Illinois Visit: Friday and Saturday!

On Friday morning, we set off to Eckert's in Belleville to take part in their Easter festivities.  We got there with just minutes to spare before the first Easter egg hunt registration time was almost closed.  But, we made it!  My mom and I thought that there would be so many kids and with Clara being so little, that she would only get one egg, so my mom staked out a spot near one egg so that we knew she would at least get one.  Luckily, she got more that just that, each child was allowed 12!  We had forgotten to bring a basket, so the eggs were thrown in my mom's purse.  We may have had Clara pick up a few too many eggs since they were swallowed in my mom's purse once they got thrown in!  Anyway, Clara loved it!!  Unfortunately, it had rained the night before so it was wet and a little muddy, so we couldn't let her crawl to find the eggs by herself.  Still, it was fun to watch her "find" them and pick them up.

 

 

 After the egg hunt portion was over, we got to see and pet baby chicks and rabbits.  Those animals were putting their lives on the lines by being there and held and touched by so many little kids.  While my mom held a one of the chicks for Clara to pet, she proceeded to strangle it!  She wasn't quite as bad with the rabbits since she only pinched the poor rabbit's ears.  We are still working on her giving gentle touches...

 

Picture taken right after the chick had the near death experience!

 Once we were done petting the bunnies and chicks, we were ready to get out of the cold wind that we definitely had not been prepared for!  The next task was for Clara to meet the Easter bunny.  She did not enjoy that!!  But, she did get a nice little duck toy from the scary guy in a bunny suit!

Then, she planted a seed, and mom and I got a sugar cookie with icing.  Once that was done, we went back to the car to load up for the rest of our day.

For those of you who don't know, the Art Museum's special exhibits are FREE on Fridays.  They currently have a photography exhibit, so going to that was my birthday present from Mom and Dad.  Unfortunately, we had to park at the bottom of Art Hill and walk up it... it is steeper than it looks!!  The exhibit was pretty AWESOME!!  Some of the pictures were kind of weird, but there were a few pretty great ones!  My favorites were: one with men in uniform doing target practice on an aircraft carrier, one of high school football players on the football field during a night game, and one piece consisting of six different pictures taken from different vantage points all at the same time.

After taking in the whole exhibition, we found a place to nurse Clara.  And, once she was a happy little girl again, we were able to enjoy a little bit more of the museum.  By then, we were starving, so it was time to head out of the museum and back down the steep hill.

The little specks on the trail to the right is my mom with Clara in the stroller.

 At the bottom of the hill, we ran into a BEAUTIFUL horse with a Forest Park Ranger on her back.  Her name is Esmerelda, and she is a ten year old Percheron/Morgan cross.  Clara was able to pet her, however she was a little scared.  But, we got a few pictures of Clara and her, and her Ranger took a picture of us with Esmerelda's ears in it that he has now posted on Esmerelda's Facebook page.

We headed back to the car and back to Illinois.  We ate at Red Robin (where I learned that not every Red Robin gives a military discount like the one in Topeka... BOO) which was yummy.  Afterwards, we headed back to Fed Ex where I did yet another hour of working on things for Clara's party.  My mom and Clara went to Toys R Us to keep Clara occupied.  She LOVES toys that make noise!

Saturday was another stay at home day.  We did more projects for Clara's party, and we looked through some of the things in the basement that were mine as a little kid.  Unfortunately, I think that some of the things that I had as a kid got thrown out in my parent's move.  I wish I would have known what I was going to want for my children when my parents moved!

My grandma and grandpa came over again for dinner, brownies, and ice cream.  They loved seeing Clara.  She is definitely A LOT bigger than she was the last time that they saw her!

Once my grandma and grandpa left, we played with Clara some more.  Then came one of the biggest milestones for her to date: she WALKED!!  And, she did it over and over.  We didn't get her official first steps on video, but we did get her taking steps on video from the first night.  YAY!!  (And yes, you hear correctly, we were telling her to fetch the rat...)

I hope that you enjoyed all of the pictures and videos.  Tune in on Monday for the end of my Illinois visit!  Have a great weekend!

Illnois Visit: Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday!!

Sorry this has taken so long to get published here.  I was first crazy busy, then I wrote it all and had pictures added, and tried to publish it... and it was all erased!

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First of all, the outcome of the poll:  The votes were counted and it was Option 1 = 7 and Option 2 = 8.  SO close!!  Then, Option 2 didn't fit on the book cover copies, Caleb told me that he liked the first one (since it was simple), and a trusted source (who likes to write and is good at it) voted for number 1... which made NUMBER 1 the WINNER!!  Thank you to all for your help!

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Clara and I left for Illinois after going to her doctor appointment and getting the all clear that she was on the mend.  This was after I stayed up to one o'clock in the morning trying to get the car packed.  So, I was very tired on the seven hour trip, but luckily, so was Clara so she slept almost the whole way.  We made just two brief stops: one in Booneville, Missouri to eat and one in Columbia, Missouri to pick up some baby girl clothes for UBER cheap.  (Thanks again Meghan!!)  Once we got back on the road, Clara actually slept for the remaining three hour trip.

Once we got home, my mom had pork chops and broccoli and rice casserole waiting for us as my birthday meal.  YUMMY!!  Clara tried pork for the first time, and she gobbled down TONS of broccoli like it was going out of style!

The rest of the night was spent playing with Clara.  My parents thought that Clara needed a baby doll, so they got out the Baby Beans that I had when I was younger for her to play with.  She was SO cute playing with it!

On Wednesday, we went shopping.  My mom and I counted up how many stops we made: 13 total.  They were: Fed Ex, Hobby Lobby, Big Lots, Party City, JoAnn's, Archivers, Ruby Tuesday, Big KMart, Babies R Us, Toys R Us, Jackman's Fabric, Scrapbook Factory, and Coldstone.  We picked up the birthday cake that I have been eying for quite a while now: cookie dough delirium.  It was VERY rich, but VERY yummy!!  And, my mom and I were the only ones who ate it... that's A LOT of cake!  However, I TOTALLY recommend it!

Later that night, we found out what toy my parent's dog will play with: Clara's duck beanie baby.  They have had her for 4 years and she hasn't really ever played with anything until now.  It was super fun to watch her play fetch with it!  We tried to replicate it with other beanie babies, but they weren't the same.

Thursday morning, when Clara first woke up, she watch birds with my mom.  The windows at my mom and dad's house are low enough that they are just the right size for Clara to look out of.  It was super cute!

We also dyed eggs for Clara's FIRST Easter.  She didn't really participate in the dying.  Instead, she would take an egg, put it into her mouth, and then smash it on the table.  Some of the dye then got on the egg white part, so when they were later eaten, they were super colorful!  She and my mom played with the stickers that came with the dye kit.  My mom would stick them onto the egg carton, and somehow Clara was able to pull them off with those little pudgy fingers of hers!  We made a pretty carton and pretty eggs!

 

 

My grandparents came over for a visit later that night.  It was nice to see them again, too.

Tune in tomorrow for what happened on Friday and Saturday... and a little more excitement!!