isa-Lay

This is my sister, Lisa. She is the best aunt named Lisa that my kids have ever had. They adore her. She is a party animal. Like, every time we visit her there are manicures, pedicures, Legos and dogs and a bunny and frogs to play with, movies to watch, and a bowl full of Wintergreen Lifesavers to eat. And then there was that one time last week when she made me get my eyebrows threaded, but we won't talk about that blip on her otherwise stellar sister record.

Her house has this completely ridiculous, gorgeous lawn that she mows every week. She let Chancho "help" a little:

Speaking of ridiculous things, and speaking of Lisa, here is a picture that I cannot find it in myself to be ashamed of:

These pictures were taken at the Mythic Creatures exhibit at the Frazier History Museum in downtown Louisville, where I was disappointed to learn that unicorns have never existed. Spoiler alert: Neither has Sasquatch, the Loch Ness monster, mermaids, cyclops, dragons, or Mr. Fitzwilliam Darcy. They are all mythical creatures - stunning mythical creatures, some of whom have ten thousand pounds per year - but still mythical.

Do not be alarmed, this next picture taken on a green screen. Dragons are not real. Thanks for killing the dream, Frazier Museum.

Remember how I said that Lisa is the party aunt? She recently took my girls to a Cincinnati Reds game that was not rained out. Their seats were close enough to smell the B.O. of each individual Reds player.

 We spend far too much time doing this every summer:

But thanks to all of our pool time my kids can swim like little fishies. Tess dives like a pro and she is actually really fast. I can't out-swim her anymore. I have tried.

Finally, this:

Those mirrors are not doing my hips any favors.

I can't believe that I am going to sign off with that picture, but that's all I've got for you today, folks. Until next time--

See ya, wouldn't wanna be ya!

(Maybe I would. Are you rich?)

(Or do you at least have an annual pass to Disneyland?)

(We'll be in touch.)

We {heart} Louisville

Let's pretend that I haven't ignored this blog for the last month and I'll just post a bunch of pictures and we'll be friends again. Sound good?

We have had a fun-filled couple of weeks here in Louisville. We visited Falls of the Ohio state park. There were fossils everywhere and this happened:

On our way home we found an adorable little ice cream shack on the side of the road. Honestly, I do not care how adorable your little shack is if you have good ice cream, but this place had the best of both worlds:

Some time later - or before, I have no sense of time these days - we visited a petting zoo and Macey's every dream came true.

 

Macey has been begging me, BEGGING ME, to get her a llama. She has thought through all of the details: She will name him Tofu. She will keep him in a shed with straw for a bed. We will bring him with us when we travel every summer. It is a water-tight plan.

 

Aaaanyway, the petting zoo had several alpacas, which everyone knows is just a smaller, cuter version of the llama. Macey was over the moon.

I have had a long-standing love of ducks. I love their waddling, quacking ways. My dreams came true that day, too:

For Independence Day made our way to Cincinnati to watch the Reds play the San Francisco Giants, but professional baseball players are kinda pantywaists about playing in the rain, it turns out. Here are our best rained-out ballgame pouts: 

Here is a little gem of local culture - the Claudia Sanders Dinner House. This restaurant was started by the wife of Colonel Sanders, the very same. We finally ate some genuine Kentucky fried chicken. It was anticlimactic, unfortunately:

We swam some more:

Finally, my favorite thing to do when we find ourselves east of the Mississippi - drive-in movies. We found a drive-in in rural southern Indiana, about 25 minutes from our house. It was perfect. There was a neon sign, classic cars, lightening bugs, those clunky speakers that you hang on the window of your car, and rednecks. This is one of my all-time favorite summer activities with kids.

We saw Monsters University and ate Junior Mints and Cheetos until we hated ourselves.

 The end.

(If you are in the mood to read my words instead of look at pictures, here is the latest of what I've written for St. George News. I miss my St. George and my chocolate caffeine-free diet Coke from Swig. Really the end this time.)