Just the Four of Us

Last week we tagged along with Shandy while he took a class in the nearest big city. We stayed at our friends' home and ate their food and laughed a lot. Thanks Mike & Chele! It was so nice to get to see daddy every night and take a few little adventures as a family.

One morning while daddy was at school, we hung out with my brother and his fiance and their chinchillas. The mama chinchilla just had babies! It's not every day that we get to hold baby...well, I get to hold them. Lily was a little wary and Mason would've tried to eat them. They're super soft. Lily loved watching one take a dust bath :). Then we went for a drive with them and ended up at Lake Calhoun. We walked around and watched a ferry 'mowing' weeds from the bottom of the lake. Velly intellesting. Thanks for hanging out with us, Brad & Jen!

That evening we picked Shandy up from school and went to the zoo with just the four of us. We realized that it's pretty rare for us to do something like that with our little family. If we go out to eat or to a special event, we generally either leave the kids (as in a date) or are with some extended family or friends. Both are good experiences, but we really enjoyed our evening out together.

First stop, the monkeys at Lily's request. She was a little disappointed that they weren't wearing tshirts this year, but we laughed at them anyway.

My three favorite people...and yes, I could take pictures like this all the livelong day.

A family picture! Mason was totally more interested in the giraffes :)

Lily checking out Sparky the Seal. No show for us that night, but we survived!

I think Mason looks a little more like his daddy without his helmet. Of course, he looks like my brothers. And my dad. And grandpa Floyd. And Micah. Apparently, the kid looks like everyone.

We all rode the train together. We spent almost the entire two times around the track trying to get pictures of each other. Good times :).

And my favorite picture of the trip:

Do you know how hard it is to get a picture like this with a point-and-shoot camera? Very hard. But it's my favorite. And this evening was my favorite. I [heart] my family.