First camping trip!

Well, we finally had a break in our wet weather and were able to get Molly's long-awaited first camping trip in this weekend. There were still some distant thunder-boomers on Friday evening and it sprinkled on us for a little bit as we were getting everyone ready for bed, but for the most part it was a nice, dry time for camping.

We went down to Lake Hope State Park about an hour and a half southeast of Columbus. We met our friends the Tomans down there at about 5:30 on Friday afternoon and got to work setting up the tents. Here are some pictures of Molly and Asher checking out the tents. Just below, Molly is sitting on her bed, which is just a yoga mat folded in half, with a down sleeping bag on top for extra cushion, topped off with her Mickey Mouse sleeping bag.

 Here are Molly and Asher checking out the Toman's tent next.

After we got the camp set-up and some food in our bellies, it was time for toasting marshmallows! Everyone got a few toasted, including Molly and Cadie. The extra-long, telescoping forks came in really handy with the kids.

It was a late night for Molly since she was having so much fun and since it stays light out so long.  Molly finally hit the sack between 9:30 and 10pm - and slept pretty well, right through to 6:30am. It was a bit of a challenge keeping Molly to a whisper, but she generally did OK not waking up the rest of the campground.

It was a nice morning, so we got up and slowly got ourselves moving to get ready for a hike. Here is Molly and Lauren showing off the new tent!

And here is everyone on the hike down towards Lake Hope

Lauren did most of the Molly carrying - and all of it on the way back. It's amazing how much faster you can move when you don't have a couple of two-year olds walking around on their own!

 We got back to the campsite in time for lunch and to do a little more exploring around the campsite. Here's Molly with an inch worm that found its way onto her chair.

Since it became pretty clear that Molly wasn't going to nap, we decided not too push our luck with a second night. The Tomans had to leave anyway, so we packed up with them and drove down to the beach at the Lake. Molly caught a few z's in the car - just enough to rejuvenate for about a couple hours of squealing and splashing in the Lake. We finished off the trip with an ice cream bar at the Lake Hope lodge and some nice BBQ at a restaurant near Logan, Ohio.  All-in-all, I think it was a successful first camping trip and we're looking forward to getting out there again and exploring more of Ohio. I think we're all a little bit exhausted today, but it was worth the wait for a break in the rain. 

As I'm sure you all knew, June 28th was International Mud Day! Molly's class at daycare celebrated by making some mud puddles and inviting the parents to join in the fun. It was a beautiful morning for Mud Day, and Molly enjoyed it while being her normal, cautious self (you'll notice that she's not completely covered in mud - most kids weren't but there were a few more adventurous ones). Here are some pictures of Molly...

making mud pies...

 Getting her feet wet...

doing some mud jumping....

and some more mud jumping...

some mud surfing (or mud karate - i'm not really sure what she's doing here)...

some mud painting...

 and finally, some cleaning up...

It was a pretty fun morning at Buckeye Village - and since Molly loves the water so much, we decided to do some running through the sprinkler this weekend to top it all off

Blueberry picking!

Molly's been enjoying picking our first crop of blueberries!

"Reading"

Over the past couple of weeks we've caught Molly "reading" aloud as she's looking at her books. Obviously she's just memorized the story as we've read it to her, and associated parts of the story with the pictures, but it's been cute to watch her read the story aloud to herself or to us if we ask her. Here's a clip of Molly with her nursery rhymes book, which she sings to rather than reads once she sees the picture, but she does read with some of her other books too. Enjoy!

Life on the farm

Molly got quite a treat this weekend - and she'll probably be talking about it for weeks.

Our realtor Susie, who helped us find our home, happens to live on a 200 acre cattle farm about an hour outside of Columbus with her husband Tom.  She was nice enough to invite us and our friends (whose home she also helped find) out to the farm for dinner and an evening feeding the cows.

Molly and her friend Ellie had a blast. Here they are riding on the "tractor"

After a great dinner (steak, of course). We all headed out into the fields to herd us some cows and bring 'em in for their dinner. Molly is supervising our friend Tom here (he is a retired faculty member from Animal Science Dept. at OSU).

 

And here she is getting ready to take some hay out to a group of cows

And here they are on the way back (Molly let Tom drive on the way back to the shed)

Then Ted, Ellie, Molly and I followed the rest of the group out to some more distant paddocks to check on a few of the other cows

 

 And here they are.

 

The rain held off until the way home, so we had a beautiful evening out on the farm. Nice and warm (a little humid) and surprisingly bug free.

We're not sure which she liked better - seeing the calves or driving on the tractor. Either way, it was a great experience for Molly and a fun way to spend a Saturday afternoon and evening in June.