Cedar Ridge Winery

A new winery opened late 2009 near the Cedar Rapids airport.  It is about 15 min from our house.  On Friday nights, they have live music and a selection of meats and pizza to eat.  I like to go with daddy so I can dance to the music!  Here's a video from our last night out:

Also, we saw an exhibit on money at the Iowa Children's museum.  I look good on a bill!

My 4th Birthday!

Yesterday was my and Gran's birthday!  My friends at school made this really cool poster for me!

 I brought Hawkeye black and gold cupcakes to school to share with my friends and they all made brithday cards in craft time. 

Thank you, Gran, for all the cool pirate stuff!  She gave me a ship with little pirate figures and a treasure chest with pirate gold and a pirate flag.  Daddy and I played pirates all afternoon; he was the captain!

Thank you mommy and daddy for my first bike!  It is pink and purple, my favorite colors!  And it has a basket that can hold my stuffed animal doggie.  I rode it to the garden and back.  The pedals take some getting used to, but I like it.

We had a family dinner at Orchard Green.  I am sorry that Gran and Granmimi couldn't be there but we had an awesome dinner.  Here I am blowing out the candles!

Fun in Chicago

As promised, here are photos from the family trip to Chicago last week.  Mommy had a medical meeting, so daddy and I went to play while mommy sat in boring meetings all day.  Dad-dad and Uncle Steve were also there, so that was fun.

In matching owl jammies, mommy and I cuddled and watched the Royal wedding.  Of course we needed to wear our princess crowns!  We all loved Duchess Katherine's dress and the use of greenery in Westminster Abbey.  Very beautiful!

Daddy and I spent all day Friday at the Science and Industry Museum.  He describes it as "Disneyland for science geeks".  I was just happy to be out playing around with daddy.  Daddy was just giddy with all the exhibits and kept hugging me and saying how much fun he was having and how glad he was I was there.  Cool, huh?

A few years ago, the museum built an enclosure for their U-505 submarine captured during World War II.  It was VERY impressive!

The porthole makes a comfortable seat!

Not a bad place to sleep for someone my size.  But the sailors on the sub were a bit bigger than me . . .

Let's see what's for dinner in the sub's galley!

After crawling around the sub, I had to get a snack.  So I buried my face into a cupcake!

They have an airplane hanging in the main rotunda area.  So we had a seat and pretended we were flying to Los Angeles.  We were sitting in Sophie class, of course!

Finally, they have an exhibit exploring the movement of spheres in liquid and gas mediums.  At least that how daddy described it.  I just thought it was a fountain and a playground!

On Friday night, we went out to dinner with Dad-dad, mommy, and Uncle Steve.  Here I am being escorted by my "entourage" 

Ok- this is wicked cool.  The Chicago Children's museum has a MASSIVE climbing gym that is made up like ship's rigging.  It spans over three floors!  No kidding!  I have seen it before but I never had the courage to do it from the bottom (my first trip to the Children's museum is recorded here: http://sophiehouse.blogspot.com/2009/12/chicago-shopping-trip.html ).  This time, I DID IT!   I CLIMBED THE WHOLE THING!  YAY!  The following are a couple of photos of me in the rigging.

Thank you, mommy and daddy, for taking me to Chicago.  When are we coming back?

Tulips!

We just got back from Chicago and I have some GREAT photos from Daddy and I at the Science and Industry Museum and the Chicago Children's Museum.  But first I want to post some photos of our tulip garden.  We got back from our trip and found that tulips are at peak RIGHT NOW!  YAY!