Memorial Day Weekend

We went into the Memorial Day weekend with an invitation to the United Educators of San Francisco's end of the year party - UESF is the union the Teenies' grandpa is president of.  I was on the fence about whether or not it was worth getting them gussied up to drive across town, but I noticed that the group's email blast invitation was boasting "an appearance by the Salvateenies", and I knew they wouldn't want to disappoint their adoring public.  So Uncle Kelly and I dressed them up and, after some spectacularly bad navigating decisions on my part, made it to the party only about an hour after it had begun.

We were greeted in the parking lot by Grandpa, and squeals of "Boppy!" from Caroline.  Inside the lobby, we met Mabel, the 17 month old daughter of UESF's communications director, Matthew Hardy.  Mabel and Caroline instantly hit it off, and Daniel, who is learning to outflirt his brother, was not far behind.

While the kids enjoyed meeting everyone and dancing to the music, they were most excited, it seemed, to try drinking out of real water bottles (and spilling water down their fronts).

Over the weekend, they got another chance to demonstrate their artistic style.  Max is an energetic colorer

Notice the dots where he stabs the paper)

Caroline kept asking specifically for this color crayon.  In Caroline's language, this color is called "pizza".  "Pizza" is also a descriptive adjective for anything truly fantastic.

Daniel was more contemplative about his drawing:

On Memorial Day itself, we drove down to Redwood City to meet Sam and Junior and Colleen and Gavin at Stafford Park, which is a wonderful playground with a fenced-in toddler area with FOUR baby swings (an important distinction, since many parks only have two).  It was especially good that there were so  many, since Daniel practically LIVED in the swings that day.  Every time we took him out, he'd walk to a different swing and ask to be picked up and deposited inside.

At one point we met a five year old who was annoyed that his 1 year old sister was not making a good companion for him on the seesaw.  So we offered the Teenies to sit on the other end.

The little girl in the background there became Caroline's friend, and her parents were amazed to find another girl as active and fearless as their daughter, who apparently runs circles around the little boys they know.

I tried to interest Max in the slides:

I think this is really why they tell you not to slide with your kids - fear of embarrassing pictures:

At one point, Colleen's husband Brad came by with his remote controlled hot rod.  When I first saw (and heard) it, I thought, "What kind of jerk is running a car through this group of kids?", but I quickly discovered that the kids did not share my opinion - they loved it!  Caroline followed it everywhere, attracting a crowd of toddlers that chased it around like a tiny little pack.  We might definitely have to put that on the wish list.