Day at the Zoo

Today Amanda and I decided to take Benjamin to the Oregon Zoo!  Amanda loves zoos and we thought Benjamin might enjoy a day with the animals.  So early this morning we packed up and hit the road to Portland.  It was a bit chilly when we arrived but was perfect weather (70 degrees in the morning) for the strolls through the exhibits.

All ready to go see the animals!!

First, I have to ride the tractor

I love this next sequence of pictures.  Benjamin kept wanting to give Aunt Amanda nice slobbery kisses on her face instead of look at the camera.  It was gross but so cute :-)

All that kissing tuckered him out and he took about a 40 minute nap while we ate our sack lunch

Me and little man

Auntie and Benjamin

ROOOOAAARRRRR!!!!

It was a perfect day to spend 4 hours exploring the zoo!

Of course, all that walking on the lovely Portland hills made us feel like we deserved The Cheesecake Factory :-)  So off we went.

When, oh when, will mama let me pick something off this menu??

the waitress did bring me mashed bananas so mama gave me a few bites

it was a little different tasting than my rice cereal., but in true Klingler fashion he inhaled all I gave him!

He hasn't quite figured out how to use it yet, but it makes a great distraction!

He was sooo tired after his long day.  He fell asleep the instant I put him in his car seat and slept the entire ride home.  Poor tuckered out little guy.

It was a great day that we all enjoyed!

Date Night!!

My sister, known these days as Auntie Amanda, is awesome and babysat for us tonight so we could go on a date.  We haven't been on a date since our little guy was born almost 6 months ago.  I was pretty excited :-)  Though I must say it was SO WEIRD being the ones going on the date instead of the ones babysitting for the date.  It'll take a little getting used to that's for sure.

We started out by heading to Novaks, a Hungarian restaurant in Albany.  We had a gift certificate we'd been wanting to use so it was a perfect opportunity.  We enjoyed fresh bread, chicken and dumpling soup, salad with blue cheese dressing and our delicious entrees.  Peter had chicken paprikas and I had linguine primavera.

Sooo yummy :-)

After dinner we headed to Corvallis for a game of mini-golf.  On the way we were reminiscing about playing mini-golf together on the day Peter proposed.  We were laughing at how the near 98 degree weather that day nearly spoiled Peter's proposal day plans which involved mini-golf outside at 2 in the afternoon, driving 1 1/2 hours in his tiny car with no air conditioning and then hiking up a mountain to enjoy a proposal dinner together (after he proposed on the mountain).  It was fun to remember those memories!

I sure love this guy!

The best part about the mini-golf was our bet.  If I won, I got a backrub.  If Peter won, he got to give me a backrub.  HA!  Peter won by 1 stroke....lucky him.....guess he gets to give me a backrub :-)

After we finished mini-golf we headed to the Carmike Theater to see....

It was pretty cute!  I've heard it's a bit emotional for moms and I could kind of see that because you see the little boy, Andy, all grown up and moving away.  It was a bit sad to think of how fast Benjamin is growing up already.  I love it, but just want to freeze time to remember the sweet moments we have.  It was a really funny movie though and was fun to watch with Peter.  I was very ready to get home to my little man :-)

We will see what time Benjamin gets up in the morning.  He apparently fell asleep on the couch at 6pm after swimming with Aunt Amanda in his little pool, and he slept until 8:30.  Then he ate and fell asleep at 9pm again and is still sleeping.  This was after napping from 12:45 to 2:00 and from 3:45 to 4:30.  I have a feeling my little booger is going to be wide awake at 5am.  Great.  It's a good thing he's cute and that I love him so much.  I sure missed him on our date but enjoyed being with his daddy.....thanks Amanda, you're awesome.

What We've Been Up To

Busy.  Busy.  Busy.

That's the biggest reason why I haven't blogged in over a week.  It's been tons of fun though!

Here's a rundown of our last week and 1/2 with lots of pictures.

