Grandparents Russell Visit, Birthday, Grandma Camp, Zoo

The Grandparents Russell arrived just in time on Friday for Grandma to come with me to pick Nico up from his Birds, Bugs & Botany camp. He was excited to see her!

I had a henna booth that night, but Guy was home from work early and made the crew a batch of Pad Thai for dinner.

Saturday morning was pancakes, of course! Nico also opened his presents from Mommy and Daddy. Rock Tumbler!

Then we hung out until it was time for Nico's birthday party. The Grandparents Russell drove to Nampa to pick up GG, and me and the boys went to pick up Nico's birthday cakes. We ordered a gluten free one, and a gluten one, so we went to both places (WinCo, and Amaru).

The party at Pojo's was epic! Nico had two friends from school who were there, Linus and Olivia. Nico really likes Olivia *wink wink*. We had also invited Linus' sister, so she was there too. Then we had all the grandparents, GG, most of the cousins, plus some of my own cousins who adore Nico, and my Aunt Ellen, in addition to Jeff & Allicia and kids. The kiddos played games, ate cake, Nico opened presents, we had a huge birthday picture taken, and Nico had some time in the Grabber booth, where he had two minutes to grab as many pieces of paper as he could. The pieces of paper symbolized a certain number of tickets. Nico ended up with 450+ tickets from the grabber booth. Then we hung out while we used up the rest of our tokens, and we weren't out of there until after 4pm, still leaving behind some cousins and my Aunt.

Ok so now let's catch up with the pictures!

They couldn't quite fit us all into the picture!

Nico said he wanted Red Robin for his birthday dinner, so we met there that night with both sets of grandparents plus GG.

Sunday we headed for church and then the boys spent the afternoon hanging out while Grandma Russell and I went shopping. We made pizza that night and rented the Lego Movie to watch. It is a good movie, with a good message!

A few more pictures from the visit...

Putting his Technic Lego together Sunday morning.

Since the Grandparents were staying up in the suite, Nico was able to take baths. He doesn't get to do this very often, so he took a bath every night that they were here!

Reading Dogman before bed.

I have a few videos I will put together of this trip, but they aren't ready for tonight's update, so hopefully they will be on next week's!

We said goodbye to them Monday morning, and will see them again at Christmas!

Nico spent the next few days at the Grandparents Salisbury's house with some of his cousins. Grandma took all of the kids school supply shopping. School starts in 3 short weeks!  Nico brought Ticket to Ride to play.

Then today we were able to meet up with one of my cousins that is visiting from California. She has two young sons that I have never met before, one is Nico's age and the other is a few years younger. We met her (Jessica) and her husband (Monty), and their two kids (Oliver and Matthew) at the Zoo this morning!

Nico brought $20 of his birthday money with him so that after the zoo we could go to the bookstore and buy Dogman #3 comic but he instead decided to buy something from the Zoo gift shop. He chose a turquoise penguin which he named Bluey, and later changed his name to Flappy.

Nico brought Lion Cub with him to the Zoo. Lion Cub participated in everything with Nico that morning. He went down the giraffe slide (by himself), looked at most of the animals, and enjoyed a few rides in my purse, too.

I did get a video uploaded of Nico swimming while at the hotel pool up in Moscow when they took that trip a few weeks ago. Nico says of this swimming experience: "I thought I was dead!" 

See you guys next time!

Minecraft, Birds Bugs & Botany Camp, Discovery Center SHARKS!

Last Friday was Avery's birthday party. Guy and Nico were able to attend and it sounded like fun. They had yummy food, and a chocolate fountain, it was Charlie and the Chocolate Factory themed.

On Sunday Nico and Guy played Minecraft in the afternoon downstairs. Evelyn, Avery and Ivy joined them, as they also had the Nintendo 64 plugged in and they were all rotating which games they were playing. They had so much fun!

On Monday started the Bugs, Birds, and Botany camp for Nico at the Botanical Garden. As we were walking into the garden, Nico asked me, "Why did you sign me up for this camp since I already know everything about birds?" I told him that I thought he might want to learn even more about them.

When I picked him up that day, his teacher said that Nico knew more birds than she did! And that he had recognized a Wilson's Warbler.

They only spent Monday on birds, they then talked about bugs, and today was about bats. Nico has been enjoying it.

Yesterday he pleaded with me to go to the Discovery Center in the afternoon because the current exhibit is all about sharks. So, we went! Most of the rooms had been switched over to the shark exhibit, where we saw huge shark jaws, teeth, and shark cages and wet suit from the JAWS movie. There was also a sand bin that had topographical projections on it that changed as you shifted the sand around. That was a very very very cool exhibit, we spent a lot of time with that. There is a short video at the end of this entry that will show you.

