Update

Get yourself ready.  This post is going to be long.  So long, in fact, that the only title I could come up with for this post was "Long Post".  So long, that I'm not even going to proofread it when I'm done.  So long that it is going to contain random pictures just to keep you reading, because reading a long blog without pictures is just plain boring.  I mean, we've got two months to catch up on here.  So, here are the highlights:

Highlight #1: Karis turned 1!  That's right, my baby is no longer a baby.  And she started walking.  And she said her first word, "Uh-Oh." And she said her second word: "Ma-ma." Then she said her third word: "Bella" (which sounds a lot like "Bew-wa", which I'm pretty sure she says to refer to all dogs, but it's sooo cute!)  We celebrated with family at the lake.  What a big girl.

This was her 1st birthday clown cake - it's a family tradition:

Obvi, she like it.  We also had cupcakes - I decorated them with marshmallows cut and dipped in sugar - and then made to look like flowers.  It was a labor of love.

Mmmm...she loved her cupcake!

And she liked her presents.  Vanilla wafers...mmm...

My baby is sooooo big!

Highlight #2: One of my best friends, Meggo, and I went to Louisville to visit another best friend, Anna, for an entire weekend.  I can hear all of you mommies in your jealous rage - that's right.  I was kid free for three WHOLE days.  I was sad to leave my girls, but it was so fun to see Anna and to see the Louisville sights (of which there are surprisingly many!).  In order to best utilize our time, we made a list of all the things we wanted to accomplish while in Louisville.  We checked online and found a list of the top 40 things to do in Louisville - and so we made that list our own list and we started to check them off one by one.

Where to begin?  Well, here was our list:

It was so long, it needed two screen shots!  There were two things we didn't get to.  The horse races (because they do not run in the summer) and the mega caverns - which is a zipline through a cavern - but it cost too much money.

But we did cross a lot off our list.  First up was breakfast at Highland Morning - a place Anna had always wanted to go to but hadn't been yet.  So, of course, that is where we began!



Next was a trip to the dry cleaners to pick up Anna's laundry:

Get it?  They are hanging on the hanger!!

Then it was off the to the steamboat.  We could have taken a ride, but it cost money and we're cheap.  So, we just looked at it.  Unfortunately I did not take any pictures of that.  But while by the river, we walked the riverwalk and saw the bridge to Indiana (at least, Anna said it was the bridge to Indiana, but I'm skeptical if it really was).

Next up, riding a horse.  Since moving to KY, Anna has really wanted to go horseback riding.  But...we couldn't find any real horses, so we saw this one and thought...why not?

Then we found this AWESOME ice cream place that made these AMAZING ice cream pies.  So good.  And it was on the list!

Number 3 on the "40 Best Things to do in Louisville" list was go to Cave Hill Cemetery.  It seemed kind of weird, but who are we to argue with the list from the internet?  so we went:

It actually was an amazingly beautiful cemetery.  They give tours, but again, we didn't want to pay for it.

Since ice-cream is always on our mind, we went to another bakery/ice cream place called Pie Kitchen, or something like that.  I don't remember the exact name, but Anna said she'd always wanted to go, so we went!  We each had an upside down cupcake.  I mean, look at all those pies!

And, of course, no trip to Louisville is complete without a trip to the Louisville Slugger Museum.

We didn't go in...guess why...it cost money, so we looked at everything we could look at that was free.

Here is Anna posing with a replica of Derek Jeter's baseball bat - like I said, it was free.

We also wanted to walk around historic Louisville - because the houses are so pretty.  But we ran out of time - though we did find this little park area in the middle of downtown that stands as a tribute to the very first Fort Louisville (I just made that up, I'm not sure if that was the name of the fort).  But it was a fort that sat right here on the OH river - and pretty much this is where the city of Lousville started.  Historic indeed!

We went to a couple random (and free!) museums too...

 

We had a great time with Anna - so fun.  Since we didn't get to cross everything off our list, we decided that a trip to Louisville should be an annual thing.  There's still, like 30 things to see in Louisville that we didn't get to see!

Highlight #3: While in Louisville, Meggo and I road-tripped to OH to see my newborn niece, Annie.  We ended up being there with Susie and Ben as they were leaving the hospital - a pretty big deal after having a baby, and we were there to witness it.  I guess that makes us a pretty big deal too.  Baby Annie is adorable and I am so glad that she is in this world!

Highlight #4: I started working out again.  That last sentence makes it seem like I've worked out more than once.  Let me re-word it: I worked out today for the first time.  My friend, JiPi, recommended the Couch to 5K work out, so I decided that's what I was going to do.  But then I never got around to doing it.  But in Louisville, Meghan was on week 3 of her couch to 5k workout, so that inspired me.  It inspired me so much, in fact, that here we are two weeks later and I am just now starting it.  So far so good.  except I didn't plan so well and ended up half a mile from home when my workout ended.  The half mile home was completely, totally and utterly up-hill.  Pushing a double stroller filled with two kids after running for 20 minutes.  Thank goodness Karis is in the 25th percentile for weight, or we might not have made it.

(I have no pictures of me running, because that would not be a pretty sight).

Highlight #5:  See that stonewall around our house?



It's the home to about 70 years worth of snakes (I calculated 70 years because our house was built in 1942).  I mean, that's generations upon generations of snakes.  And see our foundation?  Yeah, there's probably snakes living in there too.  We see snakes in our yard pretty much every day (well, that's an exaggeration, but we see them a lot).  Anyway, there was a snake in our bathroom.  You can see how that turned out:

Pretty crazy.  Then, the next week, we watched a wasp KILL a snake from the inside out, before our very eyes.  We think it was a wasp, but it was striped like a bee.  But I don't think it's a yellow jacket.  I don't know, it might be some kind of mutant bee...take a look:

We can only assume that the snake swallowed the bee, because we watched the snake die, then we saw the bee crawl OUT OF the snakes mouth.  It's let was stuck in the bees mouth for some time, but it finally freed itself and flew away with the snake lying dead in the grass.  Where do I live?  These bees (or wasps) have a home behind our shutters, I think.  So every time I water my window boxes, I keep my eyes peeled for them.  I ne'er get through a watering without running away from the house screaming less than 3 or 4 times.  These bees are lethal!!  I 'm not going to take my chances!

Highlight #6: We tried our hand at potty training.  Fail.  I read the book "Potty Training in One Day" (or something like that, I'm not sure what the exact name of the book was) but it lied.  In it's defense, the book did discuss that it would take several days, but that the majority of the potty training would be done in one day.  Like I said...Fail.  So we are back in diapers.  We did learn a few things:

First, puffy stickers are a real motivator.  Second, so are gummy worms and ESPECIALLY dum-dums.  Third, two year olds do not like to be forced to "try" to use the potty every 10 minutes.  And you're not supposed to bribe them, and you're not supposed to let them watch videos in there, and you're not supposed to reprimand them - so pretty much, I had no means to coax her into the bathroom other than her being motivated by...stickers?  Which worked the first 5 times, and then it was over.  So...we're going to take the slow approach - and then perhaps speed it up in a couple of months.

Woah, I just wrote a lot without a picture...so here ya go:

Ok, phew, the end!  I'm not proof-reading this post, like I said, it's too long of a post.  So, stand up and stretch your legs.  Hopefully it won't be two months before I update again!