Has it really been 2 months?

Okay, I knew it had been a while since I posted anything. We went on vacation to my parents' house in August, and I was trying to catch up from that. Then...well, it's been a few weeks and I forget. But then I started ripping the wallpaper off the bedroom and prepping that room to paint, and that project took 3 weeks. I'm still in the middle of priming. Yeah, I could have finished it this week, but the paint is not the no-odor kind, and I wanted to be able to paint in the morning and have the room open all day to air out. It's low VOC, but still pretty smelly.

Anyway, what I'm saying is that I'm finally getting around to posting pictures from our trip to Illinois. Mainly toddler pictures. I took a lot of landscape pictures, but that's for another day.

He sort of enjoyed his airplane ride. This is the second time he's flown, but the first time, he was 6 months old and slept the whole time. This time, he was squirmy and we spent a long time walking up and down the aisle of this tiny jet.


He got the chance to climb around on my dad's antique farm equipment.


Actually, it was really nice to be able to let him run around without having to worry about him running into the street, or into someone else's yard. I didn't have to watch and make sure he didn't step into a fire ant nest, and there were no mosquitoes. The only thing I had to watch is that he didn't get too far away or too close to the hill or pond.

Here he is with his Mimi and the antique bell they've got.


He's playing one of his favorite games here. We call it "blue ghost." He puts his blue blankie over his head and runs around yelling. Maybe it's more of a blue poltergeist. That's his cousin Devon with him.




Here they are having fun with magnetic letters and the dishwasher.


We went into downtown Marshall so I could take my watches to the jeweler there. Yes, I took them 1000 miles to a guy I trusted, and he fixed all three of my broken watches in 15 minutes. Afterward, we walked around the courthouse square. Declan thought it was awesome to walk on the curbs, and Daniel and my mom helped him jump off the posts.


So many things to explore at my parents' house.
Flowers:


The back door:


Practicing yoga on the porch:


Helping Mimi weed the flower bed:


My mom had a rolling garden seat, and Declan had the best time rolling that thing all over the yard, the side walk and the driveway.


We went to a newly constructed covered bridge.


Bubbles!


One day we went to St. Louis to the Gateway Arch. It was very hot that day.


View from the top of the Arch. Here's the Mississippi River.


Declan looking out the Arch window.


This fancy building is the Historic County Courthouse where the Dred Scott case was tried. Thanks to Scott for correcting my assumption about the building.


We may not be the most photogenic family around, but we love each other and have lots of fun. Oh, and you can see that we are 630 feet off the ground at the top of the Arch.


At my brother's house, Declan discovered a new game. He could pull out the kitchen drawers and push them back again. Wow, was that ever fun! He giggled and laughed and did it over and over again. Don't know why my brother's house's drawers are better than mine, but they are.


Just a cute picture of the little guy.


Here he is with his other cousin, Garrett. They all love little babies and kids, and they had a blast.


Devon loves the Transformers, so he had to show Declan his costume.


Back home, it's still hot as blazes, so he gets lots of fruit popsicles.


Here he is on his Elmo toy plane. He loves to chase us around the house on his plane.