2011 Staycation {day one}

Staycation (stay-cation): a period of time in which an individual or family stays and relaxes at home, or vacations in their own country, possibly taking day trips to area attractions.

In May, our family spent a long weekend together in Kansas City, at Brian and Sarah's new house! We called it our "staycation" since we just hung out around the house, and ventured to a few fun places around the KC area.  Brian and Sarah planned lots of fun trips, and Barrett especially liked the train restaurant, dinosaur restaurant, and Kaleidoscope! I didn't really care what all we did, I was just happy to have my WHOLE family together!

We got to stay in Emma Jean's room for the weekend. 

How sweet that she gave Justin and I our own drawer in her dresser!
It was marked with this tag when we arrived Thursday night :)
"Lala and Wheat's drawr"

On FRIDAY, we  slept-in and hung out around the house in the morning. Lauren and Barrett had a ball playing together. Brian had to work half a day, and Emma went to school for half a day. Before lunch, we got to go pick up Emma from her school, and see her classroom! Then we all met back up at the house and headed to lunch at Fritz's. 

Barrett's FIRST bag of cotton candy!!

This picture, we took for Justin's mom ---->

she has three dachshunds!!

After lunch at Fritz's, we stopped at a few stores in Crown Center, then headed to Kaleidoscope! This was my first time at Kaleidoscope, and it was so much fun (for the kids AND the adults)!!

We went to one of the Family Art Sessions. They are 40-minutes sessions for children of all ages. You explore and create with your own family, at your own pace. Barrett favorite activities inside Kaleidoscope were the tunnel with drums and music, the glow in the dark painting, and the puzzle making station, where he got to paint and cut his own puzzle.

 

We left Kaleidoscope and went to tour a few model homes! It's always fun to dream...

My mom and dad sold their hot tub, so my dad and I think it would be fun to do something like THIS on their covered bedroom patio!

 

After our eventful afternoon, we were all exhausted!
We went home for a couple hours of rest before our dinner reservations at a family favorite...Cinzetti's! Yum-o!!

I think they ate too much!!

Crepes...Justin's favorite Cinzetti treat!!

That's all for day one of the Tuttle family Staycation!

My Mother's Day

Guess what friends!!!
I have actual photos from my camera (not my phone) to share!!

Hope that everyone had a wonderful Mother's Day.
I was spoiled by my boys, and loved every minute of it!

I totally over-planned my weekend, so by Sunday, I was ready for some R&R!
I decided to have a garage sale on Friday evening and Saturday morning, so I spent most of last week preparing for that. They are so darn much work! Oh well, got rid of clutter and made a little moolah for Summer trips. Saturday evening I had a session downtown. By the time I got home at 8pm, we were all starvin'. So Justin and Barrett took me out to dinner at Montana Mikes. We splurged with appetizers (stuffed mushrooms...yum-o) and a Boulevard Wheat for Mommy. Yes, that's splurging for us, I guess!

Sunday morning I got to sleep-in a bit, and woke to my little guy with an envelope in hand saying "Happy Mudder's Day, Mommy...we got you presents...come see."  LOVE my new video camera! It's a Sony Bloggie Touch, if you're interested. It takes up to 2hrs of HD (1280) video and still photos. Just what I need to tuck into my purse for all the Summer activities we have coming up! Then we went to brunch!

That afternoon we went to Belle Plaine with my sister-in-law, mother-in-law and nieces to a concert at the Bartlett Arboretum. It was the perfect way to spend the day! We had a picnic on the lawn...Kim made tons of yummy treats, and enjoyed the sunshine and scenery. I hadn't been to the Arboretum since I was in elementary school, and I was just in awe of the beauty and peacefulness. Oh my goodness, I would give anything to live there! How amazing to wake up to those view every morning, and walk those grounds every afternoon.

Here are a few of my photos from the day. You can see ALL of them over on my photoblog. I put up a special Mother's Day post and tried out the "photo gallery" feature on my new blog. Enjoy~

the new camera in action =)

A circle of moms and daughters