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I Should Have Listened to My 3 Year Old...

Yesterday, I decided that I wanted to go out and do something. My husband was off work, so it somehow became a "Girl's Afternoon" when he suggested that he keep Baby Gideon while I took Kieradyn. Last summer, we discovered this delightful place called Stapp's Circle S Ranch in Greensburg, Indiana, which is about half an hour or so from where we live. This is a place where you can get up close and personal with everything from donkeys and sheep to bears and capuchin monkeys. The place had made a pretty big impression on all of us. (I even volunteered there some last summer and hope to continue that this year.)

Ever since, Kieradyn has been asking whether "Lyde the Amel"--which is how she refers to her favorite resident of the ranch, the show stealing Clyde the Camel--when she is particularly excited, is awake yet. Basically, when the weather started getting too cold to go, we told her that the animals all had to go sleep in the big barn until it got nice out again.

Without checking the weather, I called over to the ranch to see if they had opened back up yet. "Well, we are so far..." was the tentative (in retrospect) response that I received. It wasn't until I stepped outside that I saw that what had been partly cloudy earlier in the day had transformed into clouds so dark that it was amazing that I wasn't being pelted with rain.

I had made a promise, though, and By God, I wasn't going to break it if I could help it. So, Kieradyn and I got into our red chevy venture to try to beat the rain to the ranch.

About halfway there, there was a smattering of raindrops on the windshield but not quite enough yet that I had to turn on the windshield wipers. From the backseat, Kieradyn calls up to me, "Mommy, it's gonna rain too much. Take me to Chuck E. Cheese's house." I hadn't notice until that moment how often a trip to the home of that big rat had become 'Plan B'.

That realization must have had me a little crazed by this point because I pressed on. "Clyde's waiting on us, Kier-Kier. Its just a little rain." I muttered, trying to peer through the raindrops that were still slowly accumulating. "A little water's not gonna hurt us. Besides, we've got jackets with hoods and everything."

"Ohhh..." Came my three year old's voice from behind me.

I kept on driving until I reached the ranch, but when I tried to turn in, I found that the driveway was blocked off by the gate. They were closed.

Bummed, I tried to explain to my three year old why I'd gotten her hopes up.

"I'm so MAD!" I glanced in the rear view mirror long enough to see her furious pouting.

"There's always..." Here I grimaced, feeling quite sheepish over the whole ordeal. "Chuck E. Cheese."

And I kid you not, it was at that exact moment that the skies finally opened up and the rain started really pouring down. Needless to say, I drove my daughter all the way back to our hometown so that she could play at the kiddie franchise. I mean, what else could I do?

I'm just glad that she has yet to learn the phrase, "I told you so"!

Check It Out!

I'm going to take a moment to shamelessly plug my second blog. You can find it here:

Much Ado, More to Say

It is a humble start, but I'm proud of it. I hope you like it and will be kind enough to follow it as you have with this little blog of mine. I'll be glad to return the favor for any friends you send my way too.

I'm hoping to have a third blog eventually, inspired by the lovely SquirrelQueen and her writings. (If you haven't already, you should really check out her blogs!) I've got some old short stories that I would love to dig up and edit to share with folks too.

I hope this finds everyone doing well. I appreciate you taking the time to read this and (hopefully) my new blog as well.

Let me know what you think, My Dearies. I absolutely LOVE feedback.

From One Mother to Another...

I just wanted to take a minute to say:



I hope that all of you have a wonderful day surrounded by those you love and those who love you in return.

Early Mother's Day Gift

My sister called me up the other night. Now, with her being eighteen with a boyfriend, a job, and an impending high school graduation, she is usually too busy to spare time for her big sister these days. So, it is pretty rare that she calls me just out of the blue. I get a little bummed about it, but I'm glad that she seems to be happy. (You should see the boyfriend in question. The guy has dimples that would make any girl melt!)

Anyway, so she called the other night, telling me right off, "You are going to celebrate Mother's Day on Saturday. Mamaw (We were more or less raised by our grandparents, God bless them.) and I are going to each take one of the kids so that you can go out and do whatever you want for a few hours."

As you can imagine, with a very active three year old and a new baby, the hubby and I haven't gotten much time to do anything together but eat and sleep. So, this was a very endearing offer. In fact, I went to sleep last night all sorts of excited.

I woke up this morning just as excited as Kieradyn was. (She loves her Aunt Mindy, who doesn't mind spoiling her rotten with taking her places and buying her cute clothes.)I got the kids ready and pulled out the make up that has barely seen the light of day since Gideon came home. (All this despite my husband's chuckling. "We're going to a movie. It's going to be DARK..." Men.)

All in all, it was pretty nice. We saw the new Star Trek movie, which I would recommend to anyone who hasn't seen it yet. I'm not a die hard Star Trek fan or anything, but I genuinely enjoyed it. Then, when we went to pick up the kids, we were regaled with tales of what they'd done.

Kieradyn had a busy day of swimsuit and purse shopping, followed up by a visit to the KidsCommons-- home of the giant toilet slide once featured by Jay Leno. ( http://www.kidscommons.org )

It was a nice break from what's become our usual routine. In case I don't get around to posting tomorrow, I hope that all of you other moms have a great Mother's Day!

P.S. Baby Gideon rolled over for the first time today. Now he won't stop! He gets a huge grin whenever we make a big deal out of it and cheer him on.

Kieradyn-isms

I was sitting down last night with my husband, reflecting on some of the cute things Kieradyn has come up with since learning to talk.

One of our favorites occurred last summer when we traveled from Indiana to Iowa for my brother-in-law's wedding. When first crossing the Mississippi, my husband tried to get her to say the name of The Big River to little success. A little while later, when she caught sight of it again, the then two year old looked at me quite earnestly. "Mommy, Daddy says that's for-my-sippy (cup)."

Often, I find myself wondering why we ever taught the girl to talk--especially since she's started into the talking back phase! Little moments like that, though, make it all worthwhile.

Oops!

I just was taking a glance over what I wrote yesterday and realized that, for some reason, the link for Sleeping Baby Productions wasn't there. (I hate being a newbie and having to stretch my already weak Html skills...)

Anyway, here goes another try:

http://www.sleepingbaby.net