Camping!

Dennis had a few days off and the kids and I didn't have anything going on so we decided to go on a last minute camping trip. We went to Tar Hallow State Park in the southern part of Ohio in the foothills of the Appalachians. This is "Holler" country and it's quite beautiful.
It was in the mid-90s so it was great that there was a little lake with a great beach.
Towards the end of our stay Eli was brave enough to put his head under, crawl on his hands in the water, "dive" in, and chase other kids.A view of the "holler":Our camp site:Eli and I spent much of the trip looking for mushrooms. We found a lot of big beautiful perfect mushrooms:Although you can't tell from this picture, this beetle was actually about 2 inches long and it's mate just flew away:Who wants s'more? Eli and Sadie do

Gone Fishin'

We finally bought Eli his first fishing pole. We took him fishing at a local park's little fishing pond that they stock with plenty of fish. The fish are teeny-tiny, but you are pretty much guaranteed to catch a fish each and every time you drop your line in. We used corn for bait and the fish really liked it.
Here's Eli learning how to reel in the line:
His first catch of the day:
One happy fisherman:

Vacation Part III

The next part of the trip brought us to "the Farm" in Napoleon, ND. The kids loved "the farm" and all the family that came with it. There was one adventure after another including kite flying, looking into a hawk's nest, swimming at the Napoleon pool, going to a "polka mass", eating at the "Big D" and seeing the windmill that was in Dances With Wolves, trying on Auntie Paula's hats, playing in the "Moose Room" and many, many more things too exciting to mention here.
Enjoying grandma and the lovely weather that we had:
Playing with grandpa:Eli and dad slept in the tent, just for fun. Here they are seen playing the Sperle invented game "shoe kick". They are trying to kick their shoes over the clothes line:We were't going to make Eli nap when his cousins were visiting, but then we checked on him and we found him sleeping in the stuffed cow collection:What could be more fun than playing air hockey with the cousins?:You know you're a big kid when you get to eat on the stairs. Plus, this is a great shot of Eli's all-time favorite cousins, Emily and Ashley. From bottom to top: Eli, Emily, Ashley, Kyle, Kristen and Erin:No trip to Napoleon would be complete without a trip to the Logan County Museum. Grandpa is even in the Logan County "Hall of Fame" right next to Lawrence Welk and Georgia Becker-Moch (Miss ND 197?).It really is a cute museum. Here's Eli in the school house:

Vacation Part II

After arriving in North Dakota, we spent one day in Fargo with Grandma and Grandpa Z. before heading off to Napoleon to see Grandma and Grandpa S. (Don't worry, we came back to spend more time in Fargo).
Grandpa has a pick-up and Eli loves pick-ups so Grandpa took them for a spin:
We went to the Red River Valley Zoo. They have a very large petting zoo.
Eli enjoyed the snake:
Eli liked helping grandpa water the flowers, it was very serious business.
Grandma has been garage sale shopping. She has more Hot-Wheels cars at her house than we have at ours. She also has a lot of monster trucks. I can't believe I don't have any pictures of them playing trucks together because that's all they did. "Grandma, do you want to play trucks with me?" How could she refuse?

Fourth of July

We had crazy weather here in Columbus for the 4th of July. It drizzled on and off all morning, but stopped just in time for us to think that we could still go on the picnic we were planning. We went to the playground right across from Nationwide Children's Hospital, where Dennis works, but it started to pour rain right as we got there, so we ended up eating our picnic inside the hospital at the cafeteria. It let up enough for us to attend Columbus' Doo Dah parade. If you haven't ever been to Columbus' Doo-Dah parade, then you will be in for a treat as it is not your average parade. Let's just say it leans a little (ok, a lot) to the left and most of it is probably not suitable for children, but we brought the kids anyways. Anyone can be in it, as long as you come dressed for it (no full nudity!). Some Pot heads!Are you starting to get the feel for the parade? No car-sittin' politicians in this one.
This guy just wanted me to take his picture, so I did.
The skies cleared and the sun actually peaked out briefly, right before it set, so we could attend the fireworks show with our favorite little neighbor girl, Sofia, and her family. The kids thought the fireworks were almost as good as the fireflies (poor kids never get to see them as their mom makes them go to bed at 8!).

