Frying Pan Park

We decided to go out and enjoy the beautiful Spring day on the farm with our friends. It was so nice, it was almost hot and the kids got a little too much sun. The kids have been falling asleep so early this week because we have been out so much enjoying the weather. At this farm there were new babies. There were tons of new pigs just a week old and new lambs. They were so tiny and so little. Ben seemed a little scared of them all. I guess they cut the tails off the lambs when they are born so they were all bloody on the back of them, it was a little ugly. We had so much fun at the farm and I felt bad that Siena was stuck in school. She doesn't seem to miss all the adventures we go on because she loves school so much. Ben being such a good big brother tickling Claire for a good picture.

This was the kids favorite part. It was a little playground that had 5 little kid size tractors.

Watching the big sheep...from a distance. They were too scared to get any closer.

The kids wanted to eat outside on the porch so they enjoyed dinner out there while I ate quietly inside by myself.

Whos who?

I thought it would be harder than it is. I guess my two girls don't really look alike.

I love this outfit.

Siena has more hair than Claire does at this age and Siena could walk. I always thought Claire had a lot of hair.

Build a Bear Party

Siena has wanted a Build A Bear party since she turned 5. She convinced me to have one this year and it was lots of fun. We went over the bridge to Maryland in the National Harbor. We celebrated with lots of friends. Siena was so excited and said she had a good time.
Allison, Haley, Piper and Kaitlyn. I thought it was cute almost all the little girls were dressed up in their party dresses except Siena. That is actually unusual. It was really cold and windy that day.
Siena stuffing her bear.

So first you pick your bear and before you stuff it you put a little heart in it. Each girl got a extra heart to make a wish and put in Siena's bear. Then you stuff the bear and sew up the back. At other places you give your bear a little bath with air blowing on it and then comb it but they didn't have that here.

Ben so proud that he got to get a bear.

Waiting patiently for all the kids to stuff their bears. They had a choice of three bears and they all got the green St. Patricks day one except Maire. Ben even chose a name that Kaitlyn picked for her bear. Bens is called Clover and Siena's is Greenie. So happy with her bear.
At the end of the party she got another stuffed bear that all her friends signed. I was impressed with the kids. There is so much stuff that you can buy for these bears. No one threw a fit that they didn't get to accessorize their bears with all the build a bear gear.

All the kids.

Haley, Piper, Kaitlyn, Maire and Sarah
Allison, Siena, Ben and Kennedy.

We couldn't have the cake part of the party inside the store so we went out to the harbor but it was so cold. I felt bad for the kids. It looked really nice but it was windy and probably in the high 40's. We sat out there and had cupcakes but I couldn't light the candle because it was too windy so we just sang and Siena looked at me like I was crazy when I told her to pretend to blow out the candle that wouldn't light.

Then the kids forgot about how cold it was and went down to the beach part and played in the sand and climbed on the weird statue they have down there. They had a great time eventhough it was cold.

I have to say I have been to two other build a bear parties and it seemed like each store was a little different. I wasn't overly impressed with this store but Siena had fun and it was everything she wanted so it worked. The people at the store told me it would last about an hour and a half and we were done in 40 minutes. I didn't really know what I was supposed to do to fill time. Happy Birthday Siena you can add your bear Greenie to the huge pile of stuffed animals on your bed.

Sarah and Siena playing

We got a dog...

and this is how Siena feels about it...
just kidding. It was fun but we realized we are NOT ready for a dog. Atleast not this dog. This is Cooper and we watched him for a friend from Saturday till Monday night. It was a little chaotic. Claire was terrified of little Cooper. I can see how, they are the exact same size. Claire would not be put down for the whole 3 days. Cooper would stay under the table and wait for Claire to drop her food, or just jump up on the chair and take it from her. Ben ran around in circles around poor Cooper. He was just so hyper. Poor Cooper didn't like the kids I think and followed Dave and I around all weekend. The kids wanted to play with him but he only wanted to play with us. The first night he ended up in our bedroom in his bed and then the second night he wined and wined but stayed down in the family room. Dave kept reminding me that we were not getting a dog... EVER. Going outside late at night for potty runs and worrying that he was going to run under our fence and run away was not fun. The hair that he shed all over our main floor was not fun. I did clean our floors really well the day after he left. But we are happy to be a dog free house now. Lesson learned I don't think there is any way of convincing Dave of ever getting a dog.

Grandma and Birthdays

Grandma came down to celebrate the kids birthdays. She came down Friday and saw Ben at his soccer class. Ben loves putting on a show for guests. He was so excited. Then Saturday Dave played with Heathers Headache so they practiced in our basement Friday night. So she got a free concert with me Friday night. I get a free concert most Friday nights when they practice here.
Grandma learned about these individual cakes that you can make really easy. They are called 3-2-1 cakes. You get two cake mixes with one of them being angel food cake. You mix 3 TBL of the mix in an individual baking dish. Add 2 TBL water and then microwave for 1 minute. You get a little individual cake! The kids loved them. We put strawberries on top and done! Now we didn't have a huge cake to eat.

working hard.

