A Fun Day Off

Today Eli didn't have school, in observance of MLK Day, so we headed down to the Museum of Nature and Science. He is always sad to miss out on this when he is at school! I didn't get any pictures because there were LOTS of kids there today and I didn't want to lose track of mine. The kids had a fun time in the Discovery Zone playing with the foam building blocks, the magnetic ball run, and magna tiles, among other things. Then we saw the gems exhibit and made a brief stop at Expedition Health. Justin tried to meet us there for lunch, since his work is less than 10 minutes away, but it was so crowded he couldn't find a parking spot. Thanks anyway hon for trying! 

We headed home and the kids took a brief "nap" (the two littles fell asleep on the way home, which was not for long but enough to ruin their nap) and then we went to the park since it was a pretty nice day. 

When we got home, the kids helped me mix up dough for some homemade soft pretzels. One of my New Year's Resolutions is to bake more, which has been making life more fun and delicious. We had them with vegetarian split pea soup that we love. Emmie gobbled up two bowls of it.

This is unrelated to today but this picture was with my other phone pictures and I wanted to post about it. Emmie loves cats! She has several cat stuffed animals, one that she got for Christmas, "Tigey" that was Eli's, and a gray one that the boys got awhile back from Ikea and she adores them all. When we were in Rockford at my grandma's house, Emmie found this taxidermied cat and absolutely went crazy over it. She mauled it with love and did her best to drag it around the house with her. My mom brought it back from Rockford for her so now it's at our house. Justin calls Emmie the "baby cat lady" now because she is a girl of many cats. :)