Life At The Circus

The look on my daughter’s face when I told her that I was able to change her dr appointment (again) so she could attend the fable festival for her writing class at our tutorial, was one I don’t want to forget. It was one of those times when I didn’t realize how big of a deal it was to her.  But, when I told her I was able to switch her appointment, her face lit up.  She instantly grabbed the Aesop’s Fables book to look for a costume she could put together.  We were able to put together a pretty good butterfly costume so she could dress up as the Butterfly and the Rose. We just scanned down the table of contents for characters that we thought we could pull off…. “don’t we have a lion costume?”  “too small”  hmmmm wanna be a rabbit, we could make ears and attach them to a headband?”  “a butterfly?” We remembered wings in the costume bin, I had some paint in the cabinet… then we went for pink and sparkly…. we remembered the silk flower she had given me years...

Sometimes when Scott tells me he has to go on travel for work, part of me wishes I could just crawl in his suitcase and tag along.  So when Scott came home and told me he was going to be traveling to Florida for a week and suggested that maybe we come, I was thrilled!  I had to do some finagling with our schedule…. move an eye doctor appointment, get someone to trade meal train dates with me and brace the girls for the fact that they would need to miss a week of practice (this of course was met with GREAT weeping and gnashing of teeth, b/c these girls love gymnastics practice more than just about anything on earth)…. but I was able to work it all out.  And then I had about 36 hours to pack our family of 6 for a week away.  And, my incredibly wonderful and loving and selfless husband took a day of vacation so he could drive his family of 6 down the entire east coast instead of just waking up on a work day and hopping a plane…. just so that while he spent 4 days work...

Our tutorial was off on Monday and we decided to have Scott take off as well and have a family fun day.  We toyed with the idea of camping trip, but instead opted to stay home and go on outings Sat, Sun, and Monday.  It was a really nice weekend. We found a hike only an hour away.  It was PERFECT!  We slept in, took care of a few things around the house and hit the road a little after 11. We got to the trail head and enjoyed a picnic lunch along the water.  Then we hit the trail!    As we walked we ended up splitting off into three groups.  Our oldest and our third child took the lead.  My 9 year old and I took the middle and Scott and the youngest were in the rear. It was super cute to watch them walk side by side.  I love the fact that she grabs my hand to hold.  She said to be, “So, is it too early to start talking about my birthday?”  My response:  “too soon to talk about your February birthday? No way!”  ...

Since the Steelers don’t play until Monday night this week, and it was forecasted to be a beautiful afternoon, we declared today to be Pumpkin Day!    Thanks to a trip to Trader Joe’s last night we had pumpkin cinnamon rolls for breakfast before church and pumpkin ravioli for lunch.  (the cinnamon rolls were a bigger hit with the kiddos).  Then we crossed the Bay Bridge for some pumpkin patch fun on the Eastern Shore.    

Our local fire station had an open house this morning and we took the kids. I always appreciate the demo they do where they have a fireman get into his full uniform and mask so that the kids know in the even of a fire to go towards them, not hide away from them.     In addition to climbing on the trucks and sitting inside they had several educational experiences for them.   They had a fire prevention truck and a 9-1-1 practice station.  They seem like little things, but I felt like it was good practice and review for even my older kids and I was grateful for the opportunity.  They also really enjoyed trying on the gear.  Shhhh….. I think even the big kids enjoyed that part too.  Who knows maybe we have a future fireperson in the circus fam?