fourth 4th.

this year was my fourth 4th of july. it was a pretty good time.

i mostly like the fireworks, but they are also kind of scary.

the sparklers are fun until you throw the spent-but-still-hot stick up in the air and it lands on your neck and burns you.

the other stuff that everyone was lighting and setting off was neat to look at, but way too loud. at first, i was really scared. here's a picture of me running away. a nice lady named shelly showed me that they were pretty and not scary. it was still too super loud, so she let me borrow her firing range ear covers. that made things a lot better, sound-wise, but i wanted to go back inside where i was the loudest thing around.

the problem with elisabeth

is that she puts everything in her mouth. i have to tell her not to put wires in her mouth a lot, and also markers and my food. she also tries to bite books that i am reading to her.





today, we were playing with power rangers. then she had to go and bite the yellow one's head. maybe she was pretending to be the bad guy.











anyway, considering this, i did not dare let her touch the praying mantis we found outside. you can see her hand reaching for it. i kept him safe.

thumbs up, yeah!

we celebrated summer by getting a pool! mom and me and elisabeth went to walmart and looked around and looked around. i kept asking for stuff, but mom said we were getting a surprise. she got me a water gun to go with it. it was all very mysterious, but then we went outside and lugged this big giant blue pool back to the van. we got there, and mom noticed that there were two of them stuck together. so a nice cart pusher with red hair said he would take one back for us. i would not mind having two pools, but apparently that is stealing. anyhow, we filled it up and tried it out! the water was super cold, so we had to dump some hot water in there. it was a good time, though. elisabeth looks like she's not having fun in this picture, but actually she is.

we have also been driving all over looking for newer house. i like to pick out which would be my room and which would be elisabeth's room, in all the houses we go to. the girls that show us the houses are real nice, and we talked about grand country and played with cars back at the big office.

fun things

making cousin sandwiches















blowing bubbles

















tic tac toe



















p.s. that bread at red lobster is apparently not called "grass burgers," despite the green stuff on top.

i am like my dad, and that is good!

today is father's day. so happy day to my dad and my grandpa and my pappy and my papa!!

mom says that i am a lot like my dad. i think she is right, and here are some pictures to prove it. if you will notice, he is very silly, just like i am very silly. it is easy to find him in each picture, if you know what you are looking for. just find the silliest person, and that is always him.




















also this father's day we are remembering my great grandpa, who went to be with Jesus a few days ago. he was also somewhat silly, and a great man.

golf

i have a new pasttime, called golf! it is pretty fun. what you do is hit a ball with your glub, into a hole. here i am, posing for my trading card picture. you have to be very serious when you do that.

we went to branson the other day, and we stayed at this place called Grand Country that had swimming and golf all inside the place!

i did not like the big bucket of water that dumped out on everbody. that was scary. but the lazy river was a lot of fun. i rode in a tube with dad, and mom and elisabeth rode together. betty kept trying to get our boat!

in golf, i got the highest score, so i think i won. i even got a hole in 1! this morning i asked if we can go play golf at grand country, and mom says it is too far to drive just to play 18 holes. i am not sure how i am ever going to be tiger woods, if her attitude does not change.

softball and fun

tonight dad and elisabeth and i went to see my mom play softball. this was the first time we got to go, because usually there is Bible study on wednesdays. it was fun!

first we went by sonic and got some corn dogs. dad says if you are going to watch a ballgame, it is good to have a good corn dog or hot dog or something.

then we went to the field, and mom was already there. i yelled stuff like, "You better catch that ball, mommy!" and "you can do it, mommy, you are the winner!" and she was. the score was 6-4, but by the time it was over i mostly just wanted to walk around or lay on the ground. she said i was a good cheerer though, because she could hear me all the way at first base.

here is a picture of me that dad took with the cell phone. i am swinging my corn dog like mom swings the bat!

i am 3.5!

mom and dad say that today is my three and a half birthday. i am not sure what that means, exactly, but i do know that you do not really get presents. bummer.

last week we went to indiana, and it was a good time! i acted like megaman a whole lot, and i played with some girls, and i played in a creek, and i rode in the car for a looooooooong time. elisabeth hates the car, but i do not mind it. you get to read books and play with toys and eat a lot of mcdonalds. you can pretend like you are moe, while dad is curly and elisabeth is shemp, and mom is larry. mom and betty do not play along very well, though. you can listen to strongbad and brak on the radio, and also some band called BNL. you can also draw on the door of the car with a marker, but only if you really just want to get in trouble.

here are some pictures! i really liked throwing rocks in the creek, next to the waterfall. i was not real keen on getting the water on my head, though, so i was pretty careful. in the chair, i am being megaman. oh, and elisabeth hates the grass.

my cousins

here are the pictures i promised of my cousins. they are a ton of fun. this past time i was there, we did all kinds of fun stuff. like hit each other with balloons. and eat our cheese like puppies!

