Ruthie’s one lucky gal. Yet again, she got a back to back visit from both sets of grandparents.

My parents swung through Arkansas on their way back from a three week RV adventure to the southeast and stayed a couple nights. There’s a decent golf course/rv park where they used to stay at until the park owners decided to only allow RV’s of a certain age. Well, our little Beulah (#2) didn’t make the cut, but they still called and asked to park there anyway. After admitting the year of the RV, there was a long pause and the guy said, “What condition is it in?”

Man, this is like the Spanish discotheque of RV parks. I remember once (okay many more times than once) while studying in Andalucía having to be surrounded by a group of people in order to get into a club because I (gasp!) wore tennis shoes. And, okay, a sweatshirt. Sue me. I was not a fancy college student. And it was cold. And I felt like wearing sneakers. My outfit in no way hindered my awesome Elaine Benes dance moves.

And if anyone would like a visual tool on how to perform said dance moves, here ye be:

Did you hurt yourself? I know. Leave it to the professionals next time.

Anyway, so Beulah barely made the cut and be-bopped her way amongst newer versions of herself. Ruthie didn’t know the difference and of course immediately got comfortable at the wheel of this old beast. My brother and his dog came up to visit as well.

We talked about Survivor, their travel stories, and work.

I sat around waiting for someone to ask about any stories on the stay-at-home front. No one did, so we broke out the bubbles. This girl could chase bubbles all the live long day.

 
And then the kite was broken out. My mom said that my brother test drove it before we arrived and had to tell all the passers-by that the princess kite was not his. I wonder what kind of kite the newer RV’s brought. Probably hot-air balloons instead, actually. The girls went inside to get supper ready. Ruthie wanted to stay out with the boys. Probably to avoid getting attacked by the lotion monster. Every time we see Grandma (which turned into Me-maw because my mom didn’t think Ruthie could pronounce Grandma…. which then turned into Mamie because Ruthie couldn’t pronounce Me-maw either. But Mamie was the name of my mom’s grandma so it worked. Anyway, every time  we see grandma/me-maw/mamie, she lotions up Ruth’s cheeks. Maybe I should quit sticking her face out the window down the highway.

After a quick dinner during which I made Ruthie show off everything she’s learned so far. (I only do this in front of her grandparents, but besides.. they love it.) My mom commented that Ruth comes off somewhat serious on the blog and was happy to see her silly side rearing its head in person.

Before we left, I asked for a photo of the three of them.

And that’s when I wanted to stand in front of an oncoming new RV.

How many times does it take? Seriously.

Open your eyes, dad:
Open your eyes, dad. Show me your teeth, Ruth:
Open your eyes, dad:
Okay, go back to closing your eyes. Please, for the love of God.
And finally, a decent one.
I was so happy they popped through!
The next weekend, Ryan’s parents came down on Ryan’s birthday for a couple nights. I made black bean brownies for the occasion because, let’s face it, I sure as heck wasn’t gonna be the only one with gas.

Ruth helped blow out the birthday candles. His mom’s birthday was a few days prior, so it worked out!

The weather was rainy, but we managed to sneak out of the house for a bit. Our library had a book sale going on, buy one get one free. With a car full of bibliophiles (including Ruthie), we walked away with a large loot.

Then we popped into our small town’s museum. And by ‘popped in’, I mean it literally took 8 minutes to walk through.

So we hurried home to go through our books. It’s like Christmas for us!
Then Ruth took a nap and Julia & I went garage saling. I can’t even remember what I bought, but I’m sure it was extremely essential to have. When she woke up, we broke out some of the things Jama made for her. I’m going to do a separate blog post on those things, they’re so fun! One of which was this Eye Spy game:
…complete with a camera to look through…I love games like this. Mostly because Ryan had just told us about an article he’d read about kids now needing therapy to quit their addiction to iPads, iPhones, etc. The therapist in the article said that detox was like coming off of heroin. We were Shocked! Appalled! Disgusted!

Hmmmm…. Looks like Ruth’s gonna get her first Intervention. She’ll only think it’s her second birthday party and then, bam! Off to Southern California to live with other addicted toddlers.

In other news, our mini library was rummaged through by Randy.

When Ruth went to sleep, Ryan and his dad peeled out of the drive drove off to live music while Julie and I watched a movie. It was a no biggie, nice weekend.

The next morning, Jama read Ruthie some stories before getting ready to visit Ryan’s brother and wife.

…so I asked them for a picture as well, dreading what I was sure to be an excruciating process like with my parents.

Heh. That was the first try. Take notes, dad.

Can’t wait for everyone to visit us again… it’ll be coming up quickly!!