Playdate at the Park

No daycare on Friday meant an afternoon spent with my favorite girl and luckily a play date with Annie and Grace! We met at the Silo Park where the girls spent lots of time swinging, walking around the gardens and playing on the equipment. The weather was perfect and the company even better!

The girls met and in this photo they are realizing "Hey-we both have plaid skirts and pink shirts on...I like your outfit!"

McClellan liked checking out the gardens, and picking up some wood chips along the way, of course.

The pumpkins were HUGE! I don't think I've ever seen pumpkins this big, in person, before.

McClellan wasn't so sure about sitting next to this big pumpkin and kept looking over her shoulder to make sure the pumpkin was keeping to itself.

I'm pretty sure that the "It's a Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown" remake movie could be filmed here-all the pumpkins were HUGE!

Grace and McClellan had fun playing on the playground equipment and climbing in and out of the tube.

McClellan got brave and climbed all the way through to the other end. Such a big, brave girl!!

Grace and McClellan pretending this thing was big enough for both of them!

Ah...what cuties! Thanks for a fun play date Annie and Grace! The pizza afterwards was yummy, too! Looking forward to next time!

McClellan meets Yo Gabba Gabba

Needless to say it was love at first sight. She had to be peeled from the television. I pulled her park bench out and set her down on it and she sat there the entire time watching. The only other time she's sat this still was for a KU basketball game, yes, seriously.

So, I'd say Yo Gabba Gabba may very well be visiting our house more often. I'm thinking I may actually get to make dinner without a 16 month old on my leg the entire time.

This could be a very, very good thing.

(Pardon the poor photo quality - taken with my phone)

Simple Summer Pleasures

We headed to the Farmer's Market this weekend and McClellan got to try her first watermelon of the year. It was fresh-cut right in front of us, super juicy and extremely YUMMY!!


This slice of watermelon kept her busy while Matt and I strolled through the booths. McClellan didn't mind at all.

Not wasting a single bite! We had to take the rind away before she tried to choke that down!

To say that she was messy and sticky after all the watermelon would be just a *slight* understatement. Having the fountains right there was perfect! Look at all the stains on her outfit!! (Sadly those didn't come out-Boo!)

Taking it all in.

Such a happy girl! Wouldn't it be great to be a kid again? A slice of watermelon and some fountains and you'd be as happy as this!

I love us.

To say that the past few weeks, who am I kidding, months have been rough would be an understatement. To say that I've been shedding more than my fare share of tears recently would be another one.

It's been tough. Going 21 hours without seeing McClellan five days a week breaks my heart. I get up and am on the road long before she wakes up and don't see her at all until 5:00pm after I've raced out of work, broke the speed limit and taken some short cuts in order to get to daycare on time.

From there it's home to change our clothes and try to fit an entire day's worth of time together into about 3 hours.

So what I've been needing lately is some "us" time...just us, just the three of us. No friends, no family, no commitments...just us. And this weekend that's what we did ... had a weekend full of just us.

We started out our Us only weekend with making some yummy grilled pizza using our CSA veggies and veggies from our garden-YUM!! Sadly we ran out of gas so had to finish them in the oven but they were delish! Squash, onion, mushroom, tomato, peppers, basil and a really fresh mozzarella...I can still taste it!

Saturday we woke up early, made some lemon-blueberry pancakes and then headed down to the Botanic Gardens.

We visited the Children's Garden first and almost didn't see anything else! McClellan was fascinated by the gardens designed for children. They have small "stuffed" animals hidden around the area and she spotted one almost the minute we got in...as you can see, it was love at first sight.





Now that she's walking on her own, getting her away from this thing was near impossible. We had gently "guided" her away from the little beaver only for her to *run* away from us and back to it...yes, she's running now. She runs faster when it's away from us...laughing the entire time, of course.

Just when we thought that the beaver couldn't be topped, McClellan discovered the wooden blocks and the table and chairs. We were certain that she was going to just stay here forever and not see anything else. Who would have known that wood scraps would have captured her attention so securely?!?

She loved walking across this rickety bridge.

Digging in the sand pile and making quite the mess ... loving every minute of it.

Where there's water...there's McClellan. She and Matt were wading in the stream trying to cool off-it was insanely hot this day. Had I known about this we would have come prepared with bathing suits, swim diapers and a towel...good thing were members and we'll have a chance to to go again and do it right next time!

My two favorite people...I could watch the two of them play together all day long.

We had quite the morning at the gardens and decided that as we were so close, we *had* to go to LC for cupcakes! We all shared a lemon cupcake with blueberry frosting-YUM!! McClellan kept saying "Yum, Mmmmm" and "More peeee" .... but when three people are sharing a cupcake, it doesn't take long for there to be nothing left. Of course we had to take a couple home too. How could I be there and not get a salted-caramel and my favorite chocolate with vanilla icing?

After nap time we went to a near by "Sprayground" so McClellan could have some more fun and cool off. Needless to say, we'll be going back here too. She loved it!

+
Yes, that's my daughter with the 1970's rainbow booty shorts outfit on. It makes me laugh and reminds me of when I was a kid. She's grown so much this summer I think this may have been the last time she'll get to wear it.

Loving.every.single.minute.

And there they are again...my two favorite people. I watch them together and I wonder if McClellan has any idea of how lucky she is to have such an amazing Father. I watch them together and I am reminded of how lucky I am to have such an amazing husband.

Soaking wet and nowhere near ready to quit.

And then eventually, McClellan was done slaying the dragon and it was time to say goodbye.

Sunday we followed our normal routine and went to the club and enjoyed the pool. We have a fish for a daughter and so she loves our weekly visit to the pool. Sorry, no pictures of that...I'll have to remember the camera one of these days.

This was exactly the weekend I needed. I needed to have every minute be about us, and it was.

I love us.

Canvas and Cocktails

What is that you ask? You need to go check it out and when you do and you're convinced that you too need to experience it, call me and I'll go back and do it again!!

http://canvasandcocktails.com/index.html

My Mom and Sister were here for the weekend and we had decided that this was something we definitely needed to all experience together.

It was challenging for me. I'm not going to lie. When you're Type A like I am, this is a difficult exercise. Resisting the urge to trash the whole thing and start from scratch about 100 times was really hard. BUT...I didn't and in the end, it was fun.


So...this is the palette that is the start of my "masterpiece."


And this is what that palette is supposed to create. (This is the instructor's painting)




Maegan and Mom in the early stages creating of their masterpieces.

Mom with her completed Red Rocks work of art.

Maegan and her finished product - her stage was the best!

My interpretation of Red Rocks. Not horrible - even for a Type A like myself. ; )

Our group shot at the end of the night - so much fun!! I can't wait for them to come back so we can do this again!!

Now, until they can make it back out here...who wants to join me at Canvas and Cocktails??

Punky loves her some Pesto! (recipe included)

I made some cilantro pesto this week and served it with grilled chicken, veggies and pasta. We all loved it...but McClellan went crazy over it!!





We've gotten quite a bit of cilantro in our CSA boxes the past few weeks so this has been a great way to use it up ... fresh cilantro is the bomb! We use it all the time so we're happy with the weekly bunch that it's in our CSA box.

"All gone?? Surely there's some my bib pocket caught...please?"

And afterwards ... McClellan pointed to her tummy and said "big" ... yep, she was full!

Love this little girl and her full belly!

Cilantro Pesto Recipe:

http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/fabulous-cilantro-pesto/detail.aspx