Christmas in July (& a shameless brag)

For Christmas for the past few years, my in laws have given us a family pass to the Virginia Living Museum, which is located just a few blocks away from us. I LOVE having this family pass and highly recommend that you look into asking for annual passes to your local zoo or museum the next time grandparents wonder what the kids would like for a gift.

We visit often (although not as often as the short people think we should), and every time, I am able to remind the kids that Grandpa and Grandma gave us our tickets, for which they are very grateful.

Today we went specifically to see "The Giant Dinosaur Puppet Show" that is running in conjunction with the big dino exhibit going on now.

The following are pictures of the kids on some of the dino props and with some of the creatures they brought out before the puppet show. Check out Joy's strangle hold around Jessi's neck. It makes me laugh.
With one of the puppeteers and small puppets (Some of the puppets were VERY large).
Joyana touching a snake.
Joey touching an alligator.
Before the show, Jessi was waiting and sat in this circle of sunshine from a skylight, I thought it looked neat.

Joey touching a blue-tongued skink. A dragonfly I spotted as we walked through the native Virginia garden. He was so nice, let me get up close and take a number of shots before flying away.
This is where the shameless brag starts. Joyana enjoying her chocolate ice cream cone. She is so funny, if you ask her where she got her green eyes, she says, "God", but if you ask her where she got her curly hair, she goes into this long explanation that I only understand about half of, but has to do with "last night she got bonked on the head." Go figure.
This was right after a nice big lick and she still had her eyes closed in ecstasy.

Oh, the above pictures were just bragging on her cuteness, this is where I brag on her smartness. :-)
She is two and a half, look at her draw... she must take after Mom-Mom (my mom), I love to be creative, but drawing certainly isn't my niche.

This is "tiny baby Jesus", of course, she thinks all babies are baby Jesus, this could get interesting when our new baby comes...
This is Daddy. The line on his chin is his beard.
All that, and she can count to 11. Why 11 and not 10? I really don't know. At least she has now learned her odd numbers, there for a while she was counting by 2's. I did figure that one out... when I knit I usually count by 2.