Saturday:  We got up early (since Benjamin slept terrible) and headed to the Brownsville Citywide Garage Sales.  We didn't get too much but found a few fun deals.  The afternoon was spent running errands, cleaning out some junk and enjoying a family walk.

The cute view I get while we walk :-)

Saturday we also started SOLIDS!  He's been more than ready to start them so I finally gave in and took the plunge into it all.  He was a little curious at first but really seemed to like them!

 I'm pretty sure he liked his food!

Sunday:  Sunday we went to church which was particularly good.  In the afternoon we babysat our friends little boy, Gavriel, who is 2 1/2 months younger than Benjamin.  They enjoyed each other and we all had a good time.  After he left, Peter went to Albany to pick up a new mattress for our guest bedroom (will be Benjamin's room eventually) and I packed for my trip to Idaho.  It was a long but good day.

 

Monday:  Benjamin and I left at 5am to head for Idaho.  I hadn't got much sleep so the drive was a little long but Benjamin did really well on the 7 1/2 hour drive.  When we arrived we spent a couple of hours relaxing before we took off to Couer d'Alene for a mini-vacation with Aunt Amanda and Grandma.  We had dinner with one of Amanda's old friends and shopped a bit.  We stayed in a hotel in Spokane, so fun!

 

Aunt Amanda bought Benjamin a mini basketball which he loves!

Loving his solids even more!

Tuesday:  We shopped around a little bit at some fun stores in Spokane.  We came back to the hotel in the early afternoon and decided to take Benjamin swimming.  He LOVED it.  He kicks and kicks.  He came back and got a bath in his new tub from Grandma and then we hit the buffet right next to the hotel.  Yum!

Why are bum cracks so funny?

Showing off my moves for Aunt Amanda

Cute little guy in his baby boat!

He splashed and splashed in his new travel tub

Wednesday:  We ran to a few more stores before heading back to Moscow.  We stopped to hang out with Alan and Alexander then headed home for Benjamin to spend the evening with Uncle Aaron, Aunt Hannah and Grandfather.  It was fun just talking and catching up with everyone. 

Thursday:  Benjamin woke up early....happy, but early.  So Amanda and I finished packing up, said goodbye to everyone and headed off back to Oregon before 8am.  The drive went pretty well, though for the last hour Benjamin definitely wanted to be out of his car seat and I didn't blame him, I was ready to be home too.  We stopped by Daddy's work first though so he could see the little guy he'd missed so much the past couple of days.  It was adorable to see Benjamin react to having Daddy back, he was so excited.

Friday:  Amanda, Benjamin and I went garage saling in the morning then came home to get things ready for the Willamette Celebration concert in the park that evening.  We took off about 3:30pm to enjoy the festivities.  It was an absolutely gorgeous day!  It's been warm and sunny here for almost 2-3 weeks now, love it!

Benjamin was sleeping during the face painting but was still so cute!

They had a motocross demonstration and some of the tricks were awesome!

We packed a picnic dinner then got ready for the concerts to start!

 

 To say that Benjamin likes having Auntie Amanda around is an understatement!

Benjamin actually took a nap while SuperChick performed.....guess he was as impressed as his daddy with their music, ha!

SuperChick

Rapper Benjamin....who was "straight out Lacomb" as he said.  He was terrible but fun to laugh at.

He woke up and danced for the Newsboys though.  They were awesome!!  And it was all free :-)

 

 Newsboys!

We left before Skillet performed because it was almost 9pm.  We headed home to get Benjamin to bed and we finished packing for our trip to Seattle!  Another long but awesome day.

Saturday:  We took off about 7:30am for Seattle.  Our cousin Allison put together a bit of a family reunion to get all the grandkids together for our Grandmother.  We hadn't seen some of the family members in years so it was nice to see everyone.  We had a BBQ, the kids swam, and we all caught up with each other.

Benjamin with the host, cousin Allison

She also spoiled him with a "Christmas in July" gift of a new musical puppy which he adores.

