Happy Memorial Day!

We had a great Memorial Day with Ben home. We got lucky that the team was on the road so he actually got off a little early on Friday and we all enjoyed the long weekend together. I already posted what we did Friday & Saturday but yesterday we went to a local park. We attempted to ride the paddle boats but had to cut our 30 minute ride down to about 5 because Kiara kept wanting to get in the water and swim with the duckies. We did manage to get one picture before we called it quits. Notice she's sitting in the steering hole and not a real seat. For some reason she refused to sit on either of our laps and we knew it wasn't safe enough to let her sit by herself in the regular seat, especially since she wouldn't have anything to do with the lifejacket. This was our compromise and it worked for about 2 minutes! My mom made a comment this weekend that she hasn't seen a child this strong-willed in about 25 years! I'm sure she wasn't talking about me :)

After a much needed nap (for Kiara and Ben) we went back to the park and had a BBQ. Again Kiara's independence showed through when she insisted on eating her hot dog cold. I'm finally realizing that you've got to pick your battles and seeing as how it was already fully cooked we just let her go to town. She loved it and ate every last bite. What a wierdo! After dinner we had ice cream cones but Kiara's was in a cup. I am not exaggerating when I say she took 45 minutes to eat every drop of ice cream. In fact we had already left and were driving home when she finally put it down. Here are some pictures showing how much fun she was having eating her "icee" and how FILTHY she got in the process. Bathtime was definitely necessary last night!

Before we left Kiara found the "wa-wa" (water) and had to play in it. She loves water!