Same weekend plans, different city

Mike, Michelle and Gabby came up for a weekend of fun. We scheduled the same kind of kid-fun activities that we did the last time we were all together, but this time, it was in Fargo.

First up was a Friday night trip to the zoo. It rained so we spent some time indoors on the carousel, and snacking on popcorn to pass the time.


Saturday we headed to the Children's Museum. We love the fact that they hold hands on their own, then ask their moms to hold their other hand. My guess is that they won't always be this sweet to us so we needed to photograph it to freeze this moment in time forever.


This huge bubble contraption was awesome.



We tried all sorts of combos.
This one was a tight fit, but still worked.

Speaking of, Michelle decided to crawl through an extremely small space to impress Gabby. And got a little stuck.

Gabby ran to her mom's rescue immediately. She was seriously concerned.

The artists shared a canvas.

Gabby Van Gogh
And Gabby reading the Sunday morning paper.

The word Hyper only begins to describe the moments before and after this photo was taken.

Their final meal together was a refreshing popsicle on a hot Sunday morning.


Another great weekend! Thank you for making the trip to Fargo.

Headstands

This is what Gus and his friends do when it's too hot to play outside. This particular night his guest was our neighbor Aly.

The old family photo

One of my co-workers is just kicking off her own photography business, which of course we support! She snapped a few family photos of us last weekend.



When I see photos of Gus that someone other than myself takes, I think, "man, he looks old." I guess it's time for me to realize he's not a toddler anymore, but instead a feisty almost 3 year old who has plenty to say and many faces to make. His smirk in this last shot pretty much sums him up.

A baby Will update

Here's Will, our nephew, enjoying a scenic walk with his Uncle Ross after our picnic in the park. He is now 2 1/2 months old.

He likes to stand up with the help of his mom.

Wait, who's this for?

Gus was all-over the task of helping his Dad assemble furniture. We didn't tell him it was for his sister who will soon be here, and will disrupt his only-child lifestyle.


On second thought, the notion that he won't like his sister is probably all in my head. Each day, it's looking more and more as if he will like her. A few days ago when I told him I couldn't play cars because I was busy making dinner, he looked at my stomach and said, "play cars with me, baby sister?".

Gone camping

Gus got to spend an exciting week camping with his Grandma and Grandpa Debi and Steve in Lindenwood Park. They decided to stay in Fargo for 5 days on their way back from Detroit Lakes. As you can expect, Gus really had to rough it.

Highlights:

Breakfast each day included whatever Gus wanted.

And the same went for lunch.

Gifts were also included in this week-long camping trip package.

Handy-man training was held mid-day.

Hmm, I could fix this.

Or just look through it. That's way more fun.

Baby Will stopped by the campsite for a visit. He's growing!

These bikes were very cool.

Each night, he ran the bases.

After mom, dad, and Gus' stay in Lindenwood Park was done for the week, we all headed to a park north of Valley City to camp for the weekend. Ross and I were present this time to help with the exhausting of chasing a 2-yr old around.

Josh, Christy, and Will came up for the day, too. It was ridiculously hot (97 degrees), so after lunch they took off early to give Will some much-needed air conditioning.

Gus and Ross found some manly walking sticks on our hike.

Tent camping is the BEST.

Gus liked Belle because she gobbled up all the food scraps he threw to her. Belle like Gus for that very same reason.

Roasting marshmallows for the first time on his own was a success.

He experienced another first this camping trip.

This was the the world's longest/tallest twisty slide I had ever seen.

And finally, a dip in the lake to cool off! It was hot.

Thank you thank you, Grandpa and Grandma Steve and Debi for hosting Gus all week. He loved it. And each time we see a camper he brings up the fun he had camping with you.

Lake Ida is al-righta

Gus loved spending the weekend on Lake Ida, near Detroit Lakes, MN. We had a mini Vangsness family reunion on the lake at the cabin of my dad's cousin, Craig, and his family. Seeing Gus have such fun at the lake motivates us to think lake cabin someday in the future.

The pontoon ride put him to sleep.

Even the sand was exciting.

This makeshift water-slide was also a hit.

Ah, swinging always brings a smile to his face.

There were moments when we had to hide under canopies, umbrellas, or hit the house to get out of the rain.

Gus slept in his grandma and grandpa's camper for the first time. Although he slept very good during the night, the waking up part was hard.

Despite his cranky morning face, he must have gotten enough sleep because he was more than willing to be patient and stand still while he got all sunscreened up. Moments later he was sprinting out the door for some more water activities.


Leaving the lake was devastating, but the Little Einsteins DVD + the quick drive (only 45 mins to Fargo), sure helped.

Thanks for a great weekend! It was fun to catch up with family.

Nap, anyone?

We made a deal with Gus on the day he was invited to attend his friend, Aly's, birthday pool party. We told him he had to take a good, quality, nap in his own bed before he could walk over to Aly's house. We've been having some issues with naptime, and him sleeping in his bed so we jumped on this opportunity to get him to comply. It didn't work. As a matter of fact, it totally backfired. He was so overly excited to go to the party, that he could not fall asleep.

Until he got back to our house around 5pm.

As Ross prepared dinner, and I worked in the basement, Gus dove into his favorite activity, taking cushions off the couch and jumping on them - but he crashed in the middle of it.

Will arrived about 30 minutes later for dinner, and he too, was crashed out. I thought this was a cute shot of cousins napping.


They both woke up about 10 mins later.

Little Will is starting to show his personality! He is very sweet and has the cutest little squeak for a cry. His favorite activities include laughing at his mom and dad, practicing sitting up, and looking at dangling toys that hang from his carseat, or other things.


Meanwhile, naptime in this house may soon be a thing of the past.