Enjoying the view being on the Monogahela, the first morning. Our hotel had a great little patio with a fireplace where we ate breakfast, taking in this loveliness, right there close to downtown Pittsburgh.
Getting a steel mill lesson from an animated daddy (and they listened! ;))
Movie Star! We wandered over to the walking distance Starbucks in an outdoor shopping area, relaxed on the complimentary adirondacks and took turns checking out the shops.
All decked out in our clearance bin finds..
To Kennywood we go!
Most likely the last year that Ellie will be able to enjoy Kiddieland.. Thankfully, the rides there were varied in height restrictions and Ellie got to join in for quite a few of them. Lia was a good three inches shorter, and got to ride even more. Aurie had a blast… no hesitation, jumped right in and thoroughly enjoyed every one.
(The "You must NOT be this tall" arrow)
(A little too big for this one in mommy's opinion!)
Lia won this huge prize on our first game… massively exciting, but followed by equal amounts of jealousy on Ellie's part.
Only in Kennywood… Dipping Dots and Slushies BEFORE lunch!
This was the first step to Ellie making the leap to bigger rides. She ran over and said she wanted to ride this one. The picture makes it look so short… she was WAY up high…my stomach was dropping! My baby, on this huge ride…all by herself! :) She loved it and we could see her legs flipping about and her smile all the way down below.
Mommy's requested Haunted House ride… which was fine.. you ride in a cart and blip ghostly things with your taser (we've done it before). But then, I had Aurie join me on a walk through ride, Noah's Ark, which I thought was a fun house.. oh boy. Poor doll- after the immediate lights off, elevator gone crazy moment, she says, "This doesn't seem like much fun". And ended with mommy carrying her out after going through one (kind of) scary place to another, the floor started shaking and that was it..poor darling lost it and started to cry..I felt so BAD! (All the while kind of giggling though, I have to admit…)
Check out these big girls on the Log Jamb ALL BY THEMSELVES! (Again, stomach jumped!) SO, last year, Ellie did ride this one with me, but this year, Lia joined us, loved it, and the two wanted to ride again. There they went, and might have kept on had I let them!
Trying out the Kangaroo together.. they tell you during the initial spiel that this is the last ride of its kind in operation. I love that, and love that we have this place to go to, that Bill grew up with- just like my Boblo, that we can share with the girls.
Believe it or not, this is Grandma's grocery store!
Poor Aurie came down with a 24 hour thing during our trip (amazingly since she had to be drug out of Kennywood the night before, all the while wanting 'just one more time' on the carousel). So the girls and I headed to the Rebellion Softball Game (Girls' Softball) while daddy took care of his Pumpkin Muffin…(who then asked…get this… the next day, if we had left her at the hotel by herself while we all went to eh baseball game! Poor darlin.. fever made her delirious).
Was a cool incentive and motivator for them.. Ellie watched warm ups avidly…
The birthday girl! Celebrating at Grandma's house…
And then at home.. on the actual day..
Last day of swimming lessons. These girls are loving them! And, doing quite well, I might add. Lia made me smile as she showed me what she knows, the front crawl, at our neighborhood pool… it was done to perfection, and in sort of slow motion.. I wondered how she was breathing! Darn cute.
