Fun Visits

The kids and I drove up to Niles at the end of July to visit with my grandma and grandpa.  My dad and Mary drove over to visit on Wednesday night with us, we spent the night and then most of the day on Thursday before heading back home.  It was a really great visit and I'm glad the kids got to spend some time with my grandparents because we don't get to see them often.  I wish I had gotten a group picture but the visit was fast and I didn't get much.

Nolan and Quinn enjoying some of my grandma's famous chocolate cake.  Nolan stayed at the top of the hill in their backyard for most of the visit moving dirt around in the trucks he was given to play with.  He was so excited to have a pile of dirt of his own to play with.

Noland and great grandpa discussing tools.

The next week we had a visit from my dear friend Julie Anne.  She is currently living in Japan with her husband but took some time this summer to come home for some visits.  We were so lucky to have her stay with us for a couple of days.  It was great catching up and hearing about all of her adventures across the world!  We took the kids out to dinner and ice cream on Friday night.

On Saturday we headed to the zoo.  Nolan has wanted to go on the pirate ride for weeks now so we gave that a whirl.  Nolan loved it and wanted to go on it again; Quinn had a mixed reaction.  The canon shots, water sprays, and ghoulish pirates may have been a little too much for her ;)

This is pretty much how she looked the entire ride (unless she was cowering underneath Julie).

She preferred sitting on this thing.

Don't let Nolan's face fool you, he actually really liked sitting on this thing too.

We, of course, had to check out the "Animals on Safari" show.  After the show they let the kids pet some of the "stars."  Usually it is all dogs and cats but this day they had a duck to pet.  How often do you get to pet a duck?!