elisabeth did more tame things, like look at a big ball, and bite my aunt keri.
again, i was worn out. balloons do not make very good pillows, but they will do if there is nothing else to lay your head on.

look! it's that peanut guy!

he is on our peanut jar.

he maked all those peanuts!

it was really nice to give us peanuts.

they are really brown.



mom says i should be in commercials, with product promotions like that. i agree.

my cousin becky

she cracks me up. we considered playing some scrabble but decided it was more fun to drink juice with a flourish.

i get to see all my cousins again this weekend for rachel's birthday! i am pretty excited and will be sure to post pictures.

giant cheeks

they run in my family. amber took this picture of me when i was little. people talk about elisabeth and her big cheeks, but i had big cheeks first! and also an eye infection, but that is not what you are supposed to be looking at.

i like to read

so i have always liked to read. before i could ask mom and dad what all the letters all over everything were, i would point to them so they would tell me. i did this when we were walking and passed a sign, or when we were in the parking lot and passing the cars with license plates, or when we were sitting down in the house, i would point to the letters all over all our stuff. i have always just liked it, and when i was 2, i could read several words. but now i am 3 and i can read a whole bunch of words. people seem surprised about this, but really, it is nothing new. (can everyone not read?) i like to watch cartoons with the letters on the tv (closed captioning, mom calls it), and i like to help dad read maps when we are going to silver dollar city so we do not get lost and drive to goodman or battlefield or drive into a lake or river (the blue parts that look like snakes on the map). at night before we go to bed, i read my charlie brown comic book while dad reads his book about how to speak japanese.


today i was reading my Sam and the Firefly book to Elisabeth before we took our naps. she was really paying attention, so i think maybe she will be a good reader too.

woohoo!

this picture has nothing to do with what i am going to tell you about. it is me when i was elisabeth. i mean, tiny like elisabeth!

anyway, back to the present times.
i talked about silver dollar city so much that my dad took me back AGAIN on friday. man, was it ever a good time. i am getting more and more brave. this time i rode the butterflies that go really high up and down, and i tried the frogs again. i still did not like the frogs. maybe next time. we rode the flooded mine and the train and went in grandpa's crooked house, and we walked all over the place. i did not even get tired of walking around until right before we left. dad got sunburned on his face and head. i did not get sunburned, because i wore sunscreen.

i asked dad if we can live there. he said we can only just visit.

my sister

is pretty silly. she wears penguins on her head (i have to help her out with that, as she can not reach the top of her head), and she drools.

silver dollar silly!

i mean "city," not "silly." but sometimes i say "silly," and that is silly!

we all went there to silver dollar CITY the other day. it was so cold, but we got bundled up and had some good times anyway!

we rode lots of rides. well, elisabeth only rode the train.
the train was good, but not the one where you went down the hill (fire in the hole!), because i was a little bit afraid of it. the lady bugs are my favorite because they do not jump around and do crazy stuff. they just go in a circle kinda fast. also there was a big giant fort with a lot of balls. and a boat ride where you shoot targets on people. i got 1800 points in that game, because i am pretty good. i liked the teacups until they started spinning way too fast. mom rode that one with me, and she does not know how to keep it from spinning, like daddy does.

it was world fest when we went, which means there is stuff there from lots of different places. we watched some dancers from scotland and ireland. and i learned sudoku! also, there is a bridge there named after us. we let other people use it, though, if they need to walk across.

on the way home from branson, i threw up in the van. it was the first time i have ever done that, and mom and dad say they hope i am not going to get carsick a lot. i think they meant "vansick," but i get the point. yuck.

charlie brown

i do not think i ever told you that my new favorite thing is charlie brown. he is a funny guy, and a lot of people call him "blockhead." i like to call people 'blockhead' now, so if i call you that, remember that it is a term of endearment.

my dad used to read charlie brown books when he was a kid, and so now we read them together! i also watch the movies. Snoopy Come Home and A Boy Named Charlie Brown are my favorites, followed closely by the Charlie Brown Christmas special. Dad said Netflix might be calling soon to ask for their movies back. i refuse.

mom even made me a blanket with snoopy and linus and lucy and charlie brown on it! and dad let me play with his collectible charlie brown action figure that our friends jeremy and kathleen bought him a long time ago.

grandma and papa

we just got back from going somewhere else! elisabeth and mom and i went to see grandma and papa in clarksville, since we did not get to see them on spring break.

it is always a good time at their house. they got me a bike! it is a schwinn. i even let elisabeth ride.

grandma and i invented a game called "Spiders!" first the spiders have to do push-ups to get real strong, then they attack! either they can fly or tickle or run. it is a fun game.

they also have a whole bunch of flowers and a garden and a dog that i told you about before, named sugar. i remembered not to hold her by the neck this time, but i also slapped her a couple times. you guessed it; i got in trouble.

so many boundaries.