a good weekend

Dima and I met my Mother in law to see the movie UP on Saturday and he did remarkably well. There were a few instances during the movie where he kind of turned and pressed his face against my arm or tried to grab my hand and at the advise of the counselors I tried ignoring that stuff and it seemed to work - he kind of gave up and didn't get himself into trouble while we watched It was a good movie and I'm sure we'll end up owning it some day - I'm looking forward to seeing it again to pick up on all the little things that I'm sure are in it. We also went out for lunch and he was getting antsy there - kind of like when Chris and I took him to the flower show and he let loose with the silly, wild stuff once we all sat down There it's harder to ignore that stuff and I feel like I'm being inconsistent if I let him start all that when we're out when I wouldn't tolerate it at home since he still doesn't regulate himself and figure out when enough is enough. I realize that it is a long time to sit down with both things so in retrospect it might have been better to trot him around somewhere in between. After we ate I took him to French Creek park to "fish" with the plastic little dredging net that Josh made in preschool we got in quite a bit of walking since he fished, we walked around the pool there and then we went and found a cache in the park. It was big enough to have trinkets in it so we left a little toy and Dima got to pick something out he decided on a little hippo with a parachute. We also ran into other geocachers along the way - what else would you be doing in the woods with a GPS?? It turned out that we had a nice day out together.

Then since we figured Chris and Josh would be tired and doing their own thing on Sunday I got Dima up and out and we drove up to Cabela's it's like a wonderland in there for Dima since he likes water and they have a mountain with waterfalls in the store. I showed him the website first to get him excited about it and he was really looking forward to it the whole drive there. He even patiently waited for me while I poked around a sidewalk sale and he actually wanted to look for caches with me - found 3 in the Cabela's parking lot it's a HUGE lot with a HUGE building and HUGE store - then we were off to Hawk Mountain. He did great on the hike - it's pretty rocky and steep too at times and he kept right up with me and said he had a good time. He was impressed with the views from the mountain and kept the clouds in his sights all along the way. There was a "raptor show" at 2 and he said he didn't really want to stay for it but we had only a half hour to wait so we poked along in the gift shop, he had an apple in the car and I was like... "lets go explore some more... well, look over there they have birds in those boxes let's go see them." He liked looking at the Red Tailed Hawk and Screech Owl and we did get rained on while the presentation was going on but he got bored once the birds were back in their boxes so I gave in an we got going.

There was a cache listed near where we stopped for a mid -afternoon meal and we decided to go try to find it. We could have driven maybe a mile down a road to it but he wanted to park and walk in so - okey dokey walk we did. We didn't find the cache - the area was too weedy - but if it hadn't been for the sport we never would have found this cool park within walking distance of a dam with a huge water fall that Dima thought was awesome.

Josh got to go to his first NASCAR race this past Saturday, May 30. 2009 a date that will definitely live on in his mind - he'll remember this for a loooong time the roar of the engines (he had ear phones on and didn't fight them) the fly over during the Star Spangled Banner and all the hubbub around that kind of thing is just made for that little kid - he's already incorporated all that into his little play world. While playing yesterday he did his own National Anthem and had Chris simulate the fly over and he's talking about it and the friends they went with constantly well, except for right this minute because he's so tired from such a busy day that he's napping. This is a good thing since I'll be taking him to Ocean City, NJ tomorrow. I decided that since he's out of school and the big kids are still in school I'd take him to the beach - I think it's another place he'll love. He likes to go to arcades, people watch and to play in sand - it's cheaper this time of year than in full season. We haven't really had a vacation for quite a while so I'm looking forward to this. The last time I took the kids to the beach it was way- off season like in January, 2008 and they liked the beach and boardwalk then and only a few things were open then - he's going to love all the stuff when it's open.