aunt sue sue comes to visit

Olivia loves her Great Aunt Sue Sue. So she was beyond thrilled to learn that she would be coming to visit for an entire week. I decided to take the week off from work so that we could all do fun things together. Olivia had school all week but we planned to do things in the afternoons. From the second Sue arrived they were BFFs. and they were inseparable all week!

First on the agenda was taking Aunt Sue Sue to the Fort Wayne Children's Zoo. Each year Sue gets us our zoo pass for Christmas. It is the best gift and we get so much use out of it each year. Olivia really wanted to take Sue to the zoo and show her all of her favorite animals. It was a beautiful day and we got some amazing up close views of the animals. One of the highlights was the crazy close look we got at "Bill" the lion. He was very outgoing that day and came right up to the glass. It was very exciting. All of the animals were active that day, which made for a very entertaining trip to the zoo!

Each time we visit the zoo Olivia begs to go on the "rides". We usually let her choose one per visit. Well this was a special trip to the zoo so she got to choose two special rides! Her first choice was the horses. Last year Olivia developed an affinity for one very cute little horse named, Gayle. Each time she rode the horses she would request Gayle, and she quickly become one of Olivia's favorites. So of course she was thrilled to see that Gayle was at the zoo again this year. She was so excited to be reunited with her and she even more excited to go for a ride!

Since we have a zoo pass we rarely take time to go through the entire zoo in one day, but that day we did. The weather was gorgeous and we were all having a great time. We saw and did everything! Olivia was thrilled to show Sue Sue all of her favorite animals. It was almost as if my Mom and I were not even there. The day was all about Sue Sue!

Another thing Sue wanted to do while she was here was visit Olivia's school and spend a little time in her classroom. My Aunt has experience as a teacher and has worked with young children before so she was interested to see what kinds of things Olivia did her in classroom. My Mom came up with the great idea of decorating cookies with the kids. They were in the middle of a unit on art so it gave the kids the perfect opportunity to be little artists and decorate their own masterpieces. I tagged along to take pictures as the kids took turns in groups designing their cookies. As you can imagine the activity was a huge hit and the kids had a blast! Olivia was thrilled to be able to show Aunt Sue Sue her classroom and introduce her to all of her friends.

Our week of fun continued as we took a trip to the Botanical Conservatory to see the butterfly exhibit. This was something we had wanted to do for awhile but we heard mixed reviews. We heard that there were not many butterflies and that it was not really worth the trip. We thought we would give it a shot anyway with the hope that we would be able to see some beautiful butterflies. It turned out to be so much better than we expected. Olivia wanted to bring her binoculars with her so she could really get a close look. They were all kept in a large white tent and there were quite a few different kinds for us to see. It was pretty cool and Olivia was totally into it!

While we were exploring the tent a woman came up to Olivia and I and asked if she could take some photos of us. She was with one of our local newspapers and she was doing a story about things to do during Mother's Day weekend. As we left she to look in the Friday paper to see if any of the photos were used. That Friday was my birthday and I woke up to see this super cute photo in the "Weekender" section of The Journal Gazette. It was the perfect Birthday present!

"Olivia Menor, 3, looks for butterflies at Foellinger-Freimann Botanical Conservatory’s “Butterflies & Fairies” exhibit. Visiting moms will get a free plant Sunday."

It was another jam packed day and Olivia was pretty exhausted. Before heading home for a nap we promised her we would stop for ice cream. This is by far one of Olivia's favorite summer treats. She is still mastering the skill of eating an ice cream cone without getting it all over herself. It is quite a sight, but she is in pure heaven!

Later that afternoon my Mom and Sue took Olivia to her tap class. I thought it would be nice for them to take her so they could see her dance. Olivia was more than happy to show off her tap dance moves for her Aunt Sue Sue. Next month Olivia will be performing in her second dance recital. She is just as excited as she was last year to get back up on the big stage. This is an exciting year for me too as I started teaching at the dance studio and I have my first class performing. So I will not only be there as a proud parent, but also as a proud teacher.

We packed a lot of fun things into the week Aunt Sue Sue was in town. We had some nice family dinners and spent a lot of time playing, reading books and just being silly...all of Olivia's favorite things! Olivia did not want Aunt Sue Sue to go home. She even plotted ways to try and get her to stay longer. But Sue had been traveling for three weeks and really had to get back to California. We all had a great time during her visit and we will miss her very much. Olivia is already talking about her next trip to California. According to her she is going to take a plane ride all by herself out to California. Hmmm...something tells me that she is not exactly ready for that quite yet. But we are always up for a trip out to California, so maybe we will be visiting sooner rather than later. I do know that Olivia will miss her Aunt Sue Sue terribly until we get to see her again.