Road trip '12!



We're home from our summer road trip! We had a great time, and did so much fun stuff!

Playing play-dough at mrs. sarah's house!

Evan&Katy going for a swim in the frey's pool

We also went to this fun pirate theme park.

Another pic of Evan diving. These are all out of order,

but I kind of like it like that.

Santa and some of his elves were on

summer vacation :D

One last thing: a train! They had a whole safari

scene set up in a tunnel this goes through!

Well, that's my brief summary of our summer road trip!!! -Ben 

Como Park/Zoo

For somewhere fun friday, we went to como park/zoo.
It was fun, because mom had a groupon for free unlimited ride wristbands for both of us.

the polar bears (Evan's fav) were sleeping

in the shade because it was so hot. this one

kept pawing at the bugs by his nose in his sleep.

Me and Evan went on a train in the park.

There was also this awesome ride that goes

 up and down (yes, that's all it does. quite fast!)

It was great! -Ben

A few more pics added by Mom:

Waving to Lisa, since we're on her favorite ride!

This seemed like a terrible idea at the beginning, but everyone made it out alive.  phew!  I love Ben's knobby knees sticking up out of the car.

Brownie Pops!

For WCW earlier this week, we made yummy brownie pops (thank you for the kit, Auntie Mary!)

The original ingredients (except eggs and milk,

 you know that kind of stuff)

 Evan mixing. Odd that something so delicious

could be made from something so disgusting-looking.

 Pops In a Pan (sounds like some convienent-

pre-packed lunch/dessert thing, doesn't it?)

 before...

 and after decorating!

The two Pop Dudes!

Building with play-dough and various types of sticks

On monday, we built stuff using play-dough, popsicle sticks, straws, and pipe cleaners. it was one of the best things we've done this summer.

He's Perry, Perry the platapus!

AAH! it's a robot!

Evan likes ice pops!

Mom made this. It's awesome, isn't it?

Another art piece by mom that I love.

Top view! :)

 Me holding up one of my art pieces,

entitled gaurdians of the red straw

Another one by me.

Evan sculpting...

...A dinosaur ice pop!

More pics from this will

be posted soon! (originally I was going

to put 20 photos on one post.

with loading time, NOT a good idea)

-Ben

From Mom:  Who knew that play dough & a bunch of art supplies would be one of the best things we did all summer??!  I was all ready to paint or do something else that required a lot of effort on my part, but this is what Ben chose.  It was interesting that it took Evan a few tries to really get into it - he bounced in & out for a while, and then was suddenly inspired to make his dinosaur ice pop (when given popsicle sticks, you *must* make popsicles!) & was all intent concentration after that!  He cut tiny pieces of straws to use for the dino claws, and painstakingly used a toothpick to make dino's face.  Unfortunately, I could not get him to hold the finished product still enough to take a decent picture, so you will have to take my word for it!

40 Random Acts of Kindness for 40 Years

Finally, a 40 RAOK for 40 years post! 

Here's the whole list, with a few photos for good measure.  Being the dork that I am, I couldn't just write on post-it notes; I had to make cute notes to use.  Dorky or not, they still make me happy!

‎Wednesday, 6/27:
1. Made Paul's lunch at 5:30am
2-5. Mailed actual letters to some special people
6. Paid for the car behind us at DQ - the cute, young drive-thru dude grinned & said "AWESOME!" when I asked him to tell the car behind us that it was b/c of my b'day
7. Smiled & waved on two different pedestrians while we were out running errands.

Thursday, 6/28:
8.-13. Delivered cupcakes to the neighbors - side note: I used a pinterest idea for making baskets/bowls out of paper plates to hold the cupcakes, and they were super easy & really cute!

14.-16. Put gift cards in some of our favorite kids' books at the book store with a note saying, "Like this book? Use this gift card to buy it!"

17. Gave $5 to the guy on the corner with a sad sign
18. Left a gift card for the next customer at our favorite bakery counter
19. Put a snack and a note in the mailbox for the mail man - he finally took it the following day & left a thank you note of his own

Friday, 6/29:
20-24. Left dollar bills among the toys at the dollar store - the clerk was kind of hilarious when I explained to her what I was doing & then left an extra dollar with her to cover tax... she just said, "That's.... different."  ha!

25-27. Sent thank you notes to a few houses that have beautiful gardens or awesome Christmas lights
28-30. Put up "Take What You Need" & "Free Compliments" signs at SBX, Bruegger's & Caribou - The strips on the "Take What You Need" sign had things like courage, forgiveness, joy and hope, and the "Free Compliments" included things like "You are an inspiration" and "You have a great smile!"  Starbuck's & Caribou have to approve your sign before you put it up, and both of the chicks who looked at mine were cute when they realized what it was
31. Tipped at Caribou for the first time ever

Saturday, 6/30:
32-34. Taped money to a vending machine w/ a note to enjoy a soda on me
35-36. Two more "Take What You Need" & "Free Compliments" signs
37. Dropped off a donation at goodwill
We were at the bookstore as well, and one of our 3 gift cards was gone!!!  It was fun to see Ben so excited about it.

Sunday, 7/1:
39. Brought in the neighbor's mail while they are on vacation
40. Emailed McD's corporate to let them know how great the staff is at our favorite location - I actually got an email back from them thanking me for taking the time to provide positive feedback!

Phew!  Many, many more Random Acts of Kindness were done by others in honor of my birthday as well, some by people I do not know!  I love the thought of the world being a little bit better place over the past few days.  Thank you to everyone who provided encouragement and did RAOK's of their own!!


One last photo, of the fun birthday gift I got from my mom & Ed - 40 of a bunch of different treats, including hugs & kisses, as well as a few $40 gift cards!! 

Major changes to Evan's room... and Ben's, too :)

Earlier today, we no.1: cleaned up my and Evan's rooms
no. 2: rearranged a bit of furniture
and no. 3: did some more cleaning.

We took my toybox and put that in Evan's room, moved his nightstand so it was actually by his bed, and put the toybox where that used to be. We also put the shelf that used to be where Evan's nightstand is now in my room, in the place of the toybox.
Okay, did I manage to confuse you?

Starting point:

•  nightstand: close to Evan's window
•  shelf: by Evan's bed
•  toybox: in my closet

End point:

• nightstand: by Evan's bed
• shelf: in my closet
• toybox: close to Evan's window

Does that make sense? Good.

:( sorry, no pics :(

except...
(drumroll)

anybody remember this?

hehehehehe

-Ben

From Mom:  You do have to admit that Ben is hilarious, don't you???!!  =)  We had such a terrific day & got a TON of work done too.  While I have been slowly removing the baby-ness from Evan's room, Ben has also been giving his old toys to Evan, to the point that most of the bins from Ben's toy box were sitting around in Evan's room.  Since Ben was willing to give his old toys up, we made the switcheroo.  We'll get some of those cheap plastic drawers for Ben's new (Evan's old) shelf so he can store some of his legos there (of course!). 

40 Random Acts of Kindness for 40 Years post coming soon!