Each shark had a danger rating. Bull Sharks have all 5 caution symbols highlighted. Same with Tiger sharks. There are some tiny sharks that aren't at all dangerous. We also learned about prehistoric sharks. One of them had a jaw that curled out and down and around in a spiral under his chin. You can't see it in this picture.

This afternoon we went to see the Grandparents Salisbury for a quick visit. Nico is building a house in Minecraft on their iPad that he can only add to when we're there, so he spent a lot of time working on that. Grandma discovered a goat's cheese mozzarella at a local farm, that Nico loves on his pizza! She gave us more of that today as well as some sprouts and milk and eggs. Thanks Grandma!

Nico's birthday is in a few days and we will soon be seeing the Grandparents Russell's arrival tomorrow! Party time!

Here's the Discovery Center Video!

Where's Waldo, and Moscow Trip!

Nico and I went downtown on Monday to try to find Waldo. We went to about 9 shops, we tried to purchase something small at each place. We ended up with a postcard, a keychain, a stone, some tea, a sticker, a soda, a truffle, and a few other items.

Yep, Nico got his very own cherry truffle!

We also made it to the Capitol building, the gift shop had a Waldo to look for. Nico looked up at the tippy top of the inside of the Capitol and said that he remembered the stars at the top looking bigger. So, we walked up the stairs to get closer. Then it looked a bit more familiar. Here we are on the bottom level.

And here's Nico's Waldo passport now!

We need quite a few still to get a blackout, but we'll work on it!

On Tuesday Nico went to Moscow! The Grandparents Salisbury rented a passenger van and took all the kiddos up there to visit Grammy! Nico was very excited. 

We received a few pictures of their shenanigans over the next few days!

In the van on the way up to Moscow

Stopping on the way to skip rocks

At Kamiak Butte, where the Grandparents Salisbury were married.

Spending some time int he pool!

Guy and I spent our time watching some Netflix shows and eating yummy food!! On Tuesday night we got Chipotle for me and pizza for him. Wednesday, Guy picked up some deli meat from Whole Foods and we had sandwiches. Ohhh yum, both dinners were good!!

Nico returned home tonight around 6:30, his first question to me when I was helping him out of the van, "Can I watch iPad when we get inside?" hehehe. 

He is now reading books in bed after a shower, some banana bread, milk, and about 10 minutes on the iPad. 

The renewing of the vows. Kind of blurry but had to add it anyway. So cute with all the grandkids!

Thank you Grandparents Salisbury for the fun trip!! Can't wait to hear more about it! Hope you guys sleep well tonight! :)

I just realized I have a bunch more videos I haven't posted yet...

Nico practicing calligraphy

Connecting circuits at the Discovery Center

Getting his hand painted for his handprint on the salvation all at church

Lego Landmarks, GG, Squirrels, Swimming

On Friday Nico got to spend some time with the Grandparents Salisbury in the afternoon! I had a henna booth to do so he hung out with them until Guy got off work and picked him up.

Nico has declared that Mondays, Wednesdays, and Saturdays are Minecraft days, so on Saturday, Guy and Nico play Minecraft while I'm at the market. Nico is getting pretty proficient in building things in that game. He loves it.

On Sunday, Nico woke up with a slight fever. I didn't know about it until breakfast was ready and Nico said he wasn't hungry for his pancakes. NOT hungry for pancakes? Yikes! His fever was only 99.1-ish, and he ate his pancakes shortly after, but we did miss church that day.

On Monday we ran errands in the morning, and at the end we stopped by the Mall. They were displaying large US Landmarks made out of legos. We saw Mt Rushmore, the Liberty Bell, the Statue of Liberty, the White House, Capitol Building, and then various other fun lego assemblies.

I got a kick out of this next one. You can see that several letters from the mall's name have been removed, they were lying on the floor of the lego display like they had fallen off.

The middle of the mall held miniature lego displays of the larger lego monuments that were in our mall. Clever!

Then on the other side you see the mall sign in-tact, but you can see Darth Maul preparing to cut some of the letters off. heehee.

On Tuesday we stopped to see GG in the afternoon. We get a double bonus when we visit her because we also get to see Aunt Pat! GG Showed us their new patio furniture and we sat outside for a while in the lovely weather. Not too hot that day! GG also gave Nico her old laptop, and he right away found a place to plug it in and start it up, we downloaded Minecraft onto it right there and then realized we needed a login so had to close it up until we could get Guy involved.

