Our Trip to see the Cows

One of my friends from work, Tina, is the mother of twin three-year-old boys (Lord, bless her). She does a fabulous job of finding fun and creative things for them to do. Last week, she invited some friends to meet her and the boys at Homeland Creamery and Dairy Farm in Julian, NC. I was so excited! Anna and I picked up our friends Jennifer and Noah and made the hour trek to Julian. We learned so much about cows and milk!

Anna posing on our hayride

She got to feed the baby calf her bottle!

Anna was not a fan of the big turkey.

After the hayride, we fed the baby calf and saw the different animals. It was really neat because dogs and cats and chickens and roosters were just running all over the place. The kids especially liked watching the rooster do his "cock-a-doodle-doo"! They also had a modified milking station set up so you could see what it would be like to milk a cow. Anna didn't want to try it once she realized it would get her hands wet, even though it was just water! Crazy girl!

After the tour of the "milking parlor", they brought out cups of their homemade ice cream--so creamy!

Anna with her friends Noah and Jace

This is the third generation that has kept the dairy farm going and they now provide dairy products to much of the piedmont NC region. Because everything is done on sight, their products can enter the stores within 24 hours of milking! Isn't that amazing? I'm going to have to look out for them while I'm grocery shopping!

We topped the trip off with a McDonald's Happy Meal for lunch. What a treat!

Going to Watch "the Soft Girls"

My sister, Sarah, is the assistant coach for the Reagan High School softball team. She was quite the player in high school herself, so loves passing on her knowledge to the girls at Reagan. Anna and I finally got over there to watch a game last week. (I say that as if it's miles away...actually, it takes twenty minutes...yes, I feel bad about that.) Anna loved watching "Aunt Sewah" and Coach Ray out on the field and the girls were so sweet to her. They kept calling her Boo, from Monsters, Inc. After the game, Sarah took her out on the field and let her run the bases.

Once Anna and Sarah got back to the dugout, all the girls had left. Anna looked at me and asked, "Where did the soft girls go?" Priceless!

Dashing to the Baseball Game

The minor league baseball team here in town has undergone an amazing transformation. They used to be the Winston-Salem Warthogs. I mean, seriously, who came up with that name? And who wants to go watch a team called "the warthogs" play anything? So, a new stadium has been built downtown (lots of political drama to accomplish this, but I digress) which many people say rivals many of the major league stadiums. It is pretty nice! They also renamed the team the Winston-Salem Dash. Yes, I realize that there is technically a hyphen in between Winston and Salem, but "The Dash" has become a nickname of this area by the less grammatically correct. I love it!

So, partly for community support and for a little bit of PR, Hege Financial Group bought half-season tickets to the Dash games. Will and I were a little apprehensive about how Anna would respond being at a baseball game for 2-3 hours at a stretch, but I'm not sure now why we worried. She loves it!

The first game we went to, she asked if Rameses was going to be there. God love her! We had to explain that, for once, we were not at a Carolina sporting event and that the Dash had another mascot, named Bolt. She figured that out quickly and can now spot him in a millisecond. During the second game we went to, Bolt came over our way and we raced to take a picture. Once we got a shot, Bolt kneeled down and opened his arms to give Anna a hug. She went half-way, stopped, and then "bolted" back into my arms (sorry, that was for Will). Then he put his head in his hands in disappointment. When we were walking away, Anna said, "Bolt is sad because I didn't give him a hug." We explained that it was OK and that she could just give him a hug next time. Oh, the drama of a toddler!

Anna, Daddy, and the Dash mascot, Bolt

Anna finally figured out how to play in a bounce house in the Kidz Zone!

We even got free hats!

I have a feeling lots of fun will be had at the Dash ballpark this summer!

Rain Boots

It has been raining quite a bit lately. The other day after a rain shower, I looked at Anna and said, "Let's go outside and play in the puddles!" At first, she looked at me like I had a hole in my head. Now I realize this was pretty out of my Type A, everything has to be perfect, box. I was risking wet clothes and potential muddiness. However, I try hard to let my guard down for quintessential childhood things...and playing in rain puddles is one of them. Once she realized I was serious, her eyes popped open with excitement.

