Mud!

I'm running a bit behind on my blogging...go figure. A few weeks ago, we went on a hike to Hickory Hill. Here is a picture of Wally and I throwing sticks into a stream. Notice the lack of ground under the tree we are standing by. Pretty neat. I wish there was a swing on it out over the stream.

Being Iowa, the trail was muddy because it always rains here. At first, Wally would carefully walk around the mud puddles, if you can believe Wally can be careful. As you can see from the video, he got over that by the end of the hike. That's my boy!

Wally's Favorite Things

I managed to catch Wally and a few of his favorite things with the camera. First, Wally, like all young children, loves trains. He will make a train out of anything. Here, he made a train out of boxes of diapers. He decided to give his animals a ride. Wally also loves fire trucks. I always carry a fire truck in my purse because it will always keep him busy and happy. We went to work with Dad for a little while yesterday and came outside to play while he finished up. We were lucky enough to have 4 fire trucks pull up. There seemed to be a false alarm at the parking garage. As you can tell from the video, Wally was very excited to tell Daddy all about it.

Wally loves flowers. (Ok, maybe it is me, but he has nothing against them!) There are big trees around Iowa City that are covered with beautiful orchid-like flowers that smell heavenly. I just Googled them, and they are Catalpa trees. In the fall they will get really long, round seed pods.

And last, but certainly not least, Wally loves water. He loves water anyway he can get to it...sink, bathtub, wading pool, swimming pool, squirt guns, watering cans... We have wonderful neighbors who have a swimming pool. They don't really use it anymore, so they keep asking us to come over and use it. We finally did yesterday after Wally's nap. We all had a great time. Wally has no fear of water...actually, he has no fear of anything. Joel had him jump in a couple times and let him go completely under, just to make Wally respect water a little bit more. It maybe slowed him down a little, but not much. I'm guessing we'll be back to the swimming pool again soon.

Last night we just hung out in the backyard. Pretty soon I heard a splash and a little yelp. Wally had just sat down in his wading pool (completely clothed). Apparently, it was a little colder than expected! He quickly lost his clothes and I showed him how he could put his chair in the pool.

Ahh...life is good!

My Iowa Garden

I feel terrible for my family in Montana and South Dakota who have been hit by frost and hail. There's always next year or the next, or the next, or you could move to Iowa!

Though I am still learning how to garden Iowa style, our garden is coming along quite nicely. Our tomatoes are nearly to the tops of their cages and we're having beets for dinner tonight. I am currently dehydrating cilantro and dill. (If you have good recipes that use cilantro and dill, I'ld love to have them!) My Grandpa would say, "Knee high by the Fourth of July," in reference to corn. I might have to modify it to be "Knee high by the forth of June." I'm also loving having the time to work in the garden.

"Father's Day"

Last week Wally and I were shopping and he started yelling, "D my Daddy! D my Daddy!" Over and over again. Wally is learning his alphabet, but calls all letters D. He knows: D Daddy, D Mommy, D Wally, D Sander, D Papa, D Reder Ruby, and maybe a few others. Anyway, he had seen a Father's Day shirt that had a D Daddy on it. He really REALLY wanted to get it for Daddy. I really don't think I had seen him want something so badly before. We got the shirt and when we got home I had him hide it under our bed and told him that we had to wait until Father's Day to give it to Daddy. Well, as soon as Daddy got home, Wally ran to our room. I was able to stop him. However, while we were eating dinner, Wally disappeared. He came running back to the porch yelling, "D my Daddy!" and had Joel's shirt. So, Joel didn't get it on Father's Day, but seeing how proud Wally was to give it to Joel was priceless.

We celebrated Father's Day yesterday. I bought tickets for the three of us to go to a Cedar Rapids Kernels baseball game (minor league team). Then I realized that next week is actually Father's Day. Oops! Wally made Joel wear his D Daddy shirt and off we went.

Being a minor league team, we were able to get really good seats (aka front and center...I refered to them as George Bush seats...Joel quickly pointed out that I would be Barbara - guess Wally would be George W). Anyway, it wasn't very busy and having front row seat allowed for a lot of wiggle room for Wally. We had a great time, though Wally and I didn't watch much of the game, and Joel said the game was boring (2 runs the first inning, and that was it).

