locker room self-portrait

I attempted to get a picture of me with all three kids in the locker room of the fitness center's family restroom. Because of course I always have my camera with me. You never know when you might want a post-workout, pre-Chick-fil-a bathroom break picture.

Food, rides, food, rides...

...that pretty much sums up our day at the Canfield Fair Saturday. Well, I guess it actually went like this:

Food (fries, pulled pork)
Rides
Food (funnel cake)
Rides
Food (giant cinnamon rolls)
Animals
Food (shaved ice)

Yes, we Sweeney's were eating healthy that day.

But back to the rides. Of course the all-day ride bracelets are way overpriced. But worth it. The girls had so much fun. The swings were Emma's first pick. Mackenzie too. Until it was time to get on, then she changed her mind. Which made me a tad bit nervous about the $20 bracelet on her wrist.


Thankfully that was a fluke. She was more than ready to ride when Emma got off. The funniest thing had to be the dragon roller coaster. Mackenzie had this look of fear half the time...



And a big smile the rest.

More rides followed:

Including the Carousel and slide with Daddy.

We had a bit of a meltdown when Mackenzie wasn't big enough to ride a different swing ride with Emma. She was an inch too short and none too happy about it. I was heading there way from the previous ride they were on when I heard Mackenzie crying. Loudly. She was so sad to not ride it with Emma.

Of course we had to bribe the girls with seeing the animals (which we were going to do anyway but they didn't know this) in order for this picture to be taken. Check out Mackenzie's face.

There was one before that in which she was smiling. Then she decided to do make the pouty face. Then it was back to smiling.

By the time we'd seen cows, horses and chickens, then watched a line dancing demo (the girls are always ready to dance when they hear music) we were ready to go. Especially Mackenzie. I believe her exact words were, "Mommy, I'm ready to go home." She was asleep in the car rather quickly, which was no surprise considering we'd been walking around for nearly five hours.

We couldn't have asked for better weather - 60's, partly cloudy, a bit on the windy side but compared to the 90 degree heat we'd had, I was loving it!

Rock the Park

So our town does these Friday night concerts four times a summer. They're not the typical family concerts in the park, but rather for adults 21 and over. This past Friday was the first one and Michael and I attended. We went with some of the girls I work out with and their husbands.

The band was The Breakfast Club, so it was all 80's music. Some pop, some hair metal. Definitely some Bon Jovi and Def Leppard. Which made me happy. Of course, I couldn't get all of us together at the same time but we did get this photo of five of us, but we're missing five others that were there but somewhere else at the concert.

(Kelly, Lisa, me, Megan, Tracey)

I think this was the first time in, oh, maybe years, we'd been out as a couple with friends but without kids. It was good. We should do it more often. Except that's probably not going to happen with a baby arriving in less than 5 weeks. But it's a nice thought.

ten on tuesday

1. Emma's into posing lately. Which is usually funny (except when I'm trying to get a good picture). But what's funnier is when Mackenzie tries to copy her. Hee hee.


2. Trampoline jumping at my sister's.




3. Posing? Or just making funny faces? Sometimes she thinks it's the same thing.


4. Michael built the girls a new sandbox. Very cool. Very big (6ft x 6ft). Currently holding over 1 ton of sand. Mason sand which is perfect for building roads and castles and such. They love it.
Love. It.




5. Also, it's very dirty. This is not quick-brush-off-before-going-in-the-house sand. It's hose-them-down-and-they-go-in-naked sand. The girls now have 3 sets of sand clothes. Did I mention how much they love it? And how much I love that Michael built this for them? That it makes us happy seeing them so happy playing it?


6. Watched the Twins Day parade Saturday.


(When I was taking this, she was telling me "Go sit down Mommy.")

7. Got my new lens and filters Friday. (Thanks, Marie.) Wondering why it was necessary to package them like this:



8. My Mom.



9. I'm pricing things for my garage sale this weekend. This pile is done. Now to pull out the two boxes in the laundry room and start them.


10. Michael got me flowers for our anniversary yesterday. He even remembered I'm not a rose fan. :) Love the mix of flowers and colors.

Headlands

Last Friday we took the girls over to Mentor Headlands beach. It was on my Summer Fun To-Do list and given our girls love of water and wet sand, we knew they'd love it. And love it they did. We stayed about 3 hours and if it had been up to them, we would've stayed even longer.

I do have one suggestion to the fine folks running the beach: Showers to wash all the sand off would be great. It really is no fun to strap a four-year-old and two-year-old in their car seats when they have sand everywhere. And I mean everywhere. Thanks.

Ten (@ Virginia Kendall) on Tuesday

1. Sunday evening we went hiking in the Virginia Kendall Park, part of the Cuyahoga Valley National Park. It's not far from our house, I'd driven by it before in college, but we'd never been. Last week the paper had a picture of the Ice Box Cave there, which inspired my husband's idea for us to go check it out. Because we all know, with this summer's heat wave, the only thing I suggest is going to the pool. I'm so glad he thought of it, because we had a great time. We walked for an hour and 40 minutes. The girls never complained about being tired, they walked and climbed the entire time and never asked to be carried. In fact, they didn't want to leave. Well, not until Mackenzie fell and scraped her knee on the way out, then she was ready to go. But not Emma, she wanted to keep going on more trails. She asked today when we can go hiking again. Looks like we've found a new family activity.

2. This is my favorite shot of the evening. It was right after we started, so we were just heading into the trails. The girls wore their Dora backpacks, complete with water bottles and flashlights. Oh, and Off for me in Mackenzie's.


3. I had a walking partner in Mackenzie, since we're pretty much going at the same speed right now. Unless she runs. Then she can beat me.


3. The Ice Box Cave. Which Mac kept calling a cage. We kept having this conversation:

"When are we going to the cage?"
"It's cave, Mackenzie."
"Cage."
"No, cavvvvve," as I'd sound it out.
"Cabe."
"No! Cavvvvve."
"Cage."
"sigh...We'll be at the cage soon."

It's amazing. You walk up to it and it really feels as though you just opened your freezer. It's cold. And felt so good. It's also dark. Hence the flashlights.



4. There was a not-so-big opening to go back between these huge rocks. While Mackenzie was all about doing everything thing Michael did - the girl was fearless - Emma didn't want to go at first. She did end up changing her mind. I was going to just meet them on the other side...

...but then Michael convinced me to squeeze through here. Good thing I'm not a month further along. I'm pretty sure I wouldn't have made it.

5. Our two little hikers. The girls loved it. They were so in to it.

6. Apparently these stairs were carved by hand in the 1920's. There are a lot of them. I hadn't really gotten tired until I climbed these stairs at the end. Then I had to sit for a minute. There were a lot. And they were steep. Did I mention there was a lot of them?

8. Hi Munchkin.

9. In addition to getting excited by any stairs we encountered (there were also some made out of logs) they liked the bridges.

10. This one, who never wants to pose for me, wanted her picture taken by a "2" post. Unfortunately, I didn't think of this until we'd passed the "2", so we made do with a later-photoshopped "12" post. She didn't know the difference though. She saw the 12 and started yelling "2! There's the 2!"

And with that, I'm going to attempt to get the above-pictured 2 year old to bed. She napped for 3 hours today and now at 11pm, she's playing with the train set. Pretty sure she's not tired yet. Darn.