Vacation Part I

You are looking at the first of several installments of the Sperle Family Vacation 2008. This year we vacationed in, you guessed it, North Dakota. But, this year we decided to drive. Yes, we are slightly crazy to take a 1,000+ mile car trip with two little ones, but the kids did better than I thought thanks to a portable DVD player! Because we were driving, we decided to take the scenic route and take a few extra days to do some sight seeing. We went up through Michigan's Upper Peninsula across to Duluth and down to Fargo. Here's a few highlights from the first leg of the trip.
Dennis and the kids at Makinaw City:
Note to anyone going to the U.P. in June: it is freezing cold. Freezing. Cold. The highs were in the forties and I only brought one long sleeve shirt and a sweatshirt for the kids. So, we were all shivering and made every stop very brief. We found this very sandy and very isolated beach, had it been warmer we would have stayed all day. The kids and I had a great time collecting these wonderfully round and smooth palm-size rocks. We (illegally, mind you) took a large bag home with us and it's a good thing we did because those rocks kept the kids occupied for hours.
Sadie sleeping and holding one of her rocks:
One of the numerous waterfalls we saw along the way:

Sadie's First Haircut

Sadie's hair was driving me crazy. It was always in her face, getting in her eyes. She screamed bloody murder when I would put pigtails in and pulled out every barrette I put in. I desperately wanted to cut her hair, but after struggling for weeks to get her bangs cut, I figured it wasn't going to happen without a fight.
We were visiting grandma and decided that Eli really needed to have his hair cut. We drove to the nearest Great Clips and plopped Eli down in the chair. Sadie was watching very closely while Eli was getting his hair cut. I asked Sadie, "Do you want to get your hair cut?" Sadie replied, "Yes." So that's just what we did. She sat so nice all by herself in her little booster chair, though having a lollipop didn't hurt any either. Here she is before:Getting the back trimmed up a bit:

Getting Sadie to put her head down:A little blowdry:
A perfect little bob:
By the way, her hair is still in her face, but she doesn't fuss as much when I comb it. She has some short layers that still need to grow out some. It's pretty cute.

On Vacation...

We're on vacation and I can't download my pictures so I'll just give you a few highlights so far and share the pictures with you later.

• Collecting rocks on the U.P.
• Taking the Vista Fleet Boat Cruise on Lake Superior
• Playing "Speeding" with Auntie Paula
• Playing monster trucks with grandma
• Eli camping out on the farm
• Air Hockey with the cousins especially Emily and Ash-ah-ly
• Sadie getting a haircut
• Lots of mosquito bites
• Swimming
• Lots of laughing

Eli's Photos and a Princess/Ballerina

Eli was playing with the camera today and took some pictures. I didn't realize how many he took until i was downloading them. They're sort of artsy. Doesn't it look like I'm deep in thought? I'm pretty sure I'm reading a recipe. Leaves. The real reason why he wanted the camera "to take pictures of leaves" and there were a lot of them.
Eli lost a leg in the mine-field that is our back yard.
We went to a birthday party today and the girls were supposed to dress like a princess. This was the best I could do:
A little more Sadie-like:

All Sadie

We went to a free kids concert to see Justin Roberts. Eli did interpretive dance the whole time and Sadie did this:I'm going to let her get it out of her system so she's not doing it when she's 18!

Sadie's been sitting on the potty. Mostly just sitting, occasionally peeing and once a poop!

Weekend, Monkey, and Pig Tails

We had an absolutely wonderful weekend. The kids traveled well. The weather was perfect. The company couldn't have been better. The kids had a blast with Gabriella (almost 4) and Alexey (14 months). I couldn't have asked for anything else. Here are the kids enjoying an icecream treat:

This picture has nothing to do with this weekend. It was taken July 2007 of Sadie. Look at how chubby she was:She's slimmed down quite a bit don't you think? Anyways, naked horseracing is always fun!
Notice Monkey. He never leaves Sadie's side. This is a recent phenomenon within the last several weeks. Monkey goes everywhere Sadie goes.
Some more Monkey:
The latest Mommy-feat: getting Sadie into pig tails. This is how she smiles now. She squints her eyes really small. We're going to have to work on that:

BTW, we're leaving for ND on June 15. Plan to see us.

Tongues

Not much to post about this week. We're going away for the weekend to visit good friends in Pennsylvania. Hopefully, I'll have some good pictures to share when we get back!

Gymnastics Videos

I finally remembered to bring the camera to gymnastics. Here's some of the highlights:

Eli on the bars. He can flip himself around, he just didn't want to do it for the camera. It's good of him to not be cocky:

Sadie and friends on the bars:

Eli's cartwheel into the pit:

Where in the world is Eli?