What a Wild Couple of Weeks!!

It's been a little while since my last post. We've been pretty busy: Our week in Mobile, then refinishing the flooring in our new house, then the actual move. I guess I'll begin with our Mobile trip.

After resting most of the day on Saturday, we went to our church on Sunday. One of the church members not-so-subtly asked if I was pregnant. Well...she asked if I had any "news" while staring at my stomach. Phillip said it was probably because my hair was curly. You know...how pregnancy can change your hair. But I think he was being nice. Anyway...you're not supposed to ASK a woman if she's pregnant...If she wants you to know, she'll tell you!!

After church we headed to Regular E's for Father's Day. Sara made a Peruvian Potato something-or-other that was really quite good. However, it had the appearance of a large hamburger.

The Father's Day Cake was in a sad state of affairs, as far as it's appearance. It tasted quite good, but it just needed a makeover. Regular E is trying very hard to be proud of it. Here he is showing it off:

On Tuesday, Archie and I met our friend Dr. Joe at the Exploreum downtown to check out the Reptiles exhibit. We liked the snakes, crocs, alligators and lizards. But the spiders were waaay too creepy for Archie. Particularly the tarantulas, or any other larger-than-ordinary-sized spider. I don't know where he gets his arachnophobia. There was a neat wind tunnel there to demonstrate a hurricane-strength wind. Here's Archie in the wind tunnel:

Archie enjoyed showing Dr. Joe how all the children's museum stuff worked. However, he needed a little help with the pulley exhibit:

We had a great time, and Dr. Joe was a really good sport even with all the other loud preschool and/or camp kids running around there!

On Wednesday, we took our nieces to Dauphin Island for the day. It was a really fun day! I took the big girls swimming across to Sand Island, where we found a bunch of really neat sea shells, a sand dollar, lots of hermit crabs and various other fish. We spent about an hour exploring, and had to stuff all our 'loot' (sea shell treasures) in our suits to make the swim back to the beach. A good time was had by all. Here's a photo of the kids wading in the surf:

Here's a really cute picture of Archie and Lily:



On Thursday, we went to Phillip's Granny's house. We had a great time swimming and visiting with our Pensacola Family. Here's an action shot of my Dad-in-Law jumping in the pool:


Apparently, Phillip found all of our activities exhausting. Unfortunately, he fell asleep while I had my camera handy:

On Friday, I took it easy, mostly. I had a really great visit with the Minister of our Church in Mobile. I really miss being a part of the church. I miss my job as treasurer and I miss the people. I even miss the politics! I know a lot of people are turned off by the politics of the church, but I find that part extremely fascinating. Hopefully we'll find a place in Cincy soon.

After I returned to Mom & Dad's, Caleb came over to play with Archie. While they were playing, they shook a tree limb and a baby bird fell out of its nest.

We put the baby bird back in it's nest, after taking Phillip's suggestion of sprinkling a little baby powder on it to cover the "human" scent. I checked Snopes later that evening, and apparently it's not even true about the mother bird rejecting a baby because of a human's scent. Hopefully the same is true for baby powder scented ones. Oops...perhaps we'll check Snopes BEFORE deciding to sprinkle a wild animal with baby powder next time.

Phillip and Archie went to the Battleship (USS Alabama) on Saturday. It was really hot and I was beat from the week's activities, so I declined the invitation. They were driving on the Causeway and saw some alligators and stopped to take pictures.

Phillip said it was rather disconcerting just standing there when the gators would submerge and resurface in a completely different place.

After checking out the gators, they headed to the Battleship. They had a great time and Phillip said he was exhausted from climbing all those steps.

I stayed in on Saturday and got my "African Lady and Baby" wall hanging sewed. It was really nice to sit and pass that time with my Mom. I have such a hard time figuring out what to do with something like that fabric art and she has such good ideas. I can hardly wait to see it quilted. I think the next thing I am going to try to sew will be something with a pattern. I wish I had paid more attention in geometry. Whaddya know...Math really is useful for something other than money!!!!

After church on Sunday, we headed back to Cincy and arrived around 2am. It was nice to visit, but I was glad to get back and get moving to our new house! More on that soon.