roller coaster

Jacob took this video while riding the Crazy Coaster with Ella. It's a little loud for the first 20 seconds, but after that it's fine.

Ella's Rollercoaster Ride from Heather Dahle on Vimeo.

We had our annual family outing to the county fair last night. This was the first time that the girls have been old enough to understand what it is and to look forward to it. So it was extra fun this year. The weather was perfect, and the girls were on their best behavior. We wandered the exhibits, and admired the animals, pet the goats, saw lots of friends and enjoyed the rides. We just had a few little glitches in our otherwise fantastic night.



Misfortune number 1:Picking the Goliath Slide for Sophie's first ride experience.

After the ride she promptly informed me in no uncertain terms that "it was too scary."

And apparently the adrenaline rush was too much for her bladder. Luckily, there was a port-a-potty with no line at the bottom of the slide.

Phew, accident successfully averted.

Misfortune Number 2: Thinking that the climbing/maze "ride" that parents aren't allowed on would be better for Sophie.

Sophie was excited at first, but lost her enthusiasm when she couldn't make it up the rope ladder. The ticket guy (I'll call him Ticket Guy for short) let me go up far enough to lift her over the rail to bypass that part of "ride."

She happily continued on, until the bridge.
She didn't like the bridge, so she tried the hands and knees approach.
No luck. Still too uncomfortable for her.

We got Ticket Guy to let Ella go up to help her. Ella did a great job coaxing her across the first bridge.
But then she saw the second bridge, and she was done.
She didn't want Ella's help.
She didn't want to go forward.
Or backward.

This guy in the picture (I'll call him Friendly Guy for short) tried to help her but she let him firmly know that he needed to keep his distance.
So he kept his distance.
And she just stood there.
There was no crying, or hysteria. No panicking.
She was just done.
So she stood there.
And Friendly Guy stood there.
We asked Ticket Guy if we could go up and get her, but he said no.
There were a few more minutes of Friendly Guy trying to help, and myself trying to negotiate with her over the noise, and Jacob taking pictures.
Ticket Guy still wouldn't let us up. He was a little annoyed that we sent Ella up again because he'd already let her up once.

At this point, everyone in the immediate vicinity had stopped to watch what was happening.

So Ticket Guy went up to get her.

Still no crying, but she looked a little annoyed that Ticket Guy ignored her protests, and just picked her up and carried her down.


After she came down she told us very matter-of-factly, "It's too scary, I don't like it."

Fortunately we were able to redeem Sophie's 2010 fair experience with the Merry-go-Round...

the dragon roller coaster...

...and the Ferris wheel.
Surprisingly, the Ferris wheel won the Sophie Double Ride Award, so height is apparently not the issue.



And the winner of the Ella Double Ride Award...

Misfortune #3: Not keeping track of how many rides we had left on our pass.
Just before we left, we thought it would be fun to do one last ride all together. We picked the bumper cars. The girls were in line, excited, and then we found out that we didn't have any rides left on our pass. Luckily, the disappointment didn't last too long...we distracted them with ice cream.

We left exhausted, but happy. And the best thing about the end of the night...it's only a ten minute drive home.

We are already looking forward to next year.

friday photos

Laundry day...

...should have been three days ago... (hey, there's that pink shoe we've been looking for)!

...and by the state of their faces I'd say it's also bath time.

Friday Photos

Have a great weekend!

Meet May

A little bit about May:
Her birthday is May 16th.
May is 10 years old.
Her favorite colors are pink and red.
Her favorite food: Grapes.
Her favorite song is "Rudolph the Red Nose Reindeer."
She's pretty quite. She mostly just sits on her stool and listens to Ella.

Night Owls.

Bed time is 8:00PM. We aren't super strict with it, but we usually get the girls in bed by 9:00PM. Then they read, play, do math, and tease each other for hours. Around 11:00 PM they start to wind down, and after several drinks of water, and a couple of complaints from Sophie "(Ella, stop reading so loud, I'm trying to sleep,)" they are usually both asleep by midnight.

This is Sophie's new "bed." She's outgrown the crib, but we don't have a real bed for her yet. Maybe we'll get bunk beds here soon. Her pillow has gone MIA, so she's claimed the red couch pillow.

Ella generally likes to pile all of the extra blankets in the house onto her bed "in case I get cold," even though our house rarely gets below 70 degrees.


at 9:30 AM the next morning...

...evidence of their adventures the night before...Sophie's in there...somewhere....

...and Ella's blankets always end up on the floor sometime in the middle of the night.


And that is why we signed up for afternoon kindergarten.