Wally was a bit perplexed about the racing pizza slices between innings. He also was fascinated by "baseball head man" (the mascot). One of the biggests hits was the trashman. A man came through the stands halfway through the game with a trash bag collecting trash. Wally thought that was cool. For the rest of the game, he hung on to his trash waiting for "trashman" to return. I could tell he wasn't going to return, so I thought I would take Wally up to a trash can. That wasn't good enough. We had to take the trash back to the seats. I got to take the trash home with me in my pocket since trashman never returned.

The biggest hit of the game occured before the game even started. There was a man there making balloon animals for the kids. Wally waited in line very patiently. We discussed what he wanted the man to make him and we practiced telling the man nice and loudly. When it got to be Wally's turn he loudly said, "Purple green!" He was so excited he forgot to tack "Doggy" to the end. While the man was making his doggy "Moose" (go figure), Wally's hand kept reaching out for the balloons. You could tell he knew he had to wait and was trying very hard not to have his hand out there. Finally, the man was done. Wally very politely said, "Thank you!" Though I imagine it was hard to say through his huge smile. We forgot to get pictures of Wally and Moose at the game, but you can see Wally is still very excited on the way home.We had a great time and will certainly go to another minor league game. Next time, we might try out the team in the Quad Cities.

I won't eat 'em, but I like to look!

While we were at Lake MacBride with the Daughenbaugh's, we found little mushroom patches. I thought they were pretty neat. Reder asked if we could eat them. Yuck!

The Daughenbaughs Experience Iowa-updated

We had a great time with Jason, Katie, Reder and Ruby when they came to visit us last week. The boys were undescribably excited to see each other. Wally was also very excited to see Baby Ruby. The kid is obsessed with babies.

The first full day they were here, we rode the "school bus" to Wally's school to meet Wally's friends. Reder thought it was pretty neat to ride a bus. Wally thought it was pretty neat to have everyone ride the bus with him to school.

After playing at school for a little while, we went across the street to the Ped Mall and played in the fountain and on the playground. This was just one of the times where the boys' different personalities came out. Reder quickly decided he didn't want to get wet, so he went to the playground. Wally was soon using his hat as a bucket to catch water, was trying to drink it, and figuring out how to get as wet as possible. Joel met us there after working the morning at the lab. I tried to get Wally to give Joel a big hug, but Joel noticed that he was a little wet before the hug. Shucks! We got Wally into dry clothes and went to lunch.

After nap time, we had a little birthday party for all of the kids, since we weren't together for Reder and Ruby's birthdays and won't be for Wally's either. Ruby got real presents and the boys got junk from the Dollar Store. They didn't care though. We followed the presents with cake. Wally and Ruby sure liked the cake. I'm not sure what has happened to Reder, but he just doesn't like cake. I think Ruby is going to turn out more like Wally than Reder!

The following day we took Reder and Ruby to the mall to experience a carousel for the first time. It was a big hit.

After the carousel, we ventured to the otherside of the mall to the play area. Once again, all 3 had a great time. Baby Ruby sure loves to slide!

We've taught Wally that if he wants to jump off of something high, he needs to hold hands. I guess we forgot to mention that it should be an adult's hand. Shortly after this picture, holding Reder's hand, Wally jumped. Luckily, I was able to catch Reder (he was unaware of the jump coming) and Wally landed without breaking any bones.

The last full day we had them, we took them out to Lake MacBride to show them the great Iowa outdoors. It was raining, but in Iowa, it doesn't mean it is cold, so we had a nice time anyway. Ruby thought Uncle Joel was pretty neat.

The boys had a great time throwing sticks into the water. Pretty sure we found poison ivy right where they were standing after the picture was taken. No rashes appeared though!

Reder was trying to show me his collection of sticks he was going to throw into the water, when I picked a big leaf and told him it was a hat. Pretty sure he thinks I'm crazy!It just happened to be our 6th anniversary that day, so we got a family picture. A lot has changed in 6 years!Though the morning was rainy, the sun came out after nap time, so we were able to play in the pool.Wally really wanted to give Ruby a kiss, but she had other ideas!

Ruby decided that maybe if she splashed, Wally would stop trying to kiss her. Guess she didn't see Wally in the fountain earlier!

Wally got a little wet, so he decided to shake like a dog!

Wally's friend Sander also came over for some water fun. Wally finished the slide in classic Wally style. Oops, I forgot that I can't rotate the videos. Don't hurt your necks watching this one!

All in all, we had a great time with the Daughenbaughs and hope they can come visit again. We miss you guys!

Baby Ruby Photo Shoot

Baby Ruby is awfully cute. Katie says that Ruby looks like me. I'll claim her!