A Walk in the Park

Timothy's sister, Anne-Marie (finally) came to visit us this past weekend. She needed a place to get away (and do laundry), and we always welcome visitors.

On Saturday, we decided to take a family outing to the park. Kristen had visited a park before, but not with Timothy. We took her down the various slides, pushed her in a swing, took her to say hi to a small dog near the playground, and overall, just enjoyed being outside (Kristen would probably live outside, if she could). Later, we rented a movie, and Kristen stayed up late, wandering around the family room as we watched. AM commented on her activity. It is true, if everyone were as active as she is when watching TV, this country probably wouldn't have a weight problem.
Sunday was filled with church, eating out, and saying goodbye to Anne-Marie as she headed back. I sent her back with a bag full of chocolate chip cookies, and a car full of clean laundry, not to mention some weights for a presentation she is doing... long story. Mission SIL Care: accomplished. :) Not a super-exciting trip, but a good visit with some cute pics.

Jennifer Van Gogh?

Well, my mom came out to help me paint a mural on my kitchen/eating area wall. I wanted to base it off of Vincent Van Gogh's Cafe Terrace at Night, a picture I will not include here as I don't want people to compare me to an artist of his caliber.
There were a couple of obstacles I had to overcome when painting this mural. Besides the fact that I had never done something like this before, Van Gogh's painting was taller than it was wide. We were working with a wall that was about 11 feet wide by 8 feet tall. This meant that we had to modify proportions and improvise in places.
After 5 days doing not much more than painting and taking care of Kristen, we finished it. I couldn't take a picture of the whole thing all at once. It was too big. So, I had to take a couple of pictures and photostitch them together. The result gives you an idea of what the mural looks like, but there are some parts that look somewhat funky from the photostitching. If you really want to see what it looks like, you will have to come out and see for yourself. :)

Daddy's Little Girl

Everyone tells me that Kristen looks a lot like Timothy. I have accepted that my beautiful child doesn't get her looks from me, but, today, I realized how much of Timothy's little girl that she is. Now, the following events occured without any prompting from Daddy, and only a little encouragement from me once they had started.
Kristen had grabbed my fingers, indicating that she wanted to walk down the hall, not an unusual occurence in and of itself. She has a little soccer ball that my good friends Sherry and Bonnie gave her at the baby shower they held for her in Centralia. It was lying on the floor where she had left it earlier. But this time, she kicked it. I was surprised, but, more than that, I wished Timothy could have been home to see it. Well, she kicked it again, and then I encouraged her to keep kicking the ball. She did pretty well, kicking it up and down the hallway until she grew bored of it. I may end up with a soccer player instead of (or as well as) a ballerina. :)

I've Got the Blues

Well, I convinced Timothy to take me to a blues festival this evening, even though he claims that he doesn't like that type of music. He had to take the day off of work, so it wasn't just something we could do as a spur-of-the-moment event. As it was Kristen's first concert, we kind of used it to celebrate her 9 month birthday.
We arrived when the first artist had just started her performance. Since the music was amplified to blast out of speakers 10 times bigger than my college dorm room, we perched ourselves in the shade of a tree about twice as far away from the stage as the back row that had formed that early in the evening (it was a byolc -- bring your own lawn chair -- event). I sat in the chair that we had brought, but I soon joined Kristen and Timothy in the grass as it proved much cooler than sitting in the chair (but still ridiculously hot at over 100 degrees outside). We spent our time there listening to the music and eating overpriced food we bought from the vendors who had set up shop nearby. Kristen loved sitting on and pulling up the grass. She would have eaten it, too, if we had ever let her get some in her mouth. We only stayed for the first two of the about five artists lined up for the evening, but Kristen's bedtime was quickly approaching. All in all, we had a good evening. Timothy admitted to me as we were leaving that he enjoyed it, and, for a grand total of $23 for food, parking, and live entertainment, it wasn't a bad deal. Who knows. He may even take me again next year.