We went into the closet so I could get my rain boots on. While I was putting my socks on, I looked over and found this sight and had to run get the camera...

Her ladybug boots were much more her speed...and she could actually walk in those. We had the best time! I wish I had gotten pics of us playing in the puddles, but we were having too much fun to think about a camera!

Orange You Glad?

Anna seems to develop food obsessions lately. She'll find something she loves, ask for it all the time, eat it over and over for a while, and then move on to the next thing. She's done it with yogurt, grapefruit, cinnamon toast, and celery. Luckily, she doesn't refuse the old foods once she moves to the next and will still ask for them occasionally. The newest obsession...

I cut up half of a HUGE orange worth of slices and she downed them and asked for more. Eventually, she ended eating the entire orange! I'm glad I don't have to worry about her getting enough Vitamin C!

Visiting Baby Logan

At the end of March, I went to my friend Kelley's baby shower. She was still a month out from her due date at the time and still had a couple of showers to go after that one. Well, Baby Logan couldn't wait and her water broke that next Monday night after the shower. Of course, since Kelley is a labor and delivery nurse, she had a long, drawn-out labor that ended in a C-section. Logan spent several days in the NICU since he was born four weeks early. Kelley and Adam finally have him home now and Anna and I drove to Mooresville last night to take them dinner and visit Baby Logan.

He looks like Adam spit him right out. I'm hoping he'll reveal some of his Mama's features as he gets older:)

Anna even got to hold him!

The Happy Family...at last!

I am so thrilled for them I can't even put it into words. And Kelley looks like she's glowing, even in the midst of the sleepless nights and breastfeeding complications. Oh, the joys of motherhood! Thank you, Lord, for finally blessing us with Baby Logan!

What's Wrong With This Picture?

Anna's First Trip to the Zoo

A couple of months ago, Will and I talked about taking Anna to the zoo. Asheboro is only about an hour from here. However, I didn't want to go on a weekend if we could help it. So, Will and I set our planners for Monday, April 12th--Zoo Day! We got up early and headed out. We got there about 9:30 and there might have been 15 cars in the parking lot. Plus, it was 70 degrees. Perfect! We decided to just focus on the Africa side of the park since those were the animals Anna most wanted to see. So, we were off to see the giraffes and elephants first!

Once we got past the giraffes and elephants, Anna became quiet in her stroller. Finally, she looked up at us and said, "I'm tired. I want to go home." Will and I just looked at each other and laughed. We had barely been there an hour and a half and had seen maybe four animals! I realized we wouldn't last a whole day there, but I was hoping for more than that. Will looked at me and said, "And this is why you don't take a 2-year-old to Disney World!". True Dat!

So, we decided to go and grab a snack. Then we went and watched Dora and Diego's 4D Animal Adventure. That helped Anna perk up a little bit. She even got to ride the carousel!

We were able to make the rest of the trek around the Africa circle to see the chimpanzees and gorillas. There were a couple of places we would have liked to have gone, but Anna was done. We'll just have to save those for next time. We celebrated the day with a trip to McDonald's for lunch. It wasn't quite the experience I expected, but it ended up being a pretty good day anyway. If only I could get all those motherly expectations out of the way...

Osterkamp Reunion 2010

With Patti and Richard here, we decided to take advantage of it and have a family reunion for my mom's side of the family at Fred Fletcher Park in Raleigh. Several people couldn't make it down to Wilmington for the big cook-out on Easter weekend, so we did this the next weekend before Richard and Patti flew back. One of those was my cousin, Jennifer, who has seven children (yes, count them, SEVEN). I don't know quite how she and her husband do it because these are the sweetest, most well-behaved children. The kids all had a blast playing kickball and frisbee (even the adult kids).