It was a really lovely visit!

The squirrels have found our bird feeder. This one has removed all the bird seed from the bird feeder and snacked only on the sunflower seeds. At least he left the rest of the birdseed, though it's scattered everywhere now! hehe

On Wednesday we went grocery shopping. This is usually what I have Nico bring inside. He likes to pile it high.

Swimming lessons are going well for him. He has learned how to hum underwater. I may have said that last week, but he is getting better at it. He LOVES his goggles, I'm so glad we got some for him! They are blue, and whenever he takes them off he tells me everything looks red. We've run into several of his classmates at the pool also getting swimming lessons, including Linus and his sister, and Eli. We also heard back from Nico's friend Olivia, her mom let me know that Olivia would be coming to Nico's birthday party. Next week I plan to send out invitations to family, but if you aren't already aware, his party is happening July 29th at 1 PM at Pojo's! Anyway, in swimming class, tomorrow they will get to go down the Hydrotube all by themselves!

Bookstore Party, Where's Waldo, Sleepover, Swimming, Cat

So back to the party last Friday, the Book Bingo one that Guy and Nico went to. The bookstore pulled all the books that had been read off the shelves, all they had anyway, so that the kids could see what books the others had read. Of Nico's list, Guy remembers seeing Groovy Joe and I Broke my Trunk. They got to pick out a book to take home, and everyone went home with a little bag of goodies. Stickers, notepad, a pencil. They served ice cream, and since Nico couldn't have any they gave Guy some money to run over to Jamba Juice (just down the street) to buy him a smoothie. How sweet was that?

On Saturday we went to a retirement party for a friend from church who was a nurse and teacher at BSU. It was pretty special. They played games and Nico participated. He didn't win the last game but the person who did win gave the gift to Nico. It was a little cross he could hang on the wall that says "Kind" on it.

It was on Sunday that I found out that for the month of July, the bookstore started something new - a Where's Waldo around downtown. So on Monday, Nico and I went down to the bookstore to pick up the "passport". We searched the bookstore to find Waldo and Wenda, it took us a while, and one of the employees played a game of "Hot and Cold" to get us there.

Then we walked over to Jamba Juice because they were on the passport too, and bought a smoothie and found Waldo there, too.

On Tuesday, Nico was invited over to the Grandparents' Salisbury's house for a cousin sleepover. Papa is teaching the kids how to make their own knife. As far as I know, the handle is going to be made from wood. Nico told me he has to wait until he's a little older before he can make the blade.

Today we ventured to McU Sports to find another Waldo. While we were there we bought Nico some swimming goggles that he got to try out right after that at his first day of swimming lessons! (The first day was actually yesterday, but we skipped that one;)) 

Guy asked him what he learned at swimming and Nico said "I couldn't do any of them." hehe. Guy said that it takes practice to learn something new. 

Nico drew a new comic today and I wish I could find it so I could take a picture of it, but I can't find it anywhere! He was inspired today and wanted to make a bunch of comics to sell at a booth like my henna booths. He said he wants to get a booth next to mine. Then he said he'd rather sell the comics at my henna booth. 

We bought a small watermelon at the Co-op and tried it out this afternoon.

We were joined by the stray cat who has adopted us. She showed up a few weeks ago, looking scraggly and so so skinny. We started feeding her a bit of food, now she comes by every few days. Nico has named her "Sunshine".  So I brought her out some food and water, and she was very hungry.

I had sent Guy to WinCo on Tuesday and he texted me a picture of the bins of cat food they had there. He also texted me a picture of the bins of bird food, and a package of Pad Thai he wanted to buy. So now we have some cat food, a refill on our bird feeder (wasps had started building a nest in the empty feeder!) and Guy had a yummy 2nd breakfast of Pad Thai.

Nico was trying to get Sunshine into his lap, and he was being so patient.

A few snippets I forgot to mention last time - 

A picture that Nico drew on Grandpa Russell's tablet

And then a funny story about our arrival home to the Boise airport. After we got off the plane, we were walking through the terminal, and I look up, and see Jonny and Alanna standing right on the other side of the Security doors. I see Lexie, and Alanna's mom, Wanda. We were all looking at each other cockeyed, not sure what was going on. Even though it was unexpected for both of us, it was a pleasant surprise! They were waiting for Alanna's brother Johnathan, who was flying in from Alaska on a flight from Seattle, (probably on our same flight!) We laughed about it, Nico whisper-asked if he could go to Lexie's house, hehe, then we said goodbye, "See you again soon!" It was a nice refreshing welcome back into Boise :)

Until next time!