her Dolly at home). Then we began the trek to the front of the store. 

Wednesday, July 18, 2012

Crusin' With Heidi Anne


Every year in Cache Valley we have “Cursin’ on Main”. 


It’s a real popular tradition where people come to showcase their classic cars which are proudly driven up and down Main Street


It’s a huge event here. People start claiming sections of the sidewalk on Main street days before the event. 


Cursin’ is right around Heidi Anne’s birthday. 


And she LOVES classic cars.


I think she honestly believes that the Classic Car show is for her birthday.





Monday, July 16, 2012

Water Days

At Heidi Anne’s day care they have a Water Day once a week, differentdays too. They have water gun fights, slip n’sildes,  go through sprinklers, sometimes they go to the local splash pad at the park.


Heidi Anne talks and talks about how much she loves waterdays. Since she’s Char’s little girl and it was a freaking HOT summer day, wegot her a little wading pool. As soon as we started to fill it up we realized that we left her swim suit at Susu’s and right from the tap water is freezing!


This week went better. We filled up her pool with a sprinkler (a new one at that). Char put the sprinkler right in the middle of the pool. She then ran through the sprinkler, while filling up the pool, andplaying in the pool all at the same time. She was still a little hesitant to get in the water. Out theory is she’s brave and adventurous with her friends but at home she can be so shy and timid. To help her get used to the pool onher own-we did what any good parent would do. 

We started a water fight with some spray bottles. Once HeidiAnne saw Momma could do it, then anyone can. She played water war with Char.When she turned around guess who was standing in her pool and playing with her toys. Hehehe. She ran to the pool, jumped in, and said it was her turn. I never got my turn again.

Friday, July 13, 2012

Art Festival

I often wondered how family traditions start or how many times do you do an activity to make it a tradition? I know, deep thoughts.
For nearly 5 years now, every Father's Day weekend we go to the Summerfest. Summerfest is a festival showing / selling beautiful works of art. This year Heidi Anne really got into the spirit of things. She would run ahead a little and shout "Momma Daddad, come here! This store has pretty pictures." Or she would try to drag us away she would say things like "Those are bad arts!" or "The other store had prettier pictures". I have determined that an art show is the only place you can analyze someones' work and not be in to much trouble.
We have started a tradition of resting under a canopy, snacking on a funnel cake, and Heidi Anne being content with her surgery treat while on Daddy's lap. Whenever I get to take that picture is when I really feel like Summer is starting in the valley. 

Tuesday, July 10, 2012

Happy 3rd of July!


A few things about the Valley-
 1) They do the fireworks on the 3rd of July. I am not sure if that's because a lot of people are out on the 4th or they just like it here. 
2) The stadium where they ignite the fireworks is on the top of the hill. 
3) It can get freaking cold at night here still (We had a nasty storm that came in on the 1st  bringing temps down to the 50's). 
4) We have a room (it's our office, reading, and craft room) that has two big windows facing the mountains. This is a pretty view no matter what-but when there are fireworks involved it's awesome. 
       As I said above, we the 3rd of July. To start the night off we had hamburgers and I got turkey burgers. While we were cooking, Heidi Anne kept jumping up and down (really she was jumping up and down).
It got to be  9:00, that last hour before the fireworks show . This is when kids can either be amped up to stay awake to see fireworks (to be ah and amazed) or to sleep and miss it (thus a very grumpy child for a week or two).
We opted for the happy kid. But it wasn't the easiest thing. 
Towards 9:00 pm we all went outside. We set up our camping chairs and ate some ice cream. While eating ice cream Heidi Anne saw her first neighbored fire work show. Making her even MORE excited.   


9:30, that last 1/2 hour before the fireworks show. Daddad brought out the fireworks. First we played with the Snap Pops. Heidi Anne loved them; she had so much fun watching Momma / DadDad she picked it up in no time. Well almost no time, sometimes she couldn't throw them hard enough, so the snaps wouldn't pop.

At 9:45 Only 15 minutes to go. Bring on the Sparklers!! She LOVED them. She would squeal with delight as she watched me hold a few. We had her be super careful and took precautious. We're very careful because I really, really did not to cause a fire and get in trouble.



9:55-5 minutes to go so we packed up our gear to go watch the show from the office room. As soon as we go into the room-the show was starting. It started 5 minutes early. As soon as she saw the fireworks she was bumping up and down on the sofa. Shortly into the show she stated "These fireworks are fun, but aren't as pretty as the firework stars last year." It's amazing what kids remember. 
Next year we'll try to get closer to the show-maybe that will make them firework stars again for her.

Tuesday, July 3, 2012

Smartest little big girl ever!

I would soo LOVE to get her a desk like this!! 
I love Heidi Anne's day care, (I really hate calling it that because it's more like her second home). Anyways, I love it. One of benefits of being in a college town is that the teachers are going to school getting degrees where their major is child development, early childhood education, or family and consumer science. This in turn helps my Heidi Anne to excel.

Every so often, students (non-teacher ones) from the University come to observe the kids. A the most recent observation Heidi Anne asked Susu "Why is the lady watching us?"
Susu explained to her that the person was there watching them to make sure everyone was having fun. Heidi Anne responded to Susu, "We do have fun; I will just go tell her."
Before you know it she walked right up to the lady and told her "We have lots of fun here. Visitor you can go home now."

Besides doing observations the non-teacher college students do tests with the kids. Nothing horrible, just the "What color is this?" "If you have 5 apples and you share 3, how many are yours?"  Today was a testing day. When the instructor would ask a question, after Heidi Anne gave her answer she would add "I know it, huh?".

I just wish my little girl had more confidence when it comes to her education. ;D