My brother Adam who conked out on the couch after lunch was "decorated" by the rest of us!

Allison bought Benjamin his own little pool which he loved!  It was another gorgeous day.

Cousins - Anika, Alena, and Maceio

 

 Uncle Eric, Aunt Beth, Cousin Sarah and Megan, Uncle John

Benjamin snuggling up to the reason for the party, Grandmother

Uncle John, Aunt Michelle, Allison and Ryan (whose wife is due in January!)

Cousins!  Me, Allison and Amanda

Benjamin and Maceio loved playing with each other!

Maceio kept saying "he's just the cutest baby", "can he sleep in my room?"  "when can we have a playdate?"  It was adorable

Our family with Grandmother

Benjamin definitely didn't nap while all the cousins wanted to entertain him, ha!

The whole group!  It was a really nice time.

 

We left the reunion about 4:30 and headed down to the waterfront to enjoy all the tourist stuff Seattle has to offer.  It was just such a beautiful evening.

At Pike Place Market

Benjamin was given free flowers by the ladies!

I think he enjoyed people watching as much as we did down at the waterfront

Of course we went to the arcade and played the candy machine game for Grandfather.  Benjamin liked "playing" all the games....when they're this little you don't even need to put in a quarter!

We came back that evening and Scott (Allison's boyfriend) and Adam cooked us up some BBQ chicken, corn on the cob, salad and sourdough bread (from the waterfront)  It was delicious and a nice cap to the fun day.

 

Sunday:  We woke up, ate breakfast and packed up.  We headed to the West Seattle Branch of Mars Hill Church for their service.  The message was great though the music was a bit odd.  Afterward we went and got a coffee then headed downtown for a Seattle Mariners game.  It was another gorgeous day and we were excited to watch them play against the Red Sox.

I kinda think these two like each other!

 

 waiting for Daddy to get our tickets from "will call"  We had great seats in Left Field

So fun to go to games!

Take me out to the ballgame, take me out to the crowd.....

Go Mariners!!!

How cute is he?  Aunt Amanda had bought him a Mariners t-shirt awhile back and found a Mariners baseball cap at our garage sales on Friday.  Everyone couldn't stand how adorable he was (I'm not a biased mama at all!)

Rockin' his shades (yes, again from Aunt Amanda!)

view from the top of the stadium

such a cool city to visit

so glad my sis has come to visit!

family shot at the game

dancing with my Auntie

couple of cuties!  (Benjamin even made it on tv....the cameraman came over specifically to film him.  Hilarious!)

 

It was a beautiful day (though a bit hot in the bleachers) and we rallied in the bottom of the 8th inning to overtake the Red Sox and pull out the victory.  What a great day :-)

We headed home after the game (and a quick stop at DQ) and got home around 10:15.  We all crashed and slept well that night.

Monday:  We were finally back home!  We had a bit of a low key day and just went grocery shopping in the afternoon.  We also received a free high chair from a friend.  It was filthy though and needed a great cleaning so Amanda and I tackled that before dinner and 1 hour later we had an awesome highchair that looked brand new and didn't cost us a thing!!!  Benjamin liked sitting in it for his dinner later that night.

Loving the new highchair

He is MORE than getting the hang of these solids!

Tuesday:  We all slept good again last night and played with the little guy this morning.  After his morning nap we went for a walk to get a soda at McDonalds.  It's another gorgeous day.  Benjamin just woke up from his afternoon nap and might go swimming here shortly.  Aunt Amanda is AWESOME and is giving Peter and I a date night tonight.  I'm super excited.  This will be our first date night since Benjamin was born.  I'm a little nervous.  Not about whether Aunt Amanda can take care of him but whether he'll ever want his mama again after being with his fun Aunt! :-)  I'll post more on our date later this week.  Off to play with little man and wait for my wonderful hubby to come home.  Tomorrow is probably going to involve a trip to the Oregon Zoo....should be a FUN but BUSY week.

Okay, finally caught up.....for now!