Family Fun Day

Hello wonderful friends. We had a fabulous day yesterday. It was the last day of my hubby's vacation and it was payday AND hubby had a nice bonus on his paycheck so we decided to take the kiddos and do something fun. So we all decided to go to Cincinnati.

Yesterday morning when we got up the weather was HORRIBLE! The skies were dark and grey. Rain was drizzling down. It was chilly. YUCK! But we didn't let that stop us.We all got our showers and off we went.

It takes about 1 hour and 45 minutes give or take to get to Cincinnati from our house. The drive was rainy but nice. We saw many things that interested us. 

Once we got to Cincy our first stop was Bass Pro Shop. Now as luck would have it, I actually remembered that I had a camera on my phone so I did get tons of pics of our outing even though they are crappy Blackberry pictures.

My kiddos LOVED Bass Pro Shop.They loved all the stuffed animals, they liked that they could climb aboard boats inside the store, they loved riding the escalators, and all the different adventurous displays.

Here you can see 3 of my kiddos being a little afraid of the bear.

They quickly got over their fear and posed nicely by the bear.

Their favorite part of the Bass Pro Shop was this airplane that you saw as soon as you walked in the doors.

Overall the Bass Pro Shop was awesome.

Since we were starving our next stop was Chick-fil-a. This was a super special treat for hubby and me because we hadn't ate at a Chick-fil-a since we lived down south nearly 10 years ago.

Our kiddos loved it too. And do you see the lady in the white shirt and black skirt? She made this stop so sweet. She just doted on the kids. She said they were the best behaved kids she had ever seen and she gave them a whole bag of mints. She was such a nice lady.

After getting our tummies full we went to mall that was close by. I wanted to go to Forever 21 to buy a dress I had seen online BUT they were sold out of my size at this store. So we walked the entire bi-level  mall letting the kiddos spend their allotted amounts of money. It was really fun to actually shop in a REAL mall again.

Once we finished walking the mall we decided we would take the kiddos on a special out of state adventure. This was extra special for our youngest son because this was the Very first time he had ever been out of the state of Ohio!!!

Here you can see we were heading to Newport, Kentucky.

Crossing the Ohio River we were greeted by the Welcome to Kentucky sign.

We took the kiddos to Newport on the levy. We had been talking about the huge Barnes n Nobles store there and since my kiddos are all avid readers, we took them.

Here you can see them posing and cheezing in front of the window that overlooks the Ohio River and downtown Cincy.

At Barnes n Nobles I decided to buy the Fifty Shades Trilogy. I had heard tons about it and well wanted to read it. I also bought a street map of the greater Cincinnati area. The map came in very handy once we left Newport on the levy as the roads we needed to take were closed due to construction.

Here is my hubby and kiddos in front of the big, silver marlin in front of Mitchell's Fish Market.

To top off our family day, we surprised our kiddos with a visit to the Newport Aquarium. 

I won't bore you with tons of descriptions of the following pics. 

However I did want to say Sorry for the poor quality and that my youngest daughter took the majority of these pics.

 Seeing the sharks and petting the sharks was awesome.

The pic below is of Mighty Mike.

I giggled when I saw these frogs...They look like mudpies with eyes.

My kiddos 

They Newport Aquarium was AWESOME! Can you believe this was the very first time I had EVER been to an aquarium in my 32 years of life???

Oh and in the middle of walking through the aquarium a guy stopped us to take our picture.

Here is a fun family photo of us getting attacked by a huge shark. 

After we left the aquarium and getting ourselves a slushie we decided we would head back towards home. 

Once we got out of the Cincy traffic we saw an exit that had another store I wanted to go to.

When we lived in Jacksonville, Florida I loved shopping at target! It was my favorite store. I was super happy to be in one again.

As we browsed around the store I happened to notice that a point n shoot camera I wanted was on sale. I told hubby it was a great deal. He was looking at Kindle fires so I just left him there to look. He met up with me later with a target bag in his hand. I thought he had gotten a Kindle but he had gotten me this:

I couldn't believe it!!! I had been wanting a point and shoot to keep in my purse for a long time. You know, for those things you wanna capture to blog about. Now don't get me wrong I absolutely adore my Nikon D40 but it is too big and bulky to take everywhere. I wanted another Nikon because of the quality of the cameras and of the Nikor lenses. This one is perfect. I can't wait to experiment with it and show you the pics I come up with.

We got home around 10:30 last night. We were all worn out! We all went to bed by 11:30.

Thank you for checking out our family fun day!

Hugs

Erin

Yard Sales and Other Adventures

Hello again! 

