A fine day out

Jacob spent the morning asking to go to a "new-new playground." The "new playground" is hidden within walking distance of our house but has had lots of Jacob and Lucy visits, so it's probably passe by now. A "new-new playground" is one which we haven't visited before. Angie also made a request this morning for a couple of books from the Savage branch of Howard County's Public Library. This branch has a Friday morning story time (with craft). It seemed like we'd get a lot done this morning if I could find a playground.

Luckily, the internet came through with some surprising suggestions: school playgrounds. Howard County has a lot of schools and now that it's July, school's out for summer. We went to Forrest Ridge Elementary School, drove around back and found the playground. In addition to basketball courts and baseball fields, two wonderful playsets were completely empty and ready for customers. Lucy tried out the slide. After going down, she decided to go the wrong way for a second ride:

 Please note: Lucy's hair was subject to static electricity, not a bad hair day.

Jacob enjoyed playing on the playground, too, even venturing across a difficult bridge with a little help from Daddy. I gave enough help that I couldn't take a picture, so here's a shot of the bridge. You can fill in Daddy and Jacob with your imagination:

He kept his hands on the top two bars and stepped carefully across. The second time I think he would have made it on his own but I wasn't confident enough in him not to be right there holding him.

Lucy took a much safe bridge all by herself:

After all this picture taking, Jacob decided (as he often does) that he wanted to take a picture too. Somehow I was able to limit him to one picture. Naturally, his favorite subject is hanging on the side:

Yes, that is Jacob's cheek and ear on the right and the playground on the left. The sun seems awfully large and close in this picture, but it really wasn't so bad.

Afterwards, we went to the library for books and storytime. We arrived a little early and had to wait outside with some other people. It's nice to live in an area where people are lining up to get into the library! Once inside, we found three books for mommy (two with cake ideas for Regina's birthday and one for fun) and a video for Jacob. Then story time started.

Today's storytime was all about the Fourth of July, featuring stories and songs of patriotism. Then came time for the craft. Again with the patriotic hat!! Jacob had a lot of enthusiasm for making it, using the glue stick to attach the stars. Unfortunately, since Daddy was helping in stead of Mommy, the results were not as good:

Note the paper clip holding the star and pipe cleaner and the terrible taping job inside. This was supposed to be a hat for Lucy (since Jacob already made one for himself), but the measurement was far too large. Lucy wasn't allowed to model it since the structural integrity is weaker than a sandcastle's in a sandstorm. In hind sight, I think it would have been better to use the glue stick on the ribbon and stick the stars into the glue rather than putting the glue on the backs of the stars. Maybe there will be a new craft next week!