Sunday, August 31, 2008

Day at the Fair

This is my brother Jimmy, the traitor in the Twins shirt, with my beautiful Haven.  We were getting ready to spend the day at the Minnesota State Fair.
The Minnesota state fair is the largest State Fair in the USA.  It over 1.6 million attenders per year.
We drove and parked and then rode a bus the rest of the way to the fair.  Much easier than trying to find parking there, and it was free.  Here is Haven on her first bus ride.  No car seat, so Jonathan would have had to sacrifice his life.
Mom and dad came up for the labor day weekend, so they went with us.  They decided today to stay one more day.
The bus had VERY slippery seats.  We all would have went flying if the bus tipped.  Hopefully it would have tipped toward my brother, so he wouldn't have landed on me!
Here are just a few of the people that were there.  People as far as the eye could see.  209,399 for the day to be exact.
Haven is loving her Aunt Amie.
We went to the lumber jack show.  Here they are having a saw logging contest.
Pole climbing contest.
Log rolling contest.  We also saw canoe jousting, log racing, and ax throwing contest.  It was fun and pretty corny at times.
There were pretty much just a few things we did at the fair and looking at and selecting food was THE MAIN item of the day.  There were booths everywhere.  It is hard to see just how big that super long corn dog was, but it was HUGE.  The one on the right is a foot long, so imagine how large the other one is!  Jonathan was going to get the huge one but they were out, so he got the foot long.  It was big enough.
There were quite a few interesting selections.  Buffalo on a stick was below.  They had alligator, ostrich.  They had other yummy selections it was really hard to know what we wanted to try.
Haven got to eat things she normally wouldn't.  Like these little mini-doughnuts.  They were super yummy.  They dipped them in sugar and Haven sure loved them.  She also got to eat a corn dog, fresh made french fries and deep friend cheese curds (those were wonderful!).  I was torn between getting the yummy fresh fries or what they called Australian batter potatoes.  There was a security guard that came by that had some of the fries, so I asked him if they were any good.  I didn't ask him for one, but he offered so I took it.  I was teased about begging food off of strangers.  Anyway, Haven was the one that kept asking for more from him.  He was great about it.  Boy did he have a northern accent!
We all wanted different things, so Mom ended up getting a roasted corn on the cob and a fresh made pretzel.  Amie got a classic corn dog, which she said she gets every year.  Dad tried two different brauts (the first one wasn't big enough for him).  He also had a pork chop sandwich that was soggy and tasteless.  Jonathan got a foot long corn dog, some chili cheese curly fries.  Jimmy has a chili cheese hot dog(nothing spectacular according to him) and those yummy fresh fries (he was nice and shared).  I had the Hot Dish on a stick (explained below if you click on the picture it should enlarge it).  It was GREAT!  I wanted to try different things, so I also picked the Australian battered potatoes, which were slices of potatoes battered and deep fried.  They came with your choice of ranch and cheese or both.  I chose....ketchup! They were yummy, but boy was I full because we all shared the donuts and cheese curds. 
We also saw some of the fair animals.  We saw horses, pigs with their piglets, and sheep.  Oh a cow briefly that Haven mooed at.

Here is the largest boar in MN.  It weighed 1,240 lbs.  This picture does not even begin to show how huge this thing was!!  I thought it was a sad looking boar.  I have no idea how it even moved.
Here we are on our way home.  We were all sore, tired and stuffed, but it was a good time had by all!

Saturday, August 30, 2008

Traveling to Minnesota for Vacation

We started out for Minnesota to see Jimmy and Amie on Thursday afternoon.  We traveled part of the way and then stayed in Des Moines Thursday night.  Haven took a small nap each day and then poor thing was awake most of the trip.  This picture was what she did for quite a bit of the time, or so it seemed.  She really probably didn't do to bad.
Here she was for about 3 1/2 hours out of 10 hours.
My wonderful husband drove the whole way!
I ended up reading quite a bit of the time.
On Friday we stopped to eat at Pizza Hut and found out that Haven loves breadsticks and dipping sauce!  
She saw daddy get the camera out and said "cheese" and then smiled for the picture.  That was the first time she had done that without being asked.
We will be going to the MN state fair today, so stay tuned for future posts of our vacation!

