Pictures from August are now up.  The link to them is on the photo page.

It's Labor Day weekend, so summer is essentially over.  On Thursday two weeks ago, Daddy took a day off work so we could take the kids to Knoebels amusement park near Elysburg, PA and take the van for our first road-trip.  But it turned out that Mommy could squeeze in a doctors appointment that day too, so we left here around 1 p.m. after Mommy's appointment.  We arrived at Knoebels close to 3 p.m. and it was very busy.  We took a chance at driving towards the front of the parking lot, and managed to find a space that wasn't too bad.  But even early on, Jonathan and Lydia took turns at deciding they weren't sure about walking and wanted carried.  We're not sure what the problem was, but all three of them didn't really want to cooperate much that day.  It didn't help matters that the park has alot of gravel areas, and of course the kids would decide to melt-down or play in the gravel as much as they could; so we were all filthy by the end of the day.

Besides not caring for the gravel areas, another thing that we didn't care for was the pricing structure.  Even the kids rides are different prices.  Some rides were 70 cents, some were 80, etc.  They sell you ticket packs with 50, 20, and 10 cent tickets.  And where the kids rides were took some walking just to get too.  All-in-all, we really think Delgrosso Park is laid out much better, has consistent ticket prices for every kid ride, and none of the dirty gravel to deal with. 

After a couple of the rides, Anna decided she didn't want to ride any more.  Lydia and Jonathan liked riding "the whip", but that was the first ride Anna decided not to ride.  She also missed out on the fire trucks.  She did like the boats and cars they rode first.

At the end of the day, we tried to eat at the only sit-down resteraunt in the park.  It was at least a thirty minute wait before we got called to be seated.  Then we couldn't believe they didn't have kids cups with lids for toddlers!  Anna managed to spill her drink all over herself and the floor.  We put her drink in her sippy cup (which we already used once earlier in the day).  Lydia and Jonathan were better with their drinks.  We order Spaghettio's for them.  But Mommy and Daddy had to help them eat it, as they didn't want to feed themselves.

We're still slow at getting them to eat different things.  And alot of times they don't even want to try new things.  However just today Mommy brought home a roasted chicken from the grocery store, and Jonathan really seemed to like it.  He was happy and dancing around in between bites.

Lydia is really good with her verbal skills.  "What are you doing?" is her favorite phrase, but she has some other phrases she uses now too.  Jonathan and Anna are a little more resevered, but they are getting better over time.  We still have a speech therapist coming over once a week to work with them.  They seem to like her and respond to her well.

After a lull, they are all getting interested in books again.  They regularly bring books to Mommy or Daddy to either read or at least look at.  If we don't read, we at least quiz them on what the different things are on each page or what color things are.  Getting them to work on colors is a little slow, but they all know a circle when they see one.  But they don't call out other shapes as much yet.