Mornings With the Trio

It should be assumed that the trio and I go somewhere every morning. We typically go to the museum and library once a week, and different parks the other three days. Here are some random photos of our adventures from the past two weeks:

The temperature was fairly warm on this particular morning, but the wind caused Maddie and Amelia to add layers. Looking at the three of them standing there was another reminder of how different they are from one another. 

The past few outings at Discovery Place (Kids and uptown) have been significantly less crowded than other times.  The photos below are from both museums on different occasions.

While Maddie consistently takes the most pleasure from library story time, Amelia has been an active participant lately. The girls happily complete the hand motions and songs.

Maddie immediately recognized the mouse from If You Give a Mouse a Cookie series. She began feeding the mouse pretend cookies.

James looks less interested, but he is listening the whole time. During story time, he's hiding behind furniture or attached to my lap. After we leave the library James will start singing some of the songs or talking about a story. 

James and Amelia have been climbing greater heights and shown so much more physical strength over the past two weeks. Amelia climbed to the top of this slide and slid down by herself multiple times.

Maddie wasn't feeling as brave, but she was eager to slide in the comfort of my lap.

Other than slides and swings, the preferred park activity is to pretend to feed one another. The trio have full conversations about serving ice cream and pizza, asking for money, etc.

Amelia has always been naturally athletic, though James' physical strength is surpassing hers. James has been shimmying up ladders of surprising heights. Their agility makes me nervous and excited at the same time.  

In addition to parks, museums, and libraries, we've also visited the nature center. We all enjoy watching the active snakes and turtles.

Of course, we also take advantage of duck food with any opportunities to get closer to water foul.

Another favorite play area is the mall, though I only go on rainy days. The outlet mall right by our house has a Bass Pro Shop and Lego store, so we visit the aquarium, build, and play in the play area.

We stay busy, but we're always home by noon so we can have an hour for lunch and down time before we pick up Jackson. Most mornings I'm on autopilot, but there are moments every day where I stop and think about how lucky I am to have these mornings with the trio.