Monkey, Meatball, Museum

What a fun whirlwind of a weekend.  Having such a exhausting crazy exciting tiring great weekend makes Monday somehow more bearable. It seems that we've been celebrating Coopster's birthday for at least four days.  It began with monkey bread (fabulous, if I do say so myself) Wednesday morning and FINALLY ended Saturday with family at Tellus Science Museum and ye ol' Cracker Barrel.  I think it was all a pretty big hit.  I'm just slightly worried the next kid in line will expect such a huge shindig, if ya know what I mean.

Get this, my friends...  It takes monkey bread 3 hours total to rise...  This makes it both one of the most ridiculous and tasty things I can make all at the same time.

 We gained a new member of our crazy family this weekend as well.  Meet Meatball, the guinea pig.

This tiny creature is scared shitless right now, but I'm told if we have patience, he will get used to us.  Most humans are not used to us, what with all the noise and commotion and such... so I do wonder if poor Meatball stands a chance of living free of ...much anxiety, to say the least.

Another surprise we had in store was Grandma and Uncle Bro coming into town.  They live 8 hours away and we frankly do not see them enough.  The kids adore both of them and I hope they don't mind that they show their love in a very loud and obnoxious way.  Grandma was so excited, when she arrived at 4am on Thursday morning, she never went to bed!  As each kid came out of their bed, they freaked out when they saw her just sitting on the couch.   

By Saturday we were ready for our big trip to the Science Museum.  My nerdy 6 year old (I say that with nothing but love) has been talking about going for months.  I'm always so proud when we take the kids somewhere we wouldn't normally go in our everyday lives.  We live strictly on a cash budget.  When we can do something like this for them after careful budgeting, saving and planning it means a whole lot to all of us.  

 The Hubs and the Bro put on their suavest look outside of the museum.  We are openly weird people who can't take normal pictures.  There are other examples below.

Below is the first picture I took inside the museum.  Coop was very calm about it, but had been waiting to see "actual dinosaur bones" for a pretty long time.  He was quiet about it while there, but hasn't stopped talking about it since. 

Uncle "the Bro" is teaching.  Love the face.

Coop could have stayed and "dug" for dinosaur bones all day, I think.  I really think he was in heaven.  This kid has loved dinosaurs from the get-go.  I wonder if he has a future in it?

At the museum, they also had "panning for gems".  Z racked up some souvenirs.  

Z examines some tiny shrimpies.

Maximus pounds out a loud tune.

Once inside the kid section of the museum, both Z and Max tried to sit on this one dimensional couch.  Like any good mother would, I laughed my ass off. 

This is what happens when you have more than one kid...  no picture ever has any of them looking up at the same time again.  ...Until they're like 13 or something I guess... even then there's probably no hope:

Everyone had a wonderful time.  We're back to the grind today... that's my excuse for why this entry seems to bounce all over the place.  We're all trying to get back in the swing of things.  Our school starts Thursday and with the whole Tourette's thing, I guess I plumb forgot to plan one. damn. thing.  ...but I've got most of the curriculum, so time to get to work!

 

Maybe my next entry will be a little better thought out.  But then again...