More Michaela (and her sister, too)

Dan took the week after Fourth of July off and we tried to fill it with fun, stay at home local activities. We did a little work around the house on Monday, went to Great Escape of Tuesday, went to see WALL*E on Wednesday, went to McDonald's on Thursday, and mixed in lots of swimming, and trips to the ice cream stand and playgrounds.

By Friday, Michaela was BEGGING US to stop having fun... "I just want to stay home and REST!!! It's TOO MUCH!!"

Which we thought was pretty funny.

Here are a few pics from Great Escape. The girls got a little hot from the humidity and really enjoyed the water areas.

Getting wet and cooling off

The girls love posing with the characters because it shows how brave they are... the first time we brought Michaela here, we had to carry her in and out guerrilla- style as if we were kidnapping her because she was so incredibly freaked out by the costumed characters at the entrance and exit.

While the stuffed animal ones were okay this time, they did warily eye the Joker we saw walking around.

This is Jenna riding in Cinderella's pumpkin. By herself. With a stranger.

Miracles DO happen.

All Michaela, All the Time

Here's another installment of the Adventures of Michaela... her moving up ceremony from Brownies. We had a small gathering to commemorate the end of another wonderful year of Girl Scouts with my friend Dana at the helm. Michaela has really enjoyed the program, with the crafts, the field trips, the interesting topics they cover and of course, the snacks at every meeting. The end of the year was a very sweet presentation by the girls and culminated with each Brownie getting some special pins. Then we all ate ice cream.

Without further ado, some pictures from the night.

Shaking Dana's hand as she gets her pins from her co-leader, who is also wonderful!

Michaela and Erin- Brownie and soccer buddies

Out and About with Cheryl

I know I promised a few posts about Michaela, but I didn't want to forget these stories of my latest encounters with the outside world. And besides, it's my blog. I'll post about her next time... I promise.


1. Dan was off this week and we went one day to Great Escape for lots of Family Fun. It was a great trip and we saw tons of manager-looking type people walking around, talking into walkie-talkies. We saw in the paper a few days later that the CEO of Six Flags had visited Great Escape that day. Needless to say, the whole place was sparkling and the attendants couldn't have been nicer. We got some fun pictures from the day which I'll post soon.

Because there is a water park attached to Great Escape, there was lots of interesting, colorful people to look at as we were walking around. Add to that it was a pretty toasty day, and I came to these two conclusions:
1. Lots of women have tattoos. And some of them are not very good tattoos. Like they have unicorns in them.
2. Lots of women do not look at themselves in a full length mirror wearing a bathing suit and honestly assess the state of their person before going to an amusement park/water park.
Wow.

Walking around we spied several groups of older teenagers. We passed a nice-looking, fairly well put together girl who was about 17. She wore a t-shirt that read "GET ME DRUNK AND WATCH THE SHOW" in huge neon letters.
Double wow.
Hopefully every single one of those shirts ever produced is somehow burned by the time my girls are 15.

On the way out of the park, you have to walk through the obligatory gift shop. Available for purchase was a shirt which read, "Mess with me and you mess with the whole trailer park".

2. Yesterday I brought the girls to the library for a quick visit. Look at the fish, pick out some books, play on the computer- it's a great place. We went to the circulation desk and an older man, a little funky in a "I'm comfortable about being a guy and working at a library" type way (let's face it... the place doesn't exactly reek of testosterone) and we had a conversation that went something like this:

Library Guy: (to Michaela) So how's life in big sister land?
Michaela: Good.
Me: She has it so good she doesn't even know how good she's got it.
Library Guy: That's a good place to be. It's hard to know when things are good.
Me: (Thinking this is actually a pleasant interchange) Yeah, (honestly agreeing with him) it takes a fair amount of insight to realize life is pretty good. (I mean it's hard to see your life objectively and to be grateful for what you have.)

(This is where the whole thing falls apart.)

Library Guy: Yeah, I mean, do you realize how rarely two people are really in love with one another at the same time??
Me: (Speechless) Yeah.
Library Guy: Usually one person is into another but the other doesn't really like the other, you know? It's just so rare.
Me:(Not making eye contact anymore) Yeah. That's true.

I was just so stunned by this turn. It doesn't read as weird when I'm writing it, but at the moment it was such a strange leap from a very casual adult talking to a kid to a deep discussion about unrequited love. Very strange.

3. Ahhh, now to my favorite. I'm shopping in Walmart (do I go anywhere else?) last week and honest to goodness overheard this question posed by a Hispanic female shopper to a Walmart Associate near the meat section.

"Do you have any other pig's feet? 'Cause you only got one out and they don't look pretty."

All About Michaela... Oh, the Drama

Michaela has made the horrifying revelation that all year, while she was going off to school, I was spending all my time with Jenna. Together. Just us. Doing lots of fun stuff without Michaela.

This apparently was not so troubling when she had an interesting bus ride, a great teacher, lots of friends, good books to read, gym class, projects to work on, art class, and a really fun music teacher. But now that all those things have been stripped away, she is seeing how we really do things around here (you know, trips to the bank and WalMart, straightening up, making meals, doing laundry) and can't believe she has missed out on all the fun. She in turn has interpreted this to mean that clearly I love Jenna more since I am with her all day and this is another true injustice.

In order to help right this wrong, I will be putting up some cute pics of Michaela and her numerous activities in the next few postings. Not because I don't love Jenna, but because life is so unfair when you're six and bored of being at home with your dorky mom and little sister.

(The copious use of italics is to mimic the intense level of whining and drama going on in the house by Miss Michaela.)

So here is Michaela the soccer star, member of the Black Hawks team this year. This soccer season was tough because she was not on her usual team and really missed her buddies. (Mommy and Daddy missed their soccer friends, too!) Overall, we chalked it up to the Life Lesson of You Can't Always Get What You Want... a bitter pill to swallow when you're six.

I'm open! I'm open!

Michaela and the girls from her team enjoy their mid-game oranges.

The players all got Olympic-type medals and

Bethelehem Soccer Club hats at the end of the last game.

Even though it was tough, we were proud that Michaela stuck it out and played her best. Great job!

And now for something completely different...

From the Fourth of July:

When you're three and six, everything about butts, farts, burps, armpits and poop is absolutely hilarious.

The girls are wearing matching shirts that I made for them, thank you very much, and of course Jenna refused to wear hers for the rest of the day. She told me, "Everyone will say you have a dirty girl!" with such vehemence that I didn't make her wear it. I didn't understand what she meant by it but she really, really didn't want to wear the shirt, which was fine. I guess other people thinking I have dirty children was the worst insult she could throw at me. Or maybe she just made that up.

It actually made for a fascinating parenting dilemma: do I force her to wear the shirt or let it go? I could see both sides and I'm pretty sure entire parenting books have been written arguing one style of parenting over another. I came to the conclusion to let it go because 1) I had a picture of her wearing it; 2) I didn't have the energy to argue with her about it all day and 3) I didn't want her to rip the shirt as she was trying to pry it off.

Michaela, on the other hand, loved her shirt, wore it all day and looked gorgeous in it.

Hooray for 6 year olds!