ball caps, magic wands and sparkly things

Astrid and I went to my folks house today for some fun.  The Grands surprised us with a Great Grand!  Usually dad is around to take the photos, but I managed to snap a few.

Bye bye!

Auntie Jen!

We had an awesome visit with Jen.  Look how darling she is in this photo, sipping on a mocha.  We geeked out, chilled out, ate good food and generally enjoyed her company.  We're so grateful she drove out - especially due to the spring snow.

A late breakfast rounded out a relaxed end to our mellow weekend at Benton Park Cafe.  We did not haz cheezburger on Caturday, but we did have veggie burgers from OR Juice.  It was a nice lazy kind of day of enjoying each other's company.

Astrid is still having a little trouble with teething and needs a lil extra TLC.  Her dad took these lovely photos - he's great at capturing moments like these.

I awoke pre-sunrise (as is my want) to find snow on the ground.  I needed to make a run to the market and surprisingly, clearing the snow off Goldie was quite the zenjoyable moment.  In the dark morning chill, the heavy wet snow slid off in gratifying chunks.

Jen rolled in around 10 which meant someone else was awake pre-sunrise.  For lunch, we decided to check out Sweet Art.  Jen took pensive, copious notes in her Jane Austen journal whilst I held the wee bouncer.  I was disappointed that I got too full on lunch food to enjoy one of their notorious cupcakes.  

Astrid loves people watching.  She kept trying to strike up a conversation with the laptop, ipod guy at the next table who determinedly ignored her, paying absolutely no mind to half of the other patrons fawning over her.  Typical.

Guess all the gawking pooped her out, crank your volume:

owiee

Astrid is teething.  This is the cute yet pathetic lil sucky face she keeps making.

Good thing my dear viewer that you cannot hear her sad little cries and moans.

recent

Our Baby of Perpetual Cuteness:

  

Astrid and Jasmine checking each other out:

More outdoorsy things

 

Yesterday we went to the park for a walk.  Astrid was talking the entire time - completely enthralled with this big, weird world.  Here we are getting ready to go...I wish she was looking up.  Oh well at least you can get a peek inside my mouth.

It was HOT!  Hotter in a Bjorn.  Check out the heated up, rosy cheeked bean.  Her Royal Awesomeness fell asleep moments later.  

Here's one from today.  Holy cannelloni, I didn't realize how windy it was!  And ch-ch-ch-chilly!  But we saw plenty of ducks, which is always a plus, right?   And she got to rock her sun hat.

Last night when dad got home we took Astrid outside to chill.  The golden retrievers two doors down were barking at us.  Astrid had a strong reaction- look for a video of this soon.

We went to the zoo, but nobody was home

Astrid enjoyed a well deserved nap after she hostessed Grandma's birthday brunch.

 

Next up, and very exciting for Steve, the zoo.  The eternal question - will the Bjorn be appropriate?  Should we have a stroller handy?  So...off to Walmart we went and finally, by 4:45 we swam upstream through the unwashed masses to find that even though the signs SAY the zoo closes at 7pm on Sundays in early spring what it should say is, "no animals are out today and all of the animal houses close at 5pm, try again this summer, suckers".

We've been daydreaming about how much Astrid might love the penguin and puffin house because she will be close enough to see them.  Yeah, so we went inside that cavernous, cold, fish-stinky entryway...and Astrid got very...scared.  It was feeding time, full of people and extremely loud, I was even a little scared.

We strolled through most of the zoo and all we found was dung.  Piles and heaps of dung - letting us know that animals do live here- have been here recently but ostensibly get off work at 5pm.

The trip to the zoo was so boring and animal-less that Astrid fell asleep.  She did however wake up at the Wetterau Pavillion to take in some starling and squirrel action.  Thank goodness we have those in our back yard!