Amanda & Brian's Trip Through Parenthood: July 2008

There's a lot to update on this blog entry. We've had a couple opportunities to do some really fun stuff with Olivia (and others) over the past couple weeks with a bunch of new pictures to show as well! First, the weekend after the 4th of July, we met up with Damon, Laurie, and Elisabeth (our friends from Tulsa) in Oklahoma City to catch up, see how the kids are growing up, and also take a trek down to Norman to check out the old college campus. It's been 10 years since I've seen all the expansions and upgrades to the campus and it's just amazing to see all they've done to that place. The campus is as gorgeous as ever...it just has several more buildings and several more have been added to. Here's a few pictures from our time on the OU campus.

Olivia and Amanda at one of the fountains on campus

Me, Damon, and the girls in front of the Sooner Schooner

The group walking in front of the OU library

After touring the campus, we continued our walk down memory lane by going up to downtown OKC to have dinner and one our favorite restaurants. From there we walked to the "river walk" area and had Olivia feed Cheerios to some ducks and snap a few more pictures. After that, it was back to the hotel and probably the highlight of the trip from Olivia's viewpoint...fun in the pool!

Ducks, ducks, and more ducks!

Olivia and Elisabeth

Amanda and Olivia in the pool

All the girls in the pool

Olivia going for a ride with dada

Smile!

The soggy McIntosh family photo

The next day (Sunday), we had plans for the six of us to go to the OKC zoo. Well, Elisabeth did her best to disrupt those plans by not sleeping well at all Saturday night. So, Damon and Laurie decided to pack it in and head to Tulsa. Amanda, Olivia, and I pressed on and went on over to the zoo. Olivia had a good time wearing herself out and checking out the available animal displays (I really wouldn't recommend going to the OKC zoo for quite some time to come. They're in a big renovating phase right now and won't be done until 2011. That means there's a reduced number of animals out for display...no elephants either!). Still, Olivia enjoyed calling out the animals as she saw them.

My attempt at an "artistic" picture of Olivia in the butterfly garden

Olivia and dada checking out a bird exhibit

Ooooooohh...lion cubs are cool!

Olivia looking at a cat exhibit (but the tigers were nowhere to be seen)

Olivia and mama looking at the coyotes

Our second outing was much closer to home. This past weekend, we went to Wonderland Park here in Amarillo. It's an amusement park with roller coasters, water rides, and kiddie rides. The three of us went thinking Amanda and I could take Olivia on some of the "slightly bigger" rides, but she is still too small for them. So, we decided to just let Olivia have all the fun on this trip to the amusement park. We started her off with a ride on the mini train around the park...which despite the look in the picture, she really liked. Next was a ride on the carousel. She really enjoyed her time on the horse...so much so that we rode it two times in a row. As we were getting ready to leave, there was a kiddie boat ride that Olivia wanted to go on ("A boat! A boat!" she said). We were reluctant to put her on it because you couldn't ride with her and there weren't any sort of restraints on the ride. Well, we finally decided to let her have a go at it and she had a blast! After the boats, it was a similar ride with cars. Then it was over to the kiddie helicopter ride...but Amanda rode with her on that one. All in all, Olivia had a really good time once she got comfortable with being on the rides.

Olivia riding the train for the first time!

Olivia and mama on the carousel

Olivia and dada "horsing around" before riding the carousel

Enjoying the ride

Olivia riding a ride by herself for the first time!

Olivia taking the pink Mustang for a ride

Olivia and mama riding the helicopter ride

A couple of side notes...I want to wish my Grandpa Swiatowy a happy 97th birthday on Wednesday (the 23rd). 97!!! That's incredible! Also, a big congratulations goes out to our friends Amber and Randal Dovel on the birth of their second child, Ian, on Monday. I leave you with a few other "miscellaneous" pictures from the past couple weeks.

Olivia smiling in a big, inflatable bouncy

Smile!

Here fishy, fishy, fishy!

It's time to show off the new camera! First, though, a BIG "thank you" goes to Grandpa Jim and Grandma Sylvia in Albuquerque for the camera. Seems Grandpa Jim didn't fancy the camera after working with it for a little while...so we are the lucky recipients of the purchase gone awry. After toying around with it, I got it to take (what I feel to be) some pretty darn good pictures. Judge for yourself!

Another big "thank you" goes out to Carla and Billy Dunham. Their son, Chip, lived across the street from us when we were in Amarillo the first time around...and we were invited by Chip, Carla, and Billy to go up to Fritch, Texas for a 4th of July celebration. We had a lot of fun and we definitely plan on going back up there for a mini vacation sometime soon. Here are some pictures from the festivities...using the new camera, of course!