Trike-A-Thon

Molly participated in a Trike-A-Thon this morning with her preschool to raise money for St. Jude Children's Research Hospital. She had a lot of fun! (That's Molly in front in the pink jacket and blue jeans.)

After our crazy day yesterday with the plumbing issues, we were out last night and I accidentally left my keys in our van (which is locked). Cory has the other set with him at work, so we ended up walking the whole way to Molly's preschool to do the Trike-A-Thon.
Molly biked all the way there (nearly 2.5 miles) while I walked with Alex in the jogging stroller. Then she biked several laps with her friends during the Trike-A-Thon, and they all rode around the block before heading back to the school. Molly then made it 1/3 of the way back home again before declaring that she was just too tired to go any farther.
Thankfully at that point we were only a block from her good friend Josiah's house, so we dropped her bike off there. Then she rode in the double jogging stroller with Alex the rest of the way home. :)

Plumbing!

Last week we noticed a tiny bit of water dripping through the kitchen ceiling near our stove. We figured out it happened whenever a large amount of water drained from our upstairs bathroom sink. We called a plumber to check it out, and he stopped over yesterday morning. That's when the little problem turned into a BIG one. Yes, it was just that drain pipe leaking the tiniest bit, but the drain pipe was lead. Apparently, the code requirement is that you cannot FIX a lead pipe - you must REPLACE all of the lead pipe with some sort of plastic pipe. This meant that they had to remove the drain pipe from the sink and from the bathtub, and in order to do that, they had to rip up our house. Now we have huge holes in the stairway wall, Molly's room wall, and the kichen ceiling. Nice, huh?

Here's the stairway wall (where they had to access the tub plumbing).

Here's the hole in Molly's wall. The sink is on the opposite side of this wall.

Here is the GIANT section of ceiling removed from our kitchen. Yuck.

More Random Fun

Molly and Alex always love the rides at Mall of America. They give two thumbs up to the new Nickelodian Universe! The above photo was taken during Alex's first time on the Wonderpets Fly Boat (formerly the Frog Hopper). It takes the kids way up high and drops them down. Then they go up and bounce down over and over. (Molly and Alex are 4th and 5th from the Left.)

After a few rides at the Mall of America, we passed this Monster Truck on the way to our car. Cory pointed it out to Alex, and Alex stared and said, "I like it!", so we had to get his picture in front of it. :)

Bikes!

Mr. Grape Cheeks
One day Alex put two grapes in his cheeks during a meal, and we busted up laughing at him because he looked so funny. He likes the laughs and now does this regularly when we have grapes. He doesn't say anything... he just pops the grapes in and waits for us to notice. Silly kid. :)

Fun on the Farm

Cory was in NJ for work during the first week of April, so I took Molly and Alex to SD to spend a few days on the farm with my parents. They love the animals there! After checking out the 41 newly hatched baby chicks, petting baby lambs, and collecting eggs from the chickens, they went upstairs in the barn to play.

Here Molly is holding a cat named Mia.

Molly and Alex thought it was fun to climb to the top of a huge pile of hay bales.

Rudy, their little dog is a big favorite. Rudy and Molly had fun playing tug-o-war.

Molly and Alex loved to take turns holding Rudy.