The 4-H Children's Gardens @ MSU

What a day. Mason and I met Grandma, Grandpa, Meme, and Dan in Holt for a wedding open house a few weeks ago. After we said our goodbyes to the bride and groom, we headed over to MSU for ice cream and a walk through the 4-H Children's Garden. It was a smoldering hot day, so the ice cream really hit the spot. Mason had mint chocolate chip and I had my usual, Buckeye Blitz. (The MSU Dairy Store has a flavor for every Big Ten team that they mix up for football season, but Buckeye Blitz is so yummy they stock it all year round. They also make a really mean Blue Moon.)

As we wandered through the main gardens, we stumbled upon several weddings and I was really worried about Mason making a scene. He behaved like a little gentleman (or at least went unnoticed) so we rewarded him by letting him splash around in one of the fountains. At the actual Children's Garden, Mason and Grandpa climbed into the treehouse for a birds-eye view of a passing train. Much to the delite of Grandpa, it wasn't the only train that passed by while we were in the area.

Auntie Meme got to test out her parental skills by snagging Mason right before he was headed for this pond. There are ceramic frogs out of the picture that shoot water back to the cement surround when you spin a turnstile. Mason rode around on the turnstile while Grandpa got the frogs to shoot the water. All was fun until Mason stopped spinning and tried to walk. He took a little tumble from being so dizzy, but got right back up again and headed for the next interesting thing.

As you can see, Mason had a really good time! And I had a peaceful drive home, which isn't always the case when I'm on my own. I had to pull over so I could get this picture, but it was worth it. He's holding on to his three favorite friends, "Doggie" the Pound Puppy, "Spunky" the monkey and "Gary" the Gorilla.

Independence Day

Independence has become the theme around our house lately, and I'm not talking about the 4th of July. Mason is truly developing a mind of his own, has his opinions on what he wants to do and when he wants to do them. The 'terrible twos' has taken hold, and frantic days like the 4th get him worked up more so than usual. That combined with the heat made for some trying moments for mommy and daddy this weekend, but we made it through and even got a few cute pictures out of it.

Mason playing with bubbles is always an adventure. He absolutely loves them, but doesn't get the concept of blowing quite yet. What you see here, is me catching him right after dumping out his entire bottle of bubbles on the deck steps. I'm sure Papa was none too pleased about this. "What? I'm just helping to clean the stairs Papa."

One of the more interesting moments of our weekend was when hot air balloons floated over our house from the Battle Creek Air Show. Mason and I were sitting in the living room and I kept hearing this strange noise, at first I thought it was an accelerating motorcycle off in the distance. But then it hit me - it's the balloons! Mason and I ran outside to the baseball field and watched as balloon after balloon flew over our house and across the park. He absolutely loves balloons and seems to find them everywhere we go. As we watched these go over, he kept exclaiming "BAWOON, BAWOON!!!"

We hope everyone else had a safe and wonderful 4th of July!

Happy Father's Day!

I've officially hit the blog wall as it took me almost a month to post about Father's Day. We had a lovely day, swinging over to visit with Adam's parent's at the lake. Three generations of Mattens men sure make a nice picture.

To me it's amazing to look at Mason and see a mini version of Adam. I asked Adam if he feels any differently when he looks at Mason, as if he's looking a younger version of himself. But he said no, he just sees our son. I can't even imagine how I'd feel to have someone walking around that looks just like me.

Did I mention before that we've noticed Mason is double-jointed? I came home one day from work and Mason was sitting in his high chair popping his pointer fingers in and out like Adam can do. Just another reminder of how very much the same they are.