new adventures

Last week we celebrated Grandma's birthday with Chinese food and the circus! It was actually (according to my poor memory) my first time as well as the first time for the girls and we had a great time! Butterfly was so excited to hold her tickets and she loved the fancy make up of the ticket taking ladies (who happened to be the high fliers as well). We arrived just before it started so our seats were on the far side but we still got to see the amazing show. AngelBaby slept in her carseat through most of the first act while the big girls sat on Grandma and Daddy's lap, taking it all it. Their faces lit up when the tigers came out and they also especially loved when the girls in their fancy leotards climbed the ropes and twirled and posed and spun high above the ground. At intermission, the floor was opened up and tickets were sold for the kids to ride the ponies and elephants but upon hearing the outrageous price, we decided on cotton candy instead. Ladybug was getting wiggly by then and Daddy patient held onto her and tried to keep her from climbing over the seats during the second act. (Eventually she grew tired and almost fell asleep on him) But Butterfly continued to watch with such excitement, squealing and clapping and taking it in with big eyes.

We also went to the Treehouse Museum for the first time and fell in love with this ingenious place. We met Grammy plus two aunties and cousins for a lunch date at McDonald's and then took Grammy and one of the aunties and her baby with us to the Treehouse Museum. It was fascinating, targeted perfectly for their age with the incredible displays and a huge variety of things to do. It was all imagination and learning based with plenty of places to dress up and pretend, to create stories, to play instruments, role play in a hospital, school, old west town, a barn, a fire engine as well as a whole area that contained "just their size" houses from different countries, complete with furniture, decor, books and pretend food. We even attended a show in the theater, "Blanca Flor", a Mexican fairy tale (similar to Snow White) and our little Butterfly was chosen to help act it out! (I'm so excited, her first on stage experience!) In this version of the story, there are no dwarfs but there are seven robbers who protect the princess when she's lost in the forest and little Butterfly was one of them! She paraded around excitedly, not really knowing what she was supposed to do but followed her fellow bandits with joy and excitement shining on her face. (meanwhile, Ladybug sat on the floor watching Toy Story on my phone since she had lost interest rather quickly)