A long, long time ago...

I wish I had some great excuse for why it's taken me so long to blog about my parents' visit a couple of weeks ago, like I was training for a marathon, or I lost all of my fingers in a freak manicuring accident at the nail salon, or maybe thousands of toads poured out of the sky and crashed into the cable lines, disabling my internet for two weeks...Truth is, I took about a thousand pictures when my folks were here, and Blogger only lets you upload five photos at a time, and each upload takes five minutes, times two when the Autosave feature fails and your browser unexpectedly quits and the pictures that you've spent days uploading disappear into oblivion and you have to upload them again, and...well, you do the math.

That said, I will let the pictures tell most of the story about what we did when my folks were here because a) it would take me another two weeks to create a detailed account of our busy weekend two weeks after the fact and b) it's the least they can do since I spent so much time uploading them.

Due to some scheduling conflicts, my mom and dad were arriving on different days and leaving on different days. So my dad got here on Saturday morning, and since Tim had to go in to work, Alex and I picked Dad up from the airport, hung out at the house, ran some errands, toured Timothy's office, and went out for dinner.

Mom got here Sunday afternoon, and we went to the park to play while Tim got some work done. Poor Ol' Granny B threw her back out, so she had to leave the heavy lifting to Grampa. She did a great job of providing moral support, however.

The nice thing about having someone watch your kid at the park is that you get to play, too. I actually impressed myself by making it from one rung to the other. No, I'm not kidding, I really was impressed.

Of course, leave it to my old man to upstage me.

Watching us swing around made Alex thirsty (and yes, I know my dark three inch roots look thirsty for some bleach, too, but I want fresh highlights for Leah's wedding in January).

And apparently all of the swinging around made Grampa sleepy.

After naptime, A was refreshed and had a good time being silly with B.

During dinner, he continued to ham it up. Recently, out of the blue, he started doing this thing where he balls up his fists and tenses up his whole body to the point where it shakes. The really funny part is that Oliver started doing the same thing when he was about Alex's age, which the Primms called "getting psyched". Alex started doing it on his own, with no prompting from us, like it's just something boys that age do. He thinks it's funny, I guess, and he claps for himself whenever he's done performing for us.



Before bedtime, Alex decided that I wasn't the only one who got to take the pictures. Of course, he's not the one who has to upload them.

Alex makes a much better model than a photog.

Before bed, Granny B told Alex some secrets, which frankly, makes me very nervous. My mom has been known to convince children to plot against their parents, encouraging such things as putting garlic powder on their toothbrushes and filling their vehicles with packing peanuts. So far, nothing like that has happened, but when it does, I'll know who to blame.

On Monday, we hung around the house and took advantage of the gorgeous weather by playing out in the yard.

Dad is the gourmet chef in the family, so he spent the day slaving away in the kitchen, preparing to make homemade lasagna. In my house, if you are going to cook, you have to wear an apron. I think this one pretty much says it all.

It's true, she...I mean he really can cook. The lasagna was delicious, and we ate leftovers for a week.

Before Grampa's flight left on Tuesday, we played in the backyard again. Alex ran around doing boy stuff, and we broke out Timothy's remote-controlled car, which Alex loves and, of course, Murphy hates.

Grampa and Alex played hide-and-go-seek around the tree...

...and then they played in the tree.

They played on the swing...

...and we spent the rest of the time wrangling Alex away from the air conditioner and the garden hose, as seen below. I'd love to take credit for this picture, but dad is the talented photog in this case.

After we took Grampa to the airport, Alex, B, and I spent the rest of the day playing in the front yard and coloring on the driveway. After we pulled Alex around the neighborhood in his wagon, I made him pull me around for a while. That's one strong boy.

When it was time to go to the airport, Alex was sad, but he put on a brave face and even helped Granny B with her bag.