Flowing Well Photo Shoot

Well...I've been wanting to get some nice outdoor pictures of Abbie, so I thought I would give it a try myself. I picked the flowing well, in Carmel. I spent a lot of time growing up there with friends and hanging out, especially at night. We would do trust walks all the time, where we take turns blindfolding each other and guiding each other around the woods at night. My friends also drank a lot of beer there. We even stashed a bunch of beer all over the woods once before a dance, and had to go back later in the night and try to find it all.

Well...no beer on this trip, just Abbie and my mom and I. I tried to put her in a more "earthy" object." I ran out of room on my camera after about 50 shots which was fine because it was getting late and I threw my back out on July 10th and have not recovered yet so I was in a lot of pain. I hope to go out again and play around and see what I get sometime.

Okay...Abs just got up I gotta run. We have friends coming over in 30 minutes and I haven't showered yet. Surprise Surprise.

Our Day Today!

Golly gee, I waited so long for these pictures to upload, I am too tired to blog.

Well...we had a great day today. Scott got up and hit golf balls this morning, then met us at Carmel Elementary to go to "Things That Go Rodeo." It was a program put on my the Carmel Public Library where kids can sit on and get up and close with a fire truck, ambulance, dump truck, construction vehicles, school bus, different bicycles, semi truck, hummer, tractor, etc. It was a great day for it temperature wise...really cool breeze and mid 70's. At first Abbie wasn't sure because all the horns were constantly honking, but when she got up in the fire truck and was turning the wheel, she had a blast! It was a great morning, and we had a lot of fun.

Of course...nap time Abbie got out of her crib for the third nap time in a row and came running into her room. I sat in there for a few minutes and she went right to sleep. I usually let her "wake up" for awhile when she first gets up because she is in a better mood if she can hang out in there awhile. She slept for 2 1/2 hours...and I let her talk for 10 minutes or so before I went in to get her, and she was sitting in her rocking chair rocking...too cute!

After her nap, and dinner at Chick-fil-a (yum!), we went to the Hamilton County 4H Fair to check out the animals. No rides at this fair, just lots of animals and fair food. Abbie just loves animals so we had a blast...except she didn't want to leave each section to go to the next. We tried to explain we were going to go see the pigs. But she would say, "I see cows, I see cows." So we'd kinda have to drag her along to the next exhibit...and then she would get so excited. She probably just didn't believe us because I always say bad little lies when wanting her to look at the camera like "wanna see a monkey!" I'll work on that! (It works though.) The funniest part was listening to the animals make noise. It's one thing to say, what's a sheep say Abbie. But standing around hundreds of sheep and them all baaing was a riot. She just thought that was so funny she would baaa too and laugh!

Well...Scott went to the track after we got home to do some work and he is still not back. I'm giving up on him and going to bed. Tomorrow we are playing golf at 9:00 so I need my beauty sleep! Hope you enjoy the pictures!

Abbie driving the school bus.

Abbie and Daddy checking out the fire truck while we wait for Abbie's turn to drive it.

Abbie finally getting her turn to take the fire truck for a whirl...I posted this picture just for Jack & Ryan!

Abbie checking out the goat. She was "talking" to him too in goat talk.

We had a nice little rest on this little ledge while we enjoyed a funnel cake at the end of day.

Three Cute Pictures....

Well...not too much to say right now. We did go and get Abbie's portraits today...21 months. Normal people don't get portraits this often but I really enjoy it. We will see if we do portraits this often with #2. We got some good shots, and they will be on the web in a week or so so I can share them.

This past week I put Abbie's hair up in one pony tail for the first time. It was really cute but she looked all grown up. I'm not sure I'm ready for my toddler to date, so we will researve this hair style for only serious occasions...here is a picture of her on her favorite spot, the roof of the fire truck, with her hair all the way up. I know you can't really tell the pony tail part, but you can't see her hair...

Last week we went to the Children's Museum with Ellie and Lou. We had a lot of fun and rode the Merry Go Round twice of course. Here's a shot of Abbie and I on the Merry Go Round. We can't wait for the Indiana State Fair because I read today in the program there is the Avon Circus there, or something like that, and they are going to have Elephant rides for $5. There are no Camel or Elephant rides anywhere anymore. I'm sure because of Animal Rights People or something...so I am so excited to go and ride the Elephant with Abbie...hopefully she won't cry. I remember riding with my sister on elephants, taking my nephew on elephants, and even riding on camels inside target mall where Merchant Square is now.

Another picture from the Children's Museum. In the new Bob the Builder exhibit, there was a flower garden where you could "pick and plant" flowers. Abbie had a lot of fun playing with the flowers, but the rest of the exhibit was packed and we will have to go back another day to really look through it.

Okay...I know I said three pictures but I am on a roll so I'm going to add a few more. Scratch that...I am trying to upload another picture and it's not going?!? I don't know what the problem is... : ( I picked out two cute ones. I will try one last time. Oh well...I will try again another time.

1st Conference Trip: Licolnshire, Illinois

I'm so excited at the idea that Scott could start going to more conferences. I grew up going to conferences with my parents all the time for my dad's clients. They were so much fun, and it's cheap too. We went to Lincolnshire, Illinois for our first conference trip with Scott's work. Lincolnshire is a suburb of Chicago...way north. Scott had meetings on Thursday and Friday, so we decided to stay an extra night to hang out Friday night and Saturday day before we returned home. I researched like crazy to find fun things to keep Abbie and I busy while Scott was at "work."

