Odds and Ends

Gabe: Mommy, do you know what kind of gas my tricycle runs on?

Me: Ummm, regular?

Gabe: Nope.

Me: Ummm, diesel?

Gabe: No. It runs on antimatter.

Should I be proud or disturbed that my four year old knows what antimatter is.  Okay, he probably doesn't know what it is, but the fact that it's part of his vocabulary is a little weird.  No?

On our way home from church on Sunday Gabe informed me that I was ruining his life.  This bothered me at first, but then I thought, well, maybe this is a good thing, because if I ruin his life now it will be over and done with and then he can't blame me for ruining it when he's 16.  I will most definitely remember this and use this against him in the future! {insert evil laugh here}

One last Gabeism:  

Gabe: The other day I was playing croquet and I hit my ball so hard it went all the way to Timbuktu. 

Me: Wow, that's far!

Gabe: Then I hit it again and do you know where it went?  

Me: Where?

Gabe: Timbuk-three

Me: [laugh] 

Gabe:  And then I hit it so hard it went all the way to Timbuk-a-thousand!

My little super heroes practicing their moves.

Swimming Lessons

Gabe is in swim lessons this year and is doing great!  Which is a very different story from the last time he took lessons.  (For that story click here.)    Here's pictures from today's lesson.  I'm so proud of how he's overcoming his fears - good job Gabe!

I love how his foot is coming over her shoulder. 

Grandpa Wayne & Grandma Rosie

This past week we were lucky enough to have John's parents come for a visit.

Gabe has been begging us to go fishing all summer, thankfully Grandpa was more than happy to go!

John's been working on a lot of family history lately.  So one of the things we did is visit and photograph some of his ancestors graves that are in Ohio.  More posts coming soon about our time with Grandpa & Grandma!

Beach Day

On the 4th of July we headed to the lake for a day at the beach.  It was raining when we got there, but that didn't keep us from having fun!  Thankfully the water was warm and the rain didn't last!

Grandma uses Lightning McQueen and Spiderman to keep dry.  Nice!

Looking for fossils with Daddy.

Porter goes to check out the geese.

Can you see him standing in the middle of all those geese?
They didn't seem to mind at all that he was there.

And as you can see, the geese felt differently when Gabe showed up!

Carillon Park

After living in Dayton for four years I decided it was finally about time we visited Carillon Historical Park.  

When we decided to go to Carillon Park we didn't know much about it or what we would find there.  John has been doing a lot of family history lately and recently discovered his ancestors were some of the first settlers in the Dayton area.  John thought it would be really neat if he could find some info on his family at Carillon Park and sure enough when we entered the Newcom Tavern (pictured above) we found his family's names listed on the wall as part of a party of settlers who travelled to Dayton with Col. George Newcom.  The Newcom Home/Tavern was built in 1796 and served as Dayton's first courthouse, school, church, and tavern.  The building is original, but has been moved from it's original location.  How neat to be able to walk on the same floors and touch the same walls your ancestors touched back in 1796!  Small miracle?  Had we visited the park before John started doing all this family history research we would of had no idea that his ancestors were part of all this. 

It also amazes me that we've lived in Dayton for this long and this is the first of the "Wright Brothers" historical sights we've visited.  Speaking of the Wright Brothers here's a joke Gabe told me the other day.  

Q: What did they call the Wright Flyer when it crashed?

A: The wrong flyer.

Ha, ha, ha!  Pretty good for a four year old, don't you think?  Most of his jokes aren't that good, so we really appreciate the ones that are funny and make sense : )

Columbus Zoo

Every year the Columbus Zoo offers free admission for military members around the 4th of July.  We decided to brave the crowds and we took John's parents to the zoo on Tuesday morning.  It was way hot and way crowded, but totally free - yes!

Random stuff from May

Mama's boy!

Gabe finishes preschool

Porter enjoys his first ice cream cone

What not to do when you buckle yourself into a baby swing.

With so many devastating tornados hitting the country we took tornado warnings more serious this year.  When I heard stories on the news of motorcycle helmets saving peoples lives . . . well, you can see I made everyone wear a helmet while we hung out in the bathroom waiting for the storm to pass.

Porter got these red and blue wiggle cars for his birthday.
As you can see the "kids" are really enjoying them!

Gabe made a robot out of the things in our recycling bin.

Porter + blankie + thumb = life is good!

New York City

Almost as soon as we got home from our Michigan vacation John turned around and left on a TDY to Long Island.  He was only there two days, but he managed to get away from work and into the Big Apple for one evening of sight seeing!