Dex on the Farm

The timing of our visit to the great-grandparents worked out beautifully - Ben's parents were also visiting so Dex got to see his grandparents and his great-grandparents! We had lunch with Ben's parents and then they drove Dex out to the farm while Ben and I picked My Bologna up from the "babysitter" on Rim Road.

When Ben and I pulled up to the farm, we saw Gunker standing by himself at the fence, looking out over the land. Then we heard Dex shouting excitedly and saw that he and Great Gunker were riding in Great Gunker's Polaris!  It had six wheels (Dex counted them all) and a dumper in the back.

 It was so much fun for Dex to talk and play with Grandma and Gunker and Great Grandma and Great Gunker. He (very proudly) read them the book he wrote, "Woofdiddy, the Emergency Dog".

 It was all fun and games until it was time to start saying good-bye. Dex did not want to leave and he did not want to say good-bye. Try as I might, he was not in the mood for smiley photos.

I managed to capture a slight smile when Dex was saying good-bye to Great Gunker (Great Gunker must have said something funny about his chair, "the Beast").

Super Duper 8

Dex was very excited to spend the night in the Super 8! He and Daddy built a model car (one of the gifts Dex picked out for Ben's birthday) while I was at my meeting. When I got back, Dex was busy "dancing" around the room and Daddy and My Bologna were resting.

We tucked Dex into his own big bed - pillows on all sides and on the floor on either side of the bed. He fell asleep immediately.

Dex didn't fall off the bed during the night but he certainly didn't stay tucked in!

Happy Birthday Daddy!

Poor Ben. This year, his birthday fell at an incredibly busy time for me. I had to be in East St. Louis for a meeting on the afternoon of his birthday (Thursday) and had a paper due the day before. Because the meeting was only a couple hours from Dexy's great-grandparents, we decided the whole family would drive with me to my meeting, stay in a hotel, drive the two hours to the great grandparents for a short visit, and come home. I pulled the first (almost) all-nighter in many years Tuesday night, went to class, came home, picked up Dex from school and immediately took him out to pick up birthday gifts for Daddy.

We got a plate that Dex could paint and an ice cream cake for birthday breakfast.







We got Daddy up at the crack of dawn to enjoy some birthday ice cream cake and hit the road for the six hour drive to my meeting. What a way to celebrate Daddy's birthday.