Well, we had a blast yesterday.

In the morning dh took BM to the grocery store and I took LM to Kohls to look for shoes. I realized this was not a great choice because we were in a hurry and the store was big. LOL. Dh wondered what took us so long - I said "little legs, little legs."

Likewise, I have mentioned this is a pet peeve of mine, but people use strollers WAY too much. Lazy kids. LOL. The thought popped into my mind when I read an article about how people were prolonging stroller use with their kids. I guess I may be an evil parent but we took LM to Six Flags LAST year, when he was barely 2, and did not use a stroller. I do not expect to use a stroller on our 3 days in Disney. LM has legs; he'll be fine. He's almost 3 now.

We bought a double stroller when BM was 2 and LM was born. I don't think BM has hardly ever used it; certainly never needed it. (Mental note; need to sell that sucker).

Anyway, I saw a bunch of very old kids in strollers yesterday so it was mind boggling. I mean I Saw kids who looked WAY older than my 4yo in strollers. So that just bugged me. I admit LM is more borderline. But there is no doubt that my 4yo can walk as well as we can.

But I digress.

I didn't have any luck with the shoes, but picked up a couple of cute pairs of sandals for $10 and 2 pairs sunglasses for the kids for $10. I think it was a good run, though admittedly not what I had gone for.

Then we packed up and went to the Scottish Games festival.

The only bad thing I can say is that it was just about 90 degrees. Considering we had a freeze last weekend; it was quite an adjustment. I am obviously not ready for summer. (Our summers are very hot).

Well, at the games we watched hammer throwing and "Shot Put" type games as well as the Caber Toss.



"The caber is a long section of tree trunk, tapered so that it is noticeably smaller at one end than at the other. The man who essays to test his strength by tossing it raises the pole to a vertical position in his hands, smaller end down, and then throws it into the air and away from him. he must make the large end of the pole hit the ground and the pole fall in such a way that the small end will describe a half circle.
The prize goes to the man whose caber, having been thrown in the manner described, lands on the ground with its small end farthest away from the throwing point. Considerable skill is required to make the throw, as well as considerable strength. The caber is likely to fall over sideways instead of straight forward when the large end hits the ground, or it is likely to fall at an angle or even fall back the way it has come. Therefore, everything else being equal, the longest throw is always that which causes the caber to fall straight away."

We actually saw a few good throws. (Looked insanely difficult). The logs were 18-feet high and weighed 110 pounds.

OF course the professionals made it look rather effortless. When some of the less experienced really struggled you realized what an amazing feat this was.

They also had a historic section which was fun to see.



Don't ask me why but I got no pictures of the bands. I could have sat all day and watched the drum/bagpipe marching and drum majors (I used to be in a marching band) but no one else was very interested. So we didn't get to watch much and I didn't get any pictures. Bummer.

Oh yes, there were also lots of dogs there and we watched a dog herding ducks for a time. During the duck herding, LM Was far more interested in the map:



Finally, the kids section was awesome. They had a cute magic show and all that, and then later balloon animals. We had left and done other things for a time, but when we came back they were having a TP contest which BM participated in. (HE is in the orange wrapping a bigger kid). They had a second TP contest later where BM wrapped up daddy. They had SO MUCH fun. Dh worried that this would give him bad ideas. LOL.

They also had water balloons and other water games, so the kids just had a blast.

Oh yeah, reminds me we saw a pile of whiny/snotty kids. YEesh. I am grateful my kids can behave nicely in public. I think actually I was by far the grumpiest of the bunch (with the heat). LOL. Kids had little issue with anything; nor did I Expect them to. Which made it a nice day.



We spent about $50 on the day (mostly admission; and some lunch). They actually didn't take cards for anything (thought they would for admission) and we didn't really plan well. I Was surprised we had $60 cash honestly. So we really limited what we spent money on likewise. Which was probably a good plan. The lunch was expensive but we didn't eat much due to lack of cash.

On the way home what we really wanted was some ice cream to cool off. We decided to go home and clean up and the kids and I headed off to the store to pick up some ice cream for after dinner - it was getting rather late by then - hard to justify eating the ice cream first, since it was dinner time.

In theory, this was a nice plan, but I got sidetracked and bought some donuts for today, and some soda since it was on sale, etc. Spent $15 at the store. But was preferable to stopping somewhere for ice cream. We spent $7 on some ice cream treats that will last a while in our freezer instead.

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As I pulled the pictures off my camera, I realized that I haven't taken any pictures this year. Yeesh. Why I have shared none.

I did have some from our hike a few weeks back.





& I also saw the funniest picture of the neighbor cat:



She apparently likes our cat statue. LOL. She is very friendly and we don't mind her because she is a great mouser. (Has helped us out; saved us an exterminator, as we had mouse issues last year). BUT I can't say my cat agrees. Does NOT like this cat hanging around, of course.

Finally, we have no idea how, but BM got a cat toy stuck in our chandelier. We figure our ceilings are 18-feet high. & I honestly thought this was going to be a permanent fixture in our house. Dh figured out how to get it off eventually though, with our inadequate ladder...

Just kind of funny. Yeah my kids can behave in public; but I didn't say they were perfect. LOL.



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YEsterday was my day to recover. No responsibilities.

Today I have MUCH to do around the house. A lot of cleaning. Making up for my lack of attention to the house during tax season. I started this last weekend and did not get very far at all. I hope for some progress today.

Dh and I also have a date planned for the movies. I honestly do not remember the last time I went to the movies - it has been a LONG time (to see a grown up movie anyway). So, woohoo!

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Oh yeah - foreclosure across the street. I blogged about it a few days ago. Saw LOTS of people going through this weekend.

It's probably one of the smallest homes in the entire community. These small homes have taken the BIGGEST hit over the last fews. Few have sold, some have been on the market for years. (The bigger homes still sell rather fast; have been all along). So it will be interesting to see if things are picking up or if this one will sit. I am not sure if all the traffic means anything, though I think it would mean something.

I guess practically living next door to this one we shall see. I will see more what is going on. The yard looks like hell. Ugh. I don't look forward to the prospect of this house sitting on the market forever. Of course, also scary if it is an example of things to come...