All nine children of the Osterkamp clan:

Hannah, Anna, Brandon, CJ and Emily, Jonathan, Morgan, Michael, and Oren

Jenny and little Emily

Anna and Sarah

The Goswick clan: John, Jenny, Donna, and kids

It was really fun to get together and see how all the kids have grown. There's no telling how many kids will be there at the next one!

The Big Easter Weekend

Hang in there folks...this is going to be a long one. I only had 280 pics to choose from! It really should be titled "The Big Easter Week-and-a-half"!

Anna and I headed to Wilmington on Monday of Easter week to help my parents get ready for all of the family coming into town. My mom was excited that we came early because she got some quality "Anna and Mimi" time before everyone got there.

On Thursday, while Mom drove south to pick Richard and Patti up, Anna and I drove to the airport to get Kristin and Macguire and Ty. If you need an update on these folks and who they are, see my last blog. I was just ecstatic that we had talked Kristin and the boys into flying to NC to meet her parents for the weekend!

We spent so much time outside while they were here because the weather was PERFECT! It was sunny and mid-70's the entire time they were here. And the bugs hadn't attacked yet, either. Hooray!

Greg goofing around with Mac and Anna in the backyard.

All the kids in the tub on Thursday night.

On Friday, we hit the beach. It was a perfect day and was so fun experiencing the beach with these mid-westerners.:)

A family shot

Macguire loved feeding the seagulls!

Friday afternoon, more family poured in and we had a big cook-out that night to celebrate. We set out a kiddie pool in the driveway and the kids had a blast.

Sarah and Oren

Anna doing her "shake, shake, shake" dance

The four sibs: Donna, Oie, Richard, and Lynne (my mom)

The Osterkamp clan

We even had a kiddie table!

Macguire loved the beach so much, so we took them back on Saturday. Ty wasn't quite sure what to think...

Even though the water was FREEZING (about 55 degrees), Sarah and I couldn't stand the idea of Kristin coming to the beach and not getting in the water. So, we pumped each other up and then ran in Baywatch style! It took us several minutes to catch our breath from the cold. Mac got the courage to join us, too. We could look up and down the beach a mile and we were the only ones in the water! Ha! The funniest part was that the ocean was like glass that day. We were laughing at Kristin because these dinky little waves would come and she would start shouting, "Oh gosh, here comes a big one!" Good thing they didn't see the ocean really churning!

Mac wanted to be buried as a muscle man...

So, of course, then we had to bury Anna, too. Little Mermaid, eat your heart out.

On Sunday, after a handful of us went to an Easter sunrise service on the beach, we came back to see what the Easter bunny had left in Easter baskets. Anna was excited about her Peeps!

I'm not sure who was more excited about the Pez candy...Daddy or Anna.

Holding hands walking to church

A cute Easter shot

We had an extra-special reason to go to church on Easter morning (besides the obvious celebration of Jesus' resurrection). My sister-in-law, Michelle, got baptized on Easter morning! It was a beautiful service!

Greg and Michelle

The kids in front of Gramps' memorial at the columbarium.

The Knez family (minus Brandon)

Sunday afternoon, Kristin and I told Mac and Anna that we had seen the Easter Bunny running across our yard. They came flying around the house to a yard full of eggs! Here they are after a fun time of egg hunting. Some of the eggs had quarters in them rather than candy. Mac would get really excited when he found a money egg, but Anna would get a disappointed look on her face because it didn't have jellybeans. You can tell which child is five and which is two!

On Monday, we took everyone downtown to the Wilmington riverfront and went on a horse-drawn carriage ride. Here we are with Harry and Ned.

Little Ty-guy...so close to walking!

Double trouble! Mac and Anna were best buds.

First time with pigtails!

Kristin and the boys flew back on Tuesday and then Anna and I took Richard and Patti to Raleigh on our way back on Wednesday. We had such a great time! In some ways I feel like all we did was laugh and eat! But isn't that what you're supposed to do when spending time with family? Especially when that family lives half-way across the country! Now we just need to figure out when we are getting out to Wisconsin and Minnesota to visit them!