Visit to the casa loca

I took Katie up for her first real visit to my parent's house last week. They got back from Guatemala about a month ago. She has been there before but this was the first time since she has developed her independent personality, so this time she was able to become fully immersed in the craziness. It took her about 5 mins of staring at all the kids, mess and dogs (actually they only have two dogs this time but a whole mess of goats) before she jumped down and joined in. During our few days there she got pretty adventurous; she was found a couple of time stuck in the mountain of black plastic bags full of orphanage donations. She also spent quite a bit of time on the trampoline and even rode her bike off the deck once. But her biggest accomplishment of the whole trip is that she knows all of her aunts and uncles names.

One day we went to Tweetsie Railroad with Grandpa and Grandma and their whole gang ,and Sarah, Adam and Tali. Tweetsie is the greatest theme park for little kids; where I made many happy childhood memories. They have a couple of trains and tons of rides. Katie was in heaven because she got to ride a big black train with a real whistle. I let her drive our bumper car which was fun until Emmie and Bethany banged into the back of us and Katie got whiplash. She did prove that she is a little dare devil by riding on the Tilt-a-Whirl with me in the rain and laughing the whole time, we even rode it a second time.

Plugging her ears on Grandma's lap during the train whistle

Riding horses with Talia

Riding the boat with Gabby

Daredevil Katie on the airplane with Gabby