Can you fit a zoo in your shoe?

Sounds like the title of a Dr. Suess book, No?

"Lucy Lillian Tabitha Choo can fit the whole zoo inside of her shoe!"

....What? That's not a Dr. Suess?

Our trip to York's Wild Kingdom

On July 31st Dan drove a church bus down to York's Wild Kingdom in York Beach Maine. This was a family activity for our church. We had a good group and it was nice. There is a small zoo there and some carnival-type rides. I didn't really take very many pictures of this activity because my parents had just left the week before and we were going to leave on vacation the following Monday after this activity. Thought I'd share.

Make a Smilebox slideshow

Caleb - the future groomer?

Another lesson on why you never leave the room when a three-year-old has a pair of safety scissors:

Grandpa Fields was here for five minutes

Let's see... Where do I begin? Let's start at the very beginning, a very good place to start. I haven't given a decent update since July fourth. I have a ton to write and this will probably take me several posts.



Dan took the youth group to youth conference at First Baptist church in Hammond Indiana the third week of July. He was gone for almost a whole week and I missed him allot. I did much better with him being gone this year than I did last year. Last summer I was big and pregnant and extremely emotional. I started bawling right at the church in front of everyone when I told him goodbye. Ugh! This year I did ok. I wasn't nearly as weepy due to no pregnancy hormones and I also had made lots of plans for the week so I wouldn't sit around and feel sorry for myself.


The youth group had a great conference this year. I always love seeing the teens after youth conference because they seem to be so excited for the things of God and they seem to grow so much. I hope to be able to go with them sometime.


Dan got home Saturday evening then we had a very busy Sunday. My parents and younger sister and brother arrived that Monday evening. I was so excited to see them! I hadn't seen them since Thanksgiving. Jocelyn was only seven weeks old at that time. They were here for four days and we had so much fun.


On Tuesday my mom, my sister, and the kids and I went to the mall while my dad, my brother and Dan went golfing. Caleb was surprisingly pretty good during our trip. He has been kind of difficult lately, but he did ok that day, especially since we were there for almost four hours. Here are some pics of the kids on the quarter rides in the middle of the mall. This was Jocey's first time on a ride and she loved it!




A pretty scary thing did happen while we were at the mall. We went to the Chinese restaurant for lunch and I gave Jocelyn a fortune cookie still in the wrapper to play with while I was ordering because she was getting antsy. I looked down at her after I had given my order and realized she was choking. So I yanked her out of her stroller and felt around in her mouth. I didn't feel anything and she was still not breathing, so I started to pat her on the back. She still was not breathing. So I started beating her on the back. By this time I was panicking and so was everyone else in the store. Jocelyn let out a scream for a second and then the cookie became lodged again. So I started beating her on the back again and my mom started pushing on her tummy. Finally, Jocelyn threw up on the floor. I have never in my life been so happy to see throw up as I was at that moment. She then started screaming and breathing normally again.


I guess she had bit a hole into the wrapper and got a big piece of fortune cookie stuck in her throat. I felt like an idiot for giving it to her. I should have known she would have bitten through it. After words I realized how panicked I really was . While I was desperately trying to get her to breathe, Mom asked me where the hospital was and in my mind I was trying to think of which store in the mall was the hospital. LOL

On Wednesday we went swimming at a nearby lake. It was a very cloudy day and it did rain lightly a few times during the day, so we had the entire beach to ourselves. I had allot of fun. It was just very nice and relaxing even though it wasn't very warm.

There is a slide at the lake. You can barely see my dad's, sister's, and brother's heads.

Jocelyn hanging out with uncle Nate
Caleb swimming, I mean, playing with rocks -- because he can't do that at home.LOL
Thought this was just cute.
Caleb borrowed my sister's hat on the way home and fell fast asleep.

On Thursday we had planned to take a Windjammer sail to an island and enjoy a lobster bake. We got down to the dock in Portland in plenty of time, but there was a huge storm coming, so the captain of the sail boat cancelled the sail. We were very disappointed since we had been looking forward to this for several months. But they were able to re-schedule the sail for Friday. So we walked around the waterfront for a little while then went to the Lobster Shack for lunch.

Caleb and Dan looking at the boats

Nathan made a friend in Portland.

Jenelle, Nathan and Caleb looking at the waves at the shore near the Lobtser Shack.

Jenelle was just a little chilly.
Me and my little man. My cute sister!

Friday turned out to be beautiful! The sail boat ride was so nice (even though by this time Caleb was tired of all of the excitement and it seemed like he had determined to be as difficult as possible.) It took us an hour to sail out to the island. If you have never ridden on a sail boat, I highly recommend that you do if you get a chance. It was just so fun. The ride was very smooth. I was very worried about getting sea sick since the last time I was on the ocean for a whale watch that is what happened. But we just seemed to glide through the water on the windjammer.

Our sails.

UsOur captain.

No, really, they're just thrilled.

The boat took us to Cow Island. It was very nice there. It was not too hot and I didn't see any mosquitoes. A tour guide gave us a tour of the island. This did not excite Caleb in the least bit since he was just ready to run. The stopping and walking drove Caleb nuts and I'm pretty sure I didn't hear much of anything that the tour guide was saying. I did, however catch that the owner of the island is all green. They use organic gardens, recycle the trash into compost and believe in leaving the island in the same condition as it was found as much as possible. I'm sure that the island owner would not have appreciated the bouquet Caleb picked for me.

Oops!

The food for the lobster bake was just delicious! I will admit I'm not very fond of lobster, but there were tons of other yummy things to eat too. Plus, they had hot dogs and hamburgers for the kids. Here are some pics of us enjoying the food.

This is our sailboat docked at the island.

And the family on the boat.

Right after we returned to shore, my parents headed back home. When they told Caleb that they were going back home, he started bawling. He looked at me and said, "Mommy, this is too, too sad!" Poor little guy!

All in all we had a good visit and I am glad that my family was able to make it out.

Many updates to come...

As you may have guessed, I have been incredibly busy these past few weeks. I have tons of pictures to prove it too. You will probably be tired of my blog by the time I am finished updating because of all of the pictures! But for now you will have to just wait because I am going to bed. Good night!