4th of July at the Eno

The fourth of July is one of my favorite holidays, as I think you can tell from previous blog entries. Summer time, grilling out, fireworks, just gathering with friends and family with no presents or fancy meals - it's great! But one of my favorite things about the fourth when I lived in NC was going to the Festival for the Eno which is held over the fourth each year. It's music, food, art, etc - all to raise money to buy more parkland along the Eno River. I usually volunteered to facepaint (thus getting in free!). It was always hot hot hot, but I loved it. I hadn't been since we moved to State College so I was excited to finally get to go again this year, though I was a bit dubious about how dragging two small children around the festival, while pregnant, in hot humid weather would work. The answer - it worked surprisingly well!

We started with a free (airconditioned!) bus ride to the festival itself. The bus was a big hit with both the girls. We managed to find Grandma who was volunteering at a drink booth, and she told us about these neat wooden building blocks. Hayden loved them and spent at least 15 minutes building a structure that used as many blocks as she could.

getting started.

Can't you just hear Hayden? "No Eliza! Not like that!"

Our festive girl and her finished product.

While she was busy building, Eliza and I checked out the sand sculpture and dug a little bit in the play sand.

Not the best sand picture but she is holding a shovel and you can see her festive outfit!

What professionals can sculpt! Still a work in progress.

After building and digging, we added our own art to the big E-N-O community art project. I think Hayden really liked getting to color wherever on a huge O. Eliza had more fun trying to find tops for all the markers, a fruitless endeavor.

Jason's contribution was the "me too!" at the top of the O.

Then we were getting really warm, so we wandered down to the river to dip in our feet. Hayden liked wandering around, but Eliza begged to be picked up almost immediately. We hung out for a few more minutes, hoping we could get to play with one of the free nets that had been set out in the river area, but they were all used.
Eliza's preferred spot on the river bank. Still not sure why she didn't like wading in the Eno.

Then we managed to put our shoes back on and checked out the critters section. This is also where my camera died. We saw bees, salamanders, snakes, turtles, frogs, bugs, owls, doves, etc. Hayden learned about that the spotted salamander was the honorary animal of the festival (there's a different one each year) and that yellow bellied sliders are turtles that live in the Eno.

Next it was lunch time, and after a difficult trip up to the food court area (we had to drag H away from some exhibits, and then convince her to walk uphill in the sunshine to find lunch). Festival food is one of my favorites and we had a good time sampling different things: ribbon fries, a cheesesteak, lemonade, soft pretzel, ice cream, and a cherry-lime locopop. We were a bit worried about Eliza as we sat down for lunch, but she rallied when we pulled out some milk for her and ate all of a mini-bagel we'd brought, plus ice cream, and much of my delicious yet tart locopop.

After lunch the kids enjoyed the "musical petting zoo" that was right behind our shady lunch spot, and then we checked out a few art booths. Then we lucked into seeing the Paper Hand Puppet parade that had all the HUGE puppets on sticks, or carried by people, with drums playing and everything. Jason took a few pics with his phone I can share.

H watching the revelry with Popop.

Oh, and there was this cool polar bear and cub made out of plastic bags!

After the parade, we bought a tshirt for me and a onesie for Nugget (with a salamander!) and called it a day. The girls did amazingly well for a very busy long hot day and both took naps when we got home. A successful first Eno Festival for both of them. No fireworks in the evening after such a busy day, but we did enjoy some hotdogs that we cooked stovetop since it was POURING rain outside. The girls finished off the day with homemade blue and red popsicles for dessert! (which by the way, were delicious and made from almost all local fruit. so tasty!)

Columbus and Cousins

Last weekend, we ventured up to Ohio to visit with Grammy and Grandad and all the DeRousie side cousins. It was Eliza's first plane trip, and Hayden's first trip with her own seat. Hayden did declare it her first plane trip since she couldn't remember the other ones. We had managed to find direct flights from RDU to Columbus, but of course we had a delay in taking off. We distracted ourselves with dinner, and with running amok at the airport. I still think airports are one of the best places to hang with kids because there's so much to look at and so much open space (if you look for it) to run around.

playing ring-around the airport chairs. She's so fast these days!

"plane. 'nother plane!" checking out the scenery.

"these are kind of comfy. for this one second that I stop running around..."

Hayden took my picture. Notice the baby tucked in the backpack. Can't you imagine how cute Jason was walking around the airport with that on his back!?

Playing with roller cars (technically a duck and a school bus) during a lull in foot traffic. I highly recommend bringing a rolling toy on airplane trips.

Finally on the plane, getting ready to take off.

The delay was only a couple hours and the rest of the trip went fine. Eliza was pretty squirmy, but we all made it with no major tantrums or tears. And then our pickup crew was EVERYBODY! Grammy, Granddad, Aunt Jen, Lucy, Will and Liesl all came to meet us at the airport. It was great. We managed to all fit into two cars and head back the house.

We had a great time visiting with all the cousins. Hayden got to sleep up on the third floor, sharing a bed with Lucy, with Will and Liesl in the room too. Surprisingly, everyone slept fairly well! The days were filled with playing and kids everywhere. On Friday, we all went to the park to play and have a picnic lunch and then went to the pool before heading back for nap.

all the cousins taking a water break. (Lucy, Liesl, Hayden, Eliza, Will)

Hayden and Will try to play frisbee. Not the most successful game of the day.