Preparing for her birthday. She didn't get any cake yet. 2 more weeks.

So excited to break into their cakes.

YUMMY!

Present time. The kids got books and flannel bible stories with a flannel board. They were so excited to lay out all the people in the stories.

storytime

Siena turns 6

Siena turned 6 on Tuesday. It was her magic birthday... turning 6 on the 6th. She has been so excited for her birthday. Monday night she actually told us she was too excited to sleep. It was cute. She woke up early ready for presents. Ben and I had gone to the Disney store and picked out some cute things. She wanted a Jessie shirt for DisneyWorld and a Rupunzel water bottle. I see from Kindergarten that there are 'cool' things to have. One is a water bottle for P.E. class and the other are key chain/rings hooked to your backpack. Siena finds a new one each week and hooks it to her backpack. Pretty soon her backpack is going to be pretty heavy just with keychains. The other thing is chapstick, but I learned on the fieldtrip that I went on that it is her teacher who is asking the kids to bring that in because they complain about their lips being chapped all day. She got a big purse full of chapstick for Christmas with crazy yummy flavors. For her birthday we also got her a Rupunzel kite and some keychains to add to her collection.
She opened Nana and Papas gift too that morning. She got shrinky dinks that her and Ben have loved and headbands that you can decorate. She was so excited she ripped open the headbands and broke one accidently. Now she has a headband to match every outfit. Good thing she loves headbands.

We went to the store a week before her birthday and she found all this Hello Kitty stuff. I didn't know she was into it. I had never heard her mention it before so I got her this little pen that changes colors. She loves coloring with it, so I don't think it will last very long.

Doing the Shrinky dinks after school. I am having problems with them curling up when I cook them. I don't know what we are doing wrong.

A while ago we got a Groupon for Red Hot and Blue restaraunt. Siena loved it and decided that she wanted to go there for her birthday. I was excited that she wanted to go out. A suprise to us, we went on a night that they had someone face painting and making balloon animals. In normal Meilstrup kid fashion both kids didn't want to do it. After dinner we finally got them to go up and atleast get a balloon animal. (I will say, the lady doing it was a little strange) We finally talked Siena into getting something painted, eventhough she wouldn't do her face and daddy had to go first. So Dave sat there in his work clothes getting a unicorn painted on his hand with glitter all over it. His workpants were covered in glitter just so Siena would see that it wasn't scary. What a good dad. Dave said that when the lady first put the paint on Siena's hand she jumped. I think Siena thought it was going to hurt. She was really happy after she got the unicorn and decided to get a flower garden on the other hand. She was so proud and the whole way home she was talking about how brave she was and how Ben should have done it and next time he needed to be brave like her and that it didn't hurt. I would hope she would learn from this that if you try new things she may like it. She was very proud and didn't want to wash off the paint for school today.

Siena's balloon animals. Bunny, the bunny and Uni the Unicorn. Really original names.

Ben not so happy because his leash broke from playing too rough with his dinosaur balloon animal.

Way past bedtime Enjoying some cake!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY SIENA! I can't believe I have been a mom for 6 years. It has gone by so quickly. I love my baby girl and can't believe she is so big. I guess really 6 is not old but it seems like she does so much now. She is so smart and such a good helper. She gets so frutstrated when she can't help. She is really creative and love art and drawing or anything like that. The stories that she writes are hillarious and I love finding them and little notes that are laying around the house. I hope that continues and that she becomes really artistic. She is so smart and loves to read. Sometimes I think she just memorizes books and then just reads them back to me, but she can pick up a new book and read it to me so I know she can read. I am so impressed. Her teacher says she is doing great. I am so proud.

yummy cupcakes to bring to her class.

She shared a birthday with another girl in her class. She seemed to be fine with it. Her class got two treats on Tuesday. Her friend brought in Oreos. Apparently Oreo turned 100 on March 6. Lucky Siena. Siena broght in cupcakes. I think she loved going to school on her birthday. She took in cupcakes and got a crown and all the kids made her a card that they made into a book. She has been talking about this day ever since the first day of school when someone had a birthday and she found out what they did. They do this fun thing where the birthday kid gets to pick 6 kids (because they turned 6) and the chosen kids act like candles when they sing Happy birthday to them. Then the birthday kid blows all the candles out and all the kids fall on the floor. She tells me about it after each time someone has a birthday. So funny.
We love her so much!

Happy Birthday Dr. Suess

All week at Siena's school they have been celebrating Dr. Suess. Each day they get to wear something fun. Today they dressed up in Red and White. We found everything red or white that we could. Monday she got to wear a hat to school. Tuesday she had to wear green for the Grinch. Wednesday we wore crazy socks. Thursday she wore a t shirt from a place that she had visited. Apprently a lot of people had t shirts from the outer banks just like Siena. The whole week they spent reading Dr. Suess books and spent 2012 minutes reading them.
we made this cute red and white headband.