We went to Lamb's Farm, a dinky little farm on the highway with a tractor ride, train ride, merry go round, miniature golf, petting area, and lots of animals. There was also a playground and a pet shop. It only cost $5 for me and nothing for Abbie...and she rode the merry-go-round 3 times...man was I sick!

After Lamb's Farm we went to the nearby mall where a brand new Gymboree Play & Music center had just openned and had free classes that weekend we were there! We walked around the mall, had dinner, then went to a free class at Gymboree! Abbie was so excited to be at Gymboree, and it was fun to see her so happy and interacting with all the little kids. I was invited to a play group by one of the mom's in the class...but had to tell her I lived in Indiana and couldn't make it! : ( !! We went back to the hotel and went to sleep...Scott came back MUCH MUCH later!

Friday Scott was a slacker and skipped his meetings. We'll have to talk about that because Abbie and I can't go with Scott to conferences if he doesn't actually go to the meetings! We went shopping instead at Gurnee Mills....our favorite outlet mall! Scott got lots of ties and some undershirts, oh and pillows. Abbie got a new bathing suit! I got nothing :( no time to look in Archivers, the scrapbook store. We had lunch and then headed back to the hotel for a nap. Abbie of course did not nap, I tried to tell her she was going to nap and then we were going to go to the pool, and she climbed right out of the pack and play and said, "I go pool." That ruined that tactic and getting her to nap. So we let her lay in bed with us and watch a video to have some quiet down town, before we headed to Hidden Creek AquaPark (a water park just like Sahm Park Pool with zero depth & water slides). She loved the water park. At first she wouldn't walk in the water without holding our hands...but after awhile she was walking in water up to her chin to keep getting back on the slides. Although it cost $24 to get it...which is a lot for 1 1/2 hours...it was a lot of fun and Abbie had a blast.

Abbie fell asleep at 7:00 in the car on the way home from the water park and didn't get up until 9:00 the next morning...no dinner for her!

Saturday we got up and went the Shedd Aquarium on our way home...which I have to say was a bust. I cost us $42 to get in (plus $40 for lunch) and all Abbie wanted to do was push her stroller around the Aquarium...no looking a fish! Plus they were trying something new in the dolphin show and for the first 30 minutes just talked about how they train dolphins...which did not entertain Abbie at all. The dolphins jumped for 2 minutes at the end.

Below you will see some pictures from our trip:

A picture of Abbie and I at Lamb's Farm next to the train. The train ride was actually 15 minutes long and went all along a lake with fake animals and cute stuff. I would have rode it again but we had so many other things to do.

Abbie not sure about the whole walking in the water concept. She was clinging to Scott until she realized she could do it all by herself. The hat didn't last that long. On the adult swim break we went to a playground in the facility that had water features. Abbie "almost drowned" at the end of the curly slide. It went right into a pool of water about a foot deep. She landed underwater and the hat was drenched...so she has hat hair in the other pictures!

Abbie getting ready to go down the big slide. Scott would catch her then she would walk to the side of the pool, climb out, and then go up the stairs of the slide to go down again all by herself. She loved the slide!

Here's an overview of the slide Abbie was going down. You can see her on the right side of the slide in the green bathing suit. Scott's giving her a high five..well low five actually.

This is us anxiously awaiting something entertaining to happen in the dolphin show.

Oh my gosh...they finally jumped.

Sidenote: IT WORKED!

It's not there yet...on the post "It Worked!" there are captions under each picture that aren't showing up on my computer...maybe you aren't having any problems but I can't see them. To see the words highlight the space under the picture...still trying my 2nd post for today but it won't upload the pictures. Ugh!

Visit with Michael & John

Way back on June 20th my sister and her boys came over for a tennis lesson. While they were over they played in the basement for awhile with Abbie, and Michael rebuilt the train track for me...which I could never get build right. Well...Michael made the track really cool, but Abbie has since then destroyed it again.

Abbie has just gotten her moonwalk and it was her first time jumping with someone, and that was lots of fun for her.

After the tennis lesson, Mike, John, Abbie, Mary Ann & I headed over for the pool for a dip to cool off. It was fun spending time with them...and the boys did great at tennis. We will have to set up another date soon...I can't believe the summer is almost over...it has just flown by so fast! There's so many fun things coming up at the end of July and all of August though so I am excited. We've got: Hamilton County Fair, Seton Fest, Indiana State Fair, Krisit's visit home for two weeks, a couple free movies scheduled, and of course, my last birthday in my twenties! Okay...here's the next post. We will see if I can get it down today.

IT WORKED!!!!!

I can't believe this pictures finally uploaded. I only tried 2 dozen times...but here they are finally...so I can blog something else now.

This picture is Abbie trying to copy Mandy making faces....cute huh!

Abbie likes to "touch the water," here she is with Mandy showing her how.

Another fun one of Abbie touching water. Okay...I don't like writing captions, I have nothing to write. Next time the pictures better upload when I write the text...much better that way.