The Johnson's: April 21-27: Virginia Fun & More Parties

I decided to not post a blog entry last week so that the story about Kent & the dragon (aka gecko) would get more attention!

We flew up to Virginia on April 12 for a long weekend to visit my brother, Kurt and his family, who live near Shenandoah Valley Academy. My sister-in-law is a dentist and opened up her own practice on April 1. Kent had provided some assistance during the business plan phase and we wanted to see the practice now that it was up & running. The practice looks great and is off to a great start! We are very proud of Kurt & Jen for following through on their dream of owning their own dental practice! If anyone is in need of a dentist and lives in the Shenandoah Valley, look for Dr. Chalker, DDS!!

In addition to seeing the practice, we got to spend 4 days with Kurt, Jen, Jake & Caden, as well as my Dad who came down late Sunday night. Erik had great fun playing on the play-set in the backyard, figuring out how to move on a trampoline, seeing all the birds in the yard ("birda", "birda"!) and following their dog around the house. Erik is a particular favorite for everyone in that family, so he never lacked for attention while we were there. Kisses from Erik were in high demand!

Erik on the play-set at Kurt's

Our little fireman

All the guys - can't believe I actually got a photo of everyone looking in the same direction!

One of the days that we were there, we took Erik to a Pump-it-Up location. This was the first time for Kent and I as well, so we really didn't know what to expect. The owner told us that Erik was probably too young for the bouncy-house things that they had, but agreed to let us try it out before paying. We ended up paying and staying for nearly 2 hours! Erik was enthralled with the huge slide and begged to go on it again and again; he actually didn't want to try any of the bounce houses. Kent was a real trooper and hauled Erik up the slide numerous times (Erik couldn't manage the ladder on his own). I've added some photos below that should show a smidgen of Erik's glee with the slide!

So happy - he would wave at Dad & I as Kent carried him up the ladder

I braved the slide once just so that I could get photos of Erik at the top of the ladder!

See how far back Kent is leaning? That slide was STEEP!

At the bottom of the slide where Kent & Erik blew past the safety barricade.

The weekend after our trip to Virginia, we attended the 3rd birthday party for the Isidro twins, Madelyn & Kohlden. Erik & I went by ourselves; we left Kent at home so that he could work uninterrupted on various projects around the house (with our due date for baby #2 quickly approaching, my stress level is reaching the "freaking" out phase)! Because I was at the party without Kent, I was on full-time duty; I tried to take a few pictures, but they were rather blurry. I'm sharing them anyway just to prove we were there!! There was another bouncy house at this birthday party which Erik was super excited about. Kent has always been the parent-on-call when it comes to bouncy houses, so I wasn't thrilled to see the bounce house in the Isidro's back yard. I tried to get Erik distracted with other toys or kids so he wouldn't want to go in the crazy thing. No such luck. I had to follow Erik into the house of torture on 3 separate occasions to make sure that he didn't get accidentally smashed! Once I was able to squeeze my way into the bounce house (the openings are way too small for pregnant Mamas!), I tried to keep Erik in the main part and away from the slide. I was only partially successful in that as I did go down the slide 3 times! The ladders in those things are NOT designed for pregnant Mamas either, especially ones that have a 1 1/2 year to try to get to the top as well. I was wearing a maxi dress, so I had to hike it up to my knees and then support Erik on either my arm or knee as I tried to teach him how to use the hand-holds and "steps". I'm sure it was quite the picture. I tried to only attempt the ladder when there were no other kids around, but we were so slow that there was always a long line behind us by the time we got to the top. It was rather humorous that on our 2nd trip up, a little girl behind us was commenting to everyone else that "Great, we got behind the slow ones again"!! It's funny now, but while I was struggling up the ladder, sweating in the Florida humidity, I didn't think it was too funny!!