It is hot, hot, hot here in Ohio.

Wanna see how hot?

That is just how hot it is here!!!

Weather bug on my laptop says the temps are 91 degrees.

Weather man says it's only gonna get hotter until Tuesday when a cool front rolls in with some storms.

*Sigh* 

I can't complain though! We are having absolutely glorious weather.

On top of that, my hubby's vacation started yesterday (Friday). 

He doesn't have to go back to work until June 1st!!!

Yay for family time.

Speaking of family time, my family LOVES to go to yard sales. I'm not really sure if it the curiosity of seeing other people's stuff or if it is the great deals that can be found. But over the past two very glorious and hot days we have been following yard sale signs and we have come home with some pretty good deals.

First, we have this wonderful hand crank ice cream maker. This is a very old ice cream maker. I had been pricing them online but the reviews for the newer ones were not very good. This ice cream maker I got for only $10. It has a plastic outer bucket. With an aluminum inner bucket.

This pictures shows the inside of the inner bucket. 

I bet my family is really gonna have a blast making their very own ice cream this summer. I know I can't wait.

Next we found this golf practicing net. We paid $3. My hubby and I dabble in the game of golf a bit so this is really gonna help us be able to practice in our own yard. (We just hope we don't hit OVER the net)

My darling son Sj loves all things puppet like and he has been wanting to get a nutcracker for a long time. So we found this little 8 inch tall nutcracker for $2. Sj loves that he can move this "King's" mouth with the little lever in the back.

We also found a brand new bike at a yard sale. This bike in stores ranged from $50 -$75. We paid only $25 for this bike for my oldest son Eddie. He desperately needed one since his was stolen off of our front porch last summer.

We did buy a few more things I haven't photographed. I found a tshirt and a nice skirt from a girl I knew. I think I paid $1 each for them. My oldest daughter bought an antique jewelry box for only $0.75 and she bought a wallet for $1. The wallet was a steal because my daughter found a $20 bill and some change in the wallet. However, we promptly returned that money to the seller who welcomed it back with tearful joy and the words of " You just don't know.....well thank you so much" with a sigh of relief. I am so proud of my daughter for not wanting to keep the money. It lets me know she is learning a few of the morals and values we are trying to get into her thick skull..:)

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My hubby brought home a surprise Thursday from his job. You see, he had been talking about a momma cat who had had kittens in a pallet at work. They brought the kittens under some shelter but the momma just wasn't a very good momma. All but two of these kittens died. Well his boss lady had been trying to find someone who would throw these poor little kittens in the trash compactor (yes horrible!) and on Thursday she had finally found someone. Well my hubby just happened to walk by as the guy was opening the compactor and rescued the kittens!

This little guy here is the sickest of the two. When he arrived here he was on death's door. He was so weak he couldn't walk around or eat. So we warmed up some cows milk and dropper fed him. Yesterday afternoon we finally got him to eat some canned cat food!!!!!! He has more pep now but is really scared. My daughter named him Doemo.

This little stinker is the 2nd kitten. She was better off than the first. She is solid black! She loves to play and cuddle. (She is laying right beside me on the couch right now)

Luckily, these kittens are fitting in with the others. Daisy is starting to let them suckle with her babies AND she is cleaning them and not hissing them away. She is a great mommy.

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The kiddos and I also went to the skate park on Thursday. While we were there we noticed some baseball games beginning so we decided to watch one. Luckily they knew some of the kids playing and I knew some of the parents who were there.

Here you can see my boys watching the game.

When we got home from the baseball game we were all famished so I started making dinner. My boys wanted to help.

Here you can see Eddie at the stove browning the hamburger meat and Sj at the sink stirring up some mashed potatoes.

Our dinner that evening was Sloppy Taters.

Want a recipe?

You will need:

1 1/2 - 2 lbs of hamburger meat

1 can of sloppy joe sauce

instant mashed potatoes (make enough for 6 servings or how ever much you need for your family)

milk

butter

parmesan cheese

shredded colby jack cheese

Directions:

Brown the hamburger meat and drain. Add sloppy joe sauce and heat through.

Prepare mashed potatoes with milk and butter as directed on the box.

On a plate put a spoonful or two of mashed potatoes in the center.

Top with a spoonful or two of sloppy joe mix.

Shake some parmesan cheese on top of the mix and then top it off with a handful of the colby jack cheese.

I serve this with sweet corn ( I always use fresh or frozen)

Well that is all for today my friends. I'm gonna go cool off somewhere! 

Warm hugs 

Erin