I decided that it was a great day to get outside. Meme and Papa (my parents) recently gave us a picnic table that they'd previously kept at their house for the kids. We put it outside on our porch, and today was the first time we used it. I'd picked up some little paint brushes at IKEA a few days ago, and we put them to use today.
Usually I am very hesitant about doing messy crafts, but that picnic table allows us the beauty of doing them outside--where messes belong!
When the kids got bored of painting, we moved over a few feet to our sand and water table. We bought it for Caleb last year, and it's fabulous. (And heck no, we didn't pay the price listed at the link above! It was WAY cheaper when we got it.) You are supposed to put sand in one half and water in the other half, but we didn't have any water in it. I just hadn't thought ahead enough at 8:30 in the morning to bring out some water to put in it. (One of the not-so-great things about our house is that there is no water facet in the backyard--you have to go out the gate to the side of the house to get to it. )
This was Isaac's first real play time in sand. He enjoyed it, but I was not enjoying it when I saw him pick up a handful of sand and shove it in his mouth. Yup, this is the same kid who eats the wood chips at the playground and loves to eat toilet paper. Sigh. I think he'll grow up to be able to eat all sorts of weird foods. Maybe he'll be like Anthony Bourdain.
He also liked to dump the sand out of the sand table, and he ended up with a nice pile of sand on the ground:
I captured a couple of funny Calebisms this morning. He was playing with the little blue boat, and I was playing with the red boat. At one point, my boat was chasing his around the sand. He said, "The red boat is coming! The red boat is coming!" I just about fell out of my chair laughing. :)
Later, he started calling the little shovel "Scoopy Do." And no, he's never seen Scooby Do, so I'm not sure where he picked that up!
After our outside time, I scooped the kids up and put them in the bathtub. After I'd given them baths and gotten a shower myself, we headed up to the library. Our library is so fabulous. You can check out as many books as you want at a time, and there are NO LATE FEES. I can't tell you how much money I would owe them if they charged late fees! The library also has wonderful story times for the kids, but there aren't any story times in May. Starting in June, we'll be at the library every week again.
Anyway, we had a great time at the library. We checked out as many books as my reusable bag could hold--about 20 or so, at least. I picked up a copy of Bringing up Boys by James Dobson. I've been meaning to read that for awhile. I finished The Shack by William P. Young a couple of days ago. It was interesting, even if the theology is a little skewed and the writing leaves something to be desired. In the book, the main character meets God, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit face-to-face. It's fun to think about what it would be like to just sit and have dinner with God. What would YOU ask Him? I've been thinking about that for awhile, and honestly I can't think of anything really important that He left unanswered in His word. He gave us everything that we need to know for salvation, and while it would be fun to know how the earth was created, when exactly the dinosaurs lived, and how old the earth really is, it's not that important.
Okay, enough ramblings for now! :)
