El Rio Picnic

Saturday, October 9th was the annual El Rio family picnic.  I think what James was looking forward to more than anything was letting the kids have their first pony rides.  We were in luck!  They were the first thing to see once we entered the park and there was only one other child getting off and no line waiting so each of the kids rode a few times.

Unfortunately, all the trips were super speedy - they raced around that little coned off circle - and I had a hard time letting the camera autofocus to get any really good shots.

James got to join the two ladies who were leading the horses to help give all three kids a ride at the same time.  You can tell better from this picture - looks like James is getting ready to run alongside!

Timmy slept through the pony rides.  Sweet boy.

There were also balloon artists.  Callie got a purple elephant.  Trevy got the cutest little brown monkey and Landon ended up with a yellow sword.  It was a little breezy so some of the kids had a hard time holding onto their balloon creations and all it took was a touch of the dry grass to pop them.

Hot dogs and hamburgers for lunch.  Yep, still having a hard time finding shoes so Callie got to wear the Cinderella slippers again.  So fashionable!

James took the kids on the jumping apparatuses but left the camera with me so I took some shots that I've been wanting to take with Timmy for a while.  Here's how big his feet are now.

His sweet little fist.

One of James's assistants, Anna, with her son and Timmy.  She's so sweet.

Even after jumping on the inflatable toys, Callie still felt like jumping around on the sidewalk.

More hot dogs.  It may seem like a lot, but the kids almost never eat the buns.

Every kid needs a good hot dog shot.

Spontaneous yoga.

Downward dog.

Look at that form!

Alas, we didn't win anything in the raffle, but we had a good time, nonetheless.  We left around 2pm (party started at 11am) so I could get home and decorate a birthday cake for Melissa.  Sooo much fun!  I haven't had the chance to decorate a cake in a while and it was nice to get to do a simple one.  No wedding cake stress or anything.  She had offered to make a birthday cake for a friend and was feeling tired and didn't want to run out for a mix.  I just happen to have a stash so one thing led to another and I got to do a cake that Saturday as well!

Remember those Cinderella slippers?  We almost lost them!  It's strange how sad I get at the thought of some things getting lost or destroyed.  They really are cute shoes, though.  As we were getting ready to go, we couldn't find them.  Everyone else had shoes and Timmy was all loaded up so James grabbed the picnic blanket (yes, so impressed with myself that I thought to throw that one in so we didn't have to sit on dry grass again.  Thanks to Anna and her family for sharing their shade!) and away we went.  I kept looking around desperately, hoping to see the shoes in front of one of the jumping castles, but no luck.  Landon didn't want to put his on so the boys and I lagged behind James and the girls and I didn't get to see the shoes fall out of the blanket.  But happy to say they did and Callie had them on by the time we all made it back to the van.  So all's well that ends well and they may just end up being the finishing touch to Callie's Halloween costume this year!