Wild Animal Safari!

Emily missed out on attending the Yellow River Game Ranch field trip with her class, so Donald and I decided to take her on an adventure to the Wild Animal Safari at Pine Mountain. We had such a great trip! Emily loved riding in the zebra striped van (fairly grungy and smelled like wild animal kibble but a necessity - I didn't want watusi slobber all over my freshly washed car!) but was concerned about not being buckled in while we were riding. She's a safety girl. She loved feeding the animals and kept repeating that the animals must really love her. I think her special favorite was the giraffe but I loved the little squatty pigs that were running around everywhere. Donald was a great navigator and made it through the park without running over anything. There's a good reason I was in charge of picture taking in the back seat - driving is not my specialty! Donald also wins the prize for running into someone he knows while we were out. We have a kind of unofficial contest to see who will run into someone first when we're out somewhere. Donald has seen people he knows while on vacation in Hawaii, Charleston, and even while visiting the Wild Animal Safari! We thoroughly enjoyed our alternate field trip and would recommend the Safari to others with young children. Bring plenty of Wet Wipes! Oh, and be prepared with a kid-friendly explanation of why all the boy baboons seemed so "excited" to see us - and make sure to tell me what you came up with!

Happy Easter!

Emily had a great Easter this year. She woke up to find that the Easter Bunny had left her a purple basket full of purple goodies - books, bubbles, sunglasses, and chocolate bunnies. We met Cici and Grandaddy at Providence for church with them (Emily was intrigued by the contemporary service that was just finishing up when we arrived - lots of drums and flashing lights!) and then we headed home to put the finishing touches on lunch before company arrived. After a big lunch with Cici, Granddaddy, Amy, and Lane, we all settled in for an afternoon rollup. Then in the evening, we headed to the Farr House to share some leftovers and hunt some eggs in Papa's super-tall grass. Apparently he didn't cut the grass for a couple of weeks to let it get nice and high for egg hunting. The girls really had to do some digging to find all of their prizes! I have a feeling his lawnmower will probably turn up a plastic egg or two when he cuts it again. Em came back to the White House with a basket of prizes from Mim, Papa, Aunt Liz, Uncle Larry, and Miss Patsy. She's a lucky little girl - apparently lots of folks love her! Hope your Easter was full of family and chocolate bunnies!

Science Time!

Donald and Emily had some fun together while I slept in this morning. We ordered some shrimp and oysters from Florida from Joe Patti's in Pensacola which arrived yesterday packed in dry ice - a science teacher's favorite toy. When I woke up this morning, they had several different colored cocktails brewing all around the kitchen. Lots of fun!

Sally Soapsuds

Emily loves to play with shaving cream in the bath tub. It's good, clean fun - although sometimes she smells a little manly when she gets out! We bought her a new can to play with this Spring Break and I managed to snap this funny picture of her. I left the room to get a drink of water and when I came back, she was lathered from head to toe!

Linda's Playhouse

Mom and I took the girls to Linda's Playhouse in Peachtree City over Spring Break. What a fun place! Linda has basically rented a building and filled it with toys for children. There's are places for painting, building, dressing up, having tea parties, playing musical instruments, reading, weaving...all sorts of things! Abby painted all kinds of crafts while we were there and Emily had fun playing in all of the different centers. It was a really fun (and inexpensive) way to spend an afternoon.

Happy Easter!

Emily has the sweetest blue Easter dress to wear this year. I'm all ready for Easter Sunday - tights, shoes, dress, sweater (it's always so cold at Easter!), even a pair of white gloves! Luckily for us, she went out and found her own Easter bonnet just lying around the house. Isn't she creative? Seriously...I need to start picking up after myself!

Afternoon Rollup

We do love our afternoon rollups at the White House, including T.C. By the way, a rollup is a nap in Emily-speak. Donald snapped this picture of all of us resting together in the recliner. See if you can count all the heads - there's me, Emily, T.C., and Lucky the Possum. It's actually WAY more comfortable than it looks.

Two Mariposas!

Donald and I brought Emily and Abby back two feathered masks from our trip to New Orleans (more pictures from that later). They looked so cute dressed up together in their favorite colors! Emily likes to put her mask on at home along with a set of butterfly wings and yell "Mariposa!" at the top of her lungs as she runs around the house. That's butterfly in Spanish to you non-bilinguals out there. Get ready for a purple mariposa butterfly party at the White House this year!

A Day with the Girls

Donald and I spent the day with Emily and Abby and had lots of fun baking Easter egg-shaped cupcakes together. We cruised through Target and bought all of our supplies then stopped for a peek in the Oh! Chocolate store in Peachtree City. Yum! Very expensive, but completely delicious. We headed home for a baking session which included a lesson on color mixing from Donald. The girls had fun coloring their frosting and then decorating their cupcakes. And by the way - the silicone baking pan? Total rip off! But Emily loved it because it was purple.

Seeing Double

Following in a grand family tradition, Abby failed her school vision test and had to go to the optometrist for an official visit. The verdict: nearsightedness, with a prescription for glasses. Fortunately for all of us, Abby was really excited about getting classes - and so was Emily. She told me that she hopes that she'll get glasses one day, too. I told her not to worry because if genetics are any indication, she'll probably be needing glasses some time next week. Abby came by to model her two new pairs of specs this week and Emily was so entranced that she put on glasses of her own (purple, of course - a Valentine's present from Mim) to follow Abby around the house. I found them looking at the laptop together and noticed Emily's getup just in time to snap a picture. And as a sidenote - Abby is lucky because glasses are WAY cooler than they were when I was her age. I remember one disastrous pair of glasses that had orange tinted lenses. Why would we choose those? It also didn't help that one of the lenses was so thick that it enabled me to see back in time. Abby just looks like a trendy version of Velma from Scooby Doo. That's a compliment, by the way.

Welcome to the Blog!

I've added a few new blog links to our list, mainly for my own convenience since I check them all the time. However, in case you're interested, I thought I'd introduce to you to some new friends. The Loons are friends of David (Donald's brother) who live near him in Oklahoma. They are awaiting the birth of their first baby, JC - named for a Jewish carpenter or an N'Sync singer. You pick. The Pragers are Dianne and Ken. Dianne was my long term sub while I was out on maternity leave. They are quite the traveling pair and I always enjoy seeing where they'll turn up next. The Dzenis family are relatives of good friends of ours who are in need of prayer as their young daughter is facing some significant health problems. She is close to age in Emily and I like to keep tabs on them. Add them to your prayer list if you have one. Hope you enjoy cruising around these new blogs!

Future Partridge Family?

Emily is a big fan of music. She surprises us all the time by the number of lyrics she knows to songs on the radio. It makes me aware that she's actually listening to what she hears on the radio and TV now - so we have to be extra careful! She and Abby love to get together and make some noise from time to time. This is a great photo of the two of them auditioning for future Partridge Family status. We're thinking of taking our act on the road in the near future. And to all members of the Farr House who may be reading this - don't even THINK about sending that recorder home with us! You buy it - you have to put up with it!

Callaway Gardens

We recently took advantage of the warmer weather and the free admission at Callaway Gardens for a short family trip. After church, we loaded up and caravaned behind Mimi, Papa, and Abby to Callaway for a trip to the butterfly house and the beach. Our girls really love to visit the Callaway beach and romp around in the sand. We were all covered in it by the time we got back to the car. Emily's pants were so wet and sandy that we just took them off and she road commando on the way home. Arriving home exhausted and missing her pants...must have been some trip!