The NC Zoo- June.

On Sunday, we decided to head to the zoo.

Mama finally gave up hope that we'd see any animals, and we had a good time enjoying all the other things the zoo had to offer. We played on the playground.

And slid down a really steep slide. I got nervous and Papa had to come up and flip me over on my belly because I refused to go down.

Henry had a good time climbing the web.

I tried to follow the big kids through this "vine."

To Aunt Jenni, we know what you're going to say about these pants. They fit last spring as pants, and now mama loves them as short leggings. I know they look ridiculous and I think that's why mama makes me wear them.

Mama loves this picture. And she loves this dress too. She lovingly refers to it as the "Nora dress" in homage to our friend Nora who wore a similar dress for weeks straight.

We did see a few animals. The bears were out and moving around. Henry wanted to see the lions, so we made the two mile walk to the African side of the zoo, where he spent a good 15 seconds looking at them before he took off.

But he did have fun climbing things.

Including papa. Nice glasses buster.

Mama tried for a good shot on this elephant.

But I took off, so she got one of me instead.

Henry ran the the course of the life size board game.

We rode the helicopter until Henry refused to get out and give the other kids a turn. Mama and papa knew this meant that Henry hit the wall after two nights of staying up well past 10 pm and two days of no naps. So they headed straight to the tram stop to take us back to the other end of the zoo. Henry took a good nap in the car. We had a great weekend, but we're glad to be back home now.

Dixie Classic Fair- Henry.

We said that we came back to the Triad to see the Goldbergs, but we really came back for the opening weekend of the Dixie Classic Fair.

Mama wants to trade me for Gracie. While I always refuse to pose for a picture, Gracie loves to have her picture taken.

Junie and Audrey were so happy to see each other. June gave Audrey a big tickle.

We stopped for some snacks and snapped a picture of Gracie's cat face paint.

We don't know why, but Juner decided to take a break between the trash cans.

Papa let me pick one ride and I chose the train. Mama was happy a chose a ride that remained earth bound. There were some very scary looking semi trainer rides.

Juner was mad she didn't get to go on the ride, but mama wasn't shelling out another $3.

I love trains!

Always ready for a deal, mama got us two candy apples for $3. I picked blue for Gracie and I.

Little did we know, it was like eating an apple dipped in a lollipop. We licked them for a while until mama bit through the hard candy shell so we could get to the apple. We each only made it through a quarter of the apple before we gave up.

We hit up the animal barns and Audrey was so happy to pet the bunny.

Then mama made us go through the produce barn. They had contests for the best decorated gourds, pumpkins, apples, and potatoes.

We reveled in the award winning bales of hay and tobacco leaves.

Mama liked the "Best Matched" category where you tried to find two identical pieces of produce, but the rest of us were drawn to the giant muskmelons and pumpkins.

This one is the new NC record holder. 1,258 pounds.

We had to stop by the fountain.

Why did we pay money to ride carny rides when all we needed was to play in this fountain for 20 minutes?

When issued a dare to put our heads in the water, you know Grace was the one who did it.

Lucky Miss Becky was out of town this weekend! We probably would have gotten into trouble!

Once Gracie got it, Juner had to give it a try too, but she finally had to be taken away because she kept putting acorns in.

Audrey was "baptised" into her first fair. Just kidding, we didn't really dip her in.

Before we left, papa picked up a deep fried snickers bad. It's like someone stuffed a pancake with a molten candy bar and put it on a stick. Pure heaven. We enjoyed some great sausages and chicken wraps. but mama was really upset when she saw what she really wanted- a barbecue sundae. Here's what it had- bottom layer of backed beans, second layer of cole slaw and the top layer was delicious Lexington style barbecue. Too bad we already ate. Then she was double disappointed when she saw the same booth sold deep fried butter. We're not sure how it worked, but loved the sign that said, "Set your heart a flutter, come try our deepr fried butter." Were they talking about how good it was, or the instant heart attack served on a stick? Next year, we promise.

Pumpkin Fest- June.

On Saturday morning, we headed to Winston to meet up with Gracie and Audrey. First on our agenda was a trip to the "Pumpkin Church," a church that fills its front yard up with thousands of pumpkins to sell and hold a mini festival each October.

They had some great activities this year. Grace and Henry picked out pumpkins to paint.

It took hours for Henry's pumpkin to dry. Luckily we got it in the van without any paint smearing.

This isn't quite what mama wanted when she asked for a nice picture by the pumpkins.

This is the closest we got to a good picture. My sunglasses are on because I cried the whole time.

Audge got her face painted to look like a kitty and was pretty cute.

Another awesome craft they had was decorating foam picture frames with stickers and glue. There was even a guy there with a printer who printed out a picture for your frame straight from our memory card! This was the shot that we picked for our frames.

Mish mash- Henry.

On Friday morning, it was my turn to take snacks to school. Mama made banana muffins for my whole class. (She impressed everyone by making 2 loaves of bread, 12 regular muffins and 72 mini muffins.) The best part of taking in snacks is that I got to be line-leader for the whole day. I got to take my class to the library, back to my classroom and outside after school. It was the best!

June and I snuggled up on the chair to watch a little Dinosaur Train. Guess what it's about? Best. Show. Ever.

Thursday night was pancake night. Mama didn't want me to help this week because I was coughing every 1.2 seconds. So she whipped up this German Apple Puff Pancake. We all agreed that the presentation was spectacular, but I requested "Please no more oven pancakes."

On Friday night, we drove up to Greensboro because mama and papa's college friends were down visiting from Rhode Island. We all squeezed into Mister Paul and Miss Susan's tiny little apartment for the night. Mama says the best part about having kids is that you get first dis on the bedroom and are the only one who doesn't have to sleep on an air mattress! Mister Paul actually thought that I'd be sleeping in the bed until mama and papa quickly told everyone I'd be sleeping on the floor in my sleeping bag.

Three wild and crazy guys. We were so happy to see Mister Zac and Miss Liz and can't wait til all four "601 guys" are reunited at our house in 4 weeks for their manly backwoods camping weekend.