A Nailbitingly Divine Yodeller

Me: Andy, would you get me two spoons and–

Andy: Hold that thought. [Running up the stairs, yelling:] Bathroom alert! Bathroom alert! Everyone out of the way!

Jay [walking down the stairs]: I got shooed.

From Andy’s birthday party on Saturday:

Jay was tickling Andy mercilessly.

Andy: Jay, stop! You’re going to make me powder my nose in my pants!

We finally downloaded pictures from this month! The highlight of May was a visit from Grandma Cheryl! P.S. Tell us if you like the Windows Live photo album.

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On the last day of school before break, Andy’s class had an “Authors’ Cafe” where the kids presented the books they’ve been working on all year. Andy’s was Mon Halloween.

No special story here.

“Cardboard box” has been inducted into the National Toy Hall of Fame.

What goes up…

must come…

…down.

Cookies for Santa (and Super-Dog, who sneaked into the kitchen on Christmas morning), produce for the reindeer.

Andy did get to sample a few of his creations before the dog got to them.

Andy got a Spongebob Chia Pet for Christmas. It truly was the best day ever.

Long johns from Santa, Magic Eight Ball from Grandma Cheryl.

Andy told me a couple days ago that he was disappointed that he didn’t get any weird science things for Christmas. I reminded him of this gift, a pop can robot making kit. “Yeah,” he said, “but that was Green Science [the name of the company that made it]. I wanted polluting science.”

I know this is confusing, with all the pictures out of order. Sorry. This batch is from our vacation to Park Rapids, with the exception of the pictures taken on Andy’s birthday. Those were posted earlier.

On the Sunday of our trip, we made an excursion to nearby Lake George for their annual Blueberry Festival. We somehow missed all the activities that were actually related to blueberries (except for buying some blueberry jam and having blueberry pie at the diner), but we did get to see the parade. We hung out at this playground while waiting for it to start.

The playground was a pretty good place to hang out while we waited, because it was in the park where the parade vehicles lined up before the parade. Also there was Smoky Bear, handing out candy to the kids.

Andy got a good haul of candy at the parade.

Our resort had two play structures.

The other one was at the beach. Unfortunately I don’t have any pictures of Andy playing on it, or any pictures of Andy at the beach at all, but this is it.

Jay tried to teach Andy the real way to play shuffleboard, but he (and I) had fun by just going, “Ready, set, shuffleboard!” and then trying to hit each other’s pucks (or whatever they’re called).

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The major outing of our trip was to Itasca State Park, where we all walked across the Mississippi (headwaters). For some reason I can’t find my Itasca pictures! But don’t worry, when they show up, I’ll make a new post. I wouldn’t want to make this too easy for you guys.

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And finally, Jay took Andy horseback riding near Detroit Lakes. (I was the designated photographer.) We had to wait around for quite a while before the horses took off, but there were lots of cool animals to look at while we waited.

The sign says it all.

No warning sign, but we kept our distance from this guy anyway.

Still, it’s not always easy to wait.

Finally!

And then he still had to wait while everyone else got on their horses.

And…they’re off! Jay reported that Andy did extremely well on the ride.

Wolverine and Super-Dog

I’m finally adding some pictures! My plan is to start with the current ones and work my way backwards in time until I’m caught up.

Andy and I took Super-Dog to the dog park today. On a totally unrelated subject, Andy got a Transformer costume yesterday from Grandma Cheryl.

Andy’s more interested in climbing trees at the dog park than in, you know, watching the dogs play.

He also finds lots of people to talk to. This is the guy known as “Jack’s owner”; Andy took off on the path with him to keep him company while I watched Super-Dog play with his BFF:

Super-Dog and Smooch.

I thought it would be fun to take Andy to the beach today to celebrate the beginning of summer. And although bringing the dog along was a mistake, it was fun…for a while. I’d say it was fun right up until the time I had to walk into the water–fully clothed, and with the dog–to get Andy out. But on the up side, we did learn that Super-Dog can swim.

I hurt my back last Sunday, so we had to postpone our Mothers’ Day tradition by a week. The tradition is that I get to make Andy and Jay go with me to see and smell the pretty flowers.

Despite his initial complaints, he managed to entertain himself.