On a whim, we decided to stop at the car museum in Tacoma right off the freeway. We've driven by it several times and remark we should stop sometime and we finally did it. It was a fun detour. The museum is built in many levels. You choose to start one side or the other then slowly make your way down to the basement walking on graded pavement, plenty wide for the cars to be driven on to be put in their spots. Then you make the long trek back to the top floor on the other side.
The kids were obnoxious and noisy and made for a quick walk down to the
kiddie area that had a 'working' car, a driving table and several other
vehicle experiments. Laith loved the driving table. He crawled right under and popped up through a hole and caused quite the commotion when it was time to head back up.
Our final destination was the tippy top of Kitsap Peninsula to a lighthouse. The pictures of that lighthouse are the post before this. These ones are of us playing on the beach some. The sand got everywhere, even without us sitting down to officially play. The sun was already heading into the ocean and it was really cold and windy. Both kids found a broken shell and scooped large clumps of sand to dump all over. Laith gave his hair a sand treatment that took about a week to finally depart.
The next weekend we drove down into rural Portland and visited Alpenrose Dairy Farm. They have a mini old west town with toy trains motoring around, animals to pet and ice cream. We missed out on the animals, as the day we went was also the event for the junior midgets...meaning midget sized vehicles that 12 and unders drive. The twins loved watching the midgets zip around the track and these kid drivers were amazing! Most were having fun just going in circles, but there were two who duked it out, wanting the win really badly. There were caution flags waved, as well as a couple red flags to get midgets straightened out. It's super tempting to try this out in about 3-4 years...
Vivienne has turned into quite the cuddle bug. As a baby she absolutely hated to be cuddled; that was Laith's domain. She never wanted to squish up next to me. Now with her being bigger, she finally craves that one-on-one mommy time and most of it is spent next to me on my work chair. This makes working really hard, as I have to slide forward and twist my hips in a weird way to allow us to both fit.
Swimming 101 was a huge hit this year. Our wading pool did a great job and lasted beyond five swimming sessions. It finally got a tiny tear in the bottom yet the suction to the porch is so great that not much water leaks out. The kids have had a blast setting their slide in the pool. The last time we went swimming, I set it so you slid into the water. Laith wasn't so sure about this, as it broke our habit, but then he tried it out. And the S-H-O-C-K on his face of pure joy was great. Then Vivienne discovered you could sit straddled on the pool side and bounce really well. The fits of giggles were too contagious.
The tale of the bug bite. I'm not sure how or when exactly it happened, I just remember sitting on the edge of my bed, Laith next to me, Vivienne in the master closet where Bryan was changing from work. We were just chatting about the day when suddenly my arm started itching like crazy. I took off my sweater and found what looked like a mosquito bite on my arm. There was no bug (or bug remains) in my sweater so I truly thought it was a mosquito. Two days later, the bite was still itching and had an enormous red circle around it. I started to panic and research info on the internet and about gave myself a heart attack. I called Bryan in tears and he rushed home so I could go to Instacare. Of course, of all the days he comes home early, the Instacare was dead as a door nail and being there with twins under three would've been easy peasy. Oh well. At least I was seen quickly. The doctor figured it was a regular bug bite that was inbetween regular and becoming infected. Since I was so panicked she prescribed me some antibiotics, which I took right away. This all happened September 20th. Just last week, my skin finally went back to normal, to where you can't see a discoloration or bite marks anymore. The doctor told me if it was an infection that I most likely would suffer this in the future as it seems once you've had it once, you're destined to have issues the rest of your life. Geesh!
Finally the Children's Museum! On a rainy afternoon in September I got a bee in my bonnet to do something outside of the norm for our family time. Even though it was pricey ($10 a person; ouch!) The museum was a hit. Everything is geared towards a toddler aged kid. The museum was also hosting the Wizard of Oz. There was a special room with a bunch of Oz activities, like building a rainbow out of foam blocks, taking a walk through Dorothy's tumbled house, spinning a tornado, crawling through the Lion's den and brushing his mane, creating a horse of every color with projection lights, sliding down the witch's castle and on. There is also a craft room where you can color, draw on the chalkboard and make pottery. With Oz being in attendance, we made tissue paper poppies. We also played with magnetic puzzle pies that glowed in the dark, a train station table, an ambulance, and finished with a performance on a music stage. The kids fell asleep on the way home, tuckered out from the fun we'd had. I'd say every dollar was worth it at the museum that day.
My most favorite current picture. A couple weeks ago we went over to Safeway for a couple emergency groceries (milk anyone?) and we tried out the car grocery cart. The twins absolutely loved it. We had screaming fits when it was time to get back in our own car. Then a few days later we went by Safeway for something else, and with Bryan along, we had to show him how fun the car was. The twins beeped through the whole store, waving hi, making vroom noises and steering like maniacs.