All the cousins, plus Jason and Granddad, playing some version of frisbee and soccer.

Picnic lunch!

E checking out a fountain in the pool. The pool was awesome - technically 4 pools. Baby pool, play pool (with fountains and a splash play structure), lap pool, and diving well. Plus a splash pad area too!

Grammy, Granddad and the grandkids.

Saturday morning we woke up to pouring down rain. The kids played together fairly well in the morning. Tea parties, baby dolls, barbies, puzzles, and stories (among other things) kept them busy. Then, since it was still raining, we took advantage of the cheap kid movies at the local theater. They were just kicking off the kid's movie festival and we all (except Eliza and Grammy) went to see The Great Muppet Caper. Hayden had never been to a movie theater before (or even watched a movie straight through) and loved it. She was on the edge of her seat (literally) for much of the movie, she was so into it. She loved the popcorn we got to share with everyone (I've been craving movie theater popcorn!), and didn't get fidgety at all.

look at that cooperation. Hayden LOVED Lucy and followed her around everywhere. Lucy played with her very nicely.

Eliza and Liesl make tea.

The cousins left on Saturday afternoon to go visit Uncle Aaron's family elsewhere in Ohio and the house was much quieter after that. To give you an idea of the fun chaos that was all 5 cousins (soon to be 6!), Jason managed to capture a "cousins parade" on video, when they all decided that marching around the dining room loop was great fun.


On Sunday, we celebrated Hayden's birthday with Grammy and Granddad. She got a couple presents, and they constructed a tasty birthday treat (two stacked mint chocolate chip ice cream cookie sandwiches!) that we all shared after lunch.

Eliza watched the proceedings with great interest. Then gave me a big smile for a picture!

blowing out the candles. Her hands are up because Jason is holding them so she doesn't touch the cake.

Finger-licking good!
Can you see the eyeshadow she has on? Putting on makeup with Grammy is one of her favorite parts of Grammy time.

Eliza decided that hands were a waste of time in eating the ice cream cookie treat. She is so funny sometimes.

Our flight home was uneventful, no delays whatsoever. We had a great time, but I think we were all happy to be home. Hayden did say that she missed Grammy and Granddad and her cousins and had had a good time playing with everyone. And she wants to go on another plane trip at night time because she liked seeing all the lights. She got a bit upset on the way home when she realized all our travel was in daylight.

Cousin pajama party - watching a bit of a movie before bedtime. One by one they would disappear depending on age and sleepiness.

Blueberries and Swedish Fish

Heading into this weekend, we were at a loss of what to do. We wanted to go blueberry picking, since it's now blueberry season here. And we also wanted to go to IKEA in Charlotte because we had a good amount of stuff we wanted to return. These two activities seemed at odds with each other, until *lightbulb!* we could combine them by finding a blueberry picking spot near Charlotte. And so we had a day trip to the Charlotte area, and all was good.

The day trip worked out fabulously. The drives weren't too long (2 hrs at the most), the blueberry farm I found was lovely, and IKEA let us return everything we wanted to. The girls seemed to have a blast on the blueberry farm. Hayden jumped right in and was very industrious picking berries. She filled her bucket at least half way - almost as much as Jason! Eliza decided she needed to act out 'Blueberries for Sal'. She put about 20 blueberries in her bucket. I picked out about 7 that were too green. Then she ate the rest. She then spent the rest of the time picking - but putting them straight into her mouth! At one point, she would pick on one side of the push, then run quickly and determinedly over to the other side where her bucket was and then eat the berry.Hayden getting started.

Eliza, before she abandoned all pretense of the bucket.

Jason and his blueberry helpers - E is on his other side, you just can't quite see her.

At one point, Eliza decided that maybe it would be better to just pick berries off the ground rather than wasting time with the bush.

Two hard-working blueberry pickers. They both brought home lots of blueberries - in a bucket and in a belly!

After we were done picking, 45 min in or so, the farm's owner asked us if the girls would like to see the chickens. Hayden said yes, so we walked over to their little chicken coop and fed the chickens some long grass. There was a cute little rooster who cock-a-doodled several times, both startling and delighting the girls.

Feeding the chickens. Hayden was much less afraid than on her class field trip. I think the fence helped.

the chickens

the cute little rooster (sorry he's a bit fuzzy)

We found our way to IKEA, grabbed some lunch, did some shopping while H tried out the kid play area, and then had a quick frozen yogurt break before heading out. Hayden said she wouldn't fall asleep; Eliza was asleep within seconds. About an hour in, Hayden was out too. A long day, but very productive (2 gallons of blueberries, stuff returned to IKEA, Swedish fish), and even lots of fun too! It's too bad IKEA isn't closer because it is SUCH a kid friendly place (children's supervised play space, aisles to run around, frozen yogurt cones for 99 cents, family bathrooms, etc).

Our blueberry haul.
We're eaten them straight, frozen them, had them in cereal and made blueberry-peach cobbler. I think there's blueberry-peach bread in our future if the peaches will ripen!

Summer Time

Just wanted to wish everyone a happy summer with a couple cute pics of Eliza's first attempt at corn on the cob. In a fitting tribute to the first day of summer, we received our first selection of corn from our CSA. We grilled it up and let her have at it. She made a valid attempt, but we did cut it off the cob for her after a couple minutes. She (and Hayden) actually ended up liking the grilled BBQ chicken legs better. And the watermelon-raspberry granita we made for dessert.

Happy Summer!