Family Fun

Today was great. We decided to make it our "Family Fun Day in Connecticut" for the month. Sometime last summer we realized that if we failed to plan our Saturdays, they all got eaten up by various activities very quickly, and we always looked back wishing we had done more. So we resolved to take one Saturday a month for a family day activity.

Joseph didn't sleep well last night - he woke up around 2:30 am, and wouldn't go back in his crib and would toss and turn even when we held him. So Elizabeth and I switched off holding him, but we were all awake by 6:15. So we decided to go running. We loaded the boys up in the double stroller and off we went. We ended up going about 3.5 miles, partway along the base of East Rock, a city park with a nice cliff face a couple of blocks away.
Hopefully neither Elizabeth or I will be too sore come tomorrow - regular exercise has been hard to come by this winter. We came home to a breakfast party for our apartment complex. Joseph really liked the bagels, but not the herb and garlic cream cheese Elizabeth gave him.

Then we headed to the Peabody Museum, Yale's Natural History Museum. Joseph really likes the great hall of dinosaurs. According to him, they make a chomping noise and action much like alligators. Here's a view of the great hall:

We also saw a lot of neat fossils and stuffed animals native to this area and others. It's a neat museum, and we get in free. They have a fascinating exhibit on black holes, but that's a little above Joseph's head right now. It was neat to see and think of all of God's creations, even those that no longer walk the earth. I was reading about the Dodo bird, of which they have a skeleton, and thought that Heavenly Father must have been sad to see a species become extinct because of the neglect of men. It gave me a better understanding of our stewardship over the earth and the creations thereon. I was reminded of the Word of Wisdom, in which the Lord teaches us of our relationship with the plants and animals who share this world.

After the boys' nap, we went to the YMCA to swim. Both Kenny and Joseph just love the water, and they'll want to swim even when their little lips are quivering. Today Joseph let me take him all the way under twice without crying. That's pretty good progress. Then we came home and had delicious homemade pizza. It's so much fun to always have people to do uplifting and fun things with - families are wonderful!