Everyone Arrived...

Late Wednesday night, August 6th, Lillibug, Grandma and Grandpa Lowe got here. Baylee was already asleep. I kept her up as late as we could handle but she didn't quite make it until they got in from the airport. Thursday morning, Lilli and Baylee were SO excited to see each other. Baylee went straight to Lilli. She even tried to get Lilli to pick her up. That would have been a disaster had Lilli actually known what Baylee was trying to make happen. Sometimes being in the dark is a good thing. This was one of them.

Lilli of course was thrilled to see the kitty as well. And has nonstop been determined to carry the kitty, in other words, make her mad. Just last night, we had to have a don't touch the kitty at all night.

We were all so excited for everyone to come. We celebrated Baylee's birthday on Thursday and decided to just do it with family. She turned one on the 4th but we waited for the festivities to take place after everyone got here. She does love so much to tear paper, just not when she's supposed to. It was a time trying to get her to open her presents. She just wanted to carry boxes around in typical Baylee fashion. And she was scared of her candle so Lilli and Grandma blew it out for her. It took her a minute to warm up to the cupcake and icing, but only a minute. She tried to pull out her ponytail with icing hands, that made some great hair gel!

Lilli was also helpful in opening Baylee's presents and it was almost as hard to keep her from opening them as it was to get Baylee to open them. Eventually we gave in and let her assist. Baylee got a lot of really cute things!

Lilli helped me with dinner. If it was left to Chef Lilli, we would have been eating red colored, chicken and cinnamon flavored beef stroganoff (it turned out salty thanks to my carelessness, but at least not chicken flavored).

Friday, we went on an adventure to the Abraham Lincoln museum and Presidential Library. We had a 2 hour drive each way to Springfield. The drive was well worth it. The museum was very very cool. As expected pictures were not allowed in most of it. I did grab one of my favorite part, the dresses. They are so pretty and they were real from way back when. There was so much to read and learn. It was probably one of the best museums I have ever been to. They had the real looking mannequins. A few of them looked so real they were creepy.

There were rooms set up the way they would have been back then with the mannequins and displayed in a scene. They had some from the house, meetings, they had one of the theatre. They had one set up the way they did when his casket was displayed and had the flowers all over with the banners and flags and ribbons, it was a large room, it actually made me sad. It was a fabulous museum. Considering the fact that I think Lincoln was one of, if not the greatest president this country has had, it was phenomenal to be able to go. If you are ever in the area I would definitely suggest it. By the end, the ladies were a little worn out.

We did go to the library, I had no idea it was actually just a research library. So we stayed in there for about 10 minutes reading some displays and then headed over to the tomb. We got a little history about the actual vaults and how long it took to build and how many times he was transferred from a worker and then got to go inside and see where he is buried(he's 10 feet down under tons of concrete).

We walked around a bit outside. Lilli and Dad went down the "big hill" upon Lilli's request. One of the temporary tombs was at the bottom of the hill. The rest of us stayed at the top with Baylee where she walked around and picked up and passed out sticks to passersby. She gave quite a few people sticks and laughs.

Grandpa Lowe's cousins came into town from Wisconsin on Saturday. David and Judy got here in the afternoon. We took them fishing with us. Lilli was by far the best fisherman out there that day catching 7 bluegill. We had so much fun watching and helping her. We would tell her to "REEL, REEL, REEL", She would respond with "ROW, ROW, ROW". She enjoyed holding the fish by their tails and throwing them back in the water. But she was scared of her big catch.

We had a great time with David and Judy. They hung out with us on Saturday and then part of Sunday until they had to head home. They were kind enough to take us to lunch on Sunday, we went next door to the Mexican restaraunt where Grandpa Lowe tried some pretty spicy hot sauce. Afterwards, we all regretted not having taken the video camera or at least a camera. His face was worth a million words at that point.

It was the first time I got the opportunity to meet David and Judy. They are great people and I enjoyed the time they were here. I learned a lot and got to hear a few stories.

I need to take a break from the blog for a while. The ladies will be up soon. Have no fear, more pictures to come soon!