Tuesday, August 26, 2008

A day in the park

The Veo's blog inspired me to take Haven to the park!  I didn't realize we had a cool little toddler playground.  So Monday night we packed Haven in the car and started out to see how she would do.  Most of the time she just watched the other little kids play.  I don't think she knew quite what to do with herself.  She did enjoy the bouncy dinosaur.


Jonathan played a bit also.
Haven never did go through the tunnel.  She would get a few paces in and then turn around and come back out.  Jonathan got into the tunnel, but could not entice her to follow.

The first time on the slide was not a joyous one.  She didn't cry, but she didn't quite know what to think.  Eventually she enjoyed going down, but what she enjoyed most was......
....going up.  This picture cracks me up because it looks like Jonathan is goosing her!  She wanted to climb up the slide and then.....
....go down the stairs.  She kept going up the slide and down the stairs.  It was so funny.
Don't let this picture fool you...she didn't make it all the way through.

Monday, August 25, 2008

Crayola Queen

I thought this was a super fun pic.  We bought her the crayola markers that only write on certain paper.  She loves taking the lid off and trying to put it back on, but doesn't really write on the paper much, which really surprises me since she love to write on things.  Anyway, this is the package that the paper and markers came in.  I just love her smile.

Thursday, August 21, 2008

Laughter is the best medicine

We just LOVE Haven's laughter.  There are many ways to make her laugh.  She is actually a pretty happy child most of the time.  The top two pictures daddy was putting her baby on my head and playing peek-a-boo.  Notice the bib?  She loves things around her neck and arm, so the only reason why it is there is because she wanted it on.  She has another bib on tonight.  She is just funny that way. 
I love the way her eyes smile.  You wouldn't have to see her mouth to know that she is smiling or laughing.  It usually starts with her eyes.
Haven loves to be tickled or "gotten".  In the following pictures daddy was tickling her and she just laughed and laughed.  She also loves being chased and "gotten".  No pictures of that, but it is a really fun game!


Can you see her sixth tooth?  She has been snotty nosed this week because one of her top teeth broke through.  Four on top and two on bottom.  Most kids her age have more than six, but as I have heard a million times, the slower the teeth come in the better they are supposed to be.

Not pictured below, but she will also throw her body back to make it available for tickling.  She just loves the tickle game.
She is ticklish in several places and it just depends on the day or mood which one will work.  Here daddy is tickling her collar bone.  Her neck, legs, belly and arm pits are other good places.  I just LOVE that smile.

Wednesday, August 20, 2008

Box House

Haven has a new house!  She is now 20lbs and we were able to get her a forward facing car seat.  That means big box, which means new house!  Daddy made a little door and a couple of windows.  Here is Haven peeking through the window.

Saturday, August 9, 2008

Hiiiiyyy

Haven loves talking on her phone.  She has started chattering into it instead of just carrying it around.  She sometimes hands it to us to talk and she is very persistent about it too.  Now she even chats on the real phone to the grandparents.  Of course there are more "phones".  Such as a remote, a calculator, anything flat that she can put up to her ear.  

Thursday, August 7, 2008

Zooooommmm

I just thought this turned out to be the coolest picture!  She likes to push her train around. 
She picks out a stuffed animal or a doll for the day and carries it around.  She pats it and says aaaawwww.  This outfit used to be so big on her she would step on it.  Now it fits just right and looks so cute!  She is now up to 20lbs so forward facing it is...as soon as we get one.
Daddy was passing on his wisdom of the model pose.  
She is just the cutest thing in the world!!  She loves her rocking chair and sits in it and gets out of it several times a day.