Josh Renaud

Festivals and face-painting

Recently, we went to a celebration of the anniversary of "Parents as Teachers" Florissant Civic Center that featured all sorts of fun activities for the girls -- including face-painting.

It was the first time Jadzia, Ludi and Josie had experiences with face- (or body-) painting. Jadzia became a cat and Ludi got some butterflies on her cheeks. Both girls had flowers put on one of their arms. We didn't think Josie would like having her face painted, but she didn't object to a having a ladybug on her leg.

We went inside the skating rink at the civic center. Inside we found all sorts of booths and activity centers. There was a table filled with rice and little cups and spoons and plastic toys that kept Jadzia and Ludi occupied for a long time.

After spending a lot of time seeing different things inside, we headed back out. At first we thought to get in line for pony rides, but then we heard that the ponies were closing. So we went over to the inflatable jump thingy. Jadzia and Ludi both went inside. Ludi didn't last long before she wanted to get out. Jadzia lasted much longer than she has in the past, but she wouldn't stand up and try to jump. Instead she sat and sort of bumped up and down on her bottom.

Towards the end of our time at the festival, Jadzia and Ludi got to play with a parachute thingy with some other kids -- including their friends Maggie, Molly, and Claire. They had never really done something like this, but they really enjoyed it.

The kicker for Jadzia is that she got to try it again a week later when she was in her first Awana class.

A little notice about videos on Geni

If you are related to me and you are part of our family tree on Geni.com, you should login and check out some of the videos I have posted there from my Dad's 50th birthday.

Jadzia's 1st Cardinal game

For her participation in the Ferguson Library's summer reading program, Jadzia received two free tickets to a Cardinals game. Actually she has gotten these tickets for the last few years, but has never been able to use them (or know of their existence). This year we decided she was finally big enough to try sitting through an entire baseball game.

She was very excited about the prospect of the baseball game. I had already shot video of two different Cardinal games this year: the first being the one we took Yoli's parents to; the second being the one I went to with my dad and my uncles and all. So Jadzia was familiar with Busch Stadium from these videos.

She wanted to see Fredbird and eat a hot dog. Fredbird was definitely the biggest item on her agenda. In fact it may have been her entire agenda.

She did really well. Though she got silly in the middle innings, she calmed down and stuck with me through the entire game. It turned out to be a Cardinal victory, so that meant fireworks over Busch Stadium. And Jadzia was very pleased about that. Plus I introduced her to Cracker Jacks, and the little prize inside provided her a lot of amusement and distraction. (It was a little picture of Alexander Hamilton as a kid that could be folded to show him as an adult)

View from near where our seats were located.

We had upper deck seats, but they were positioned right above one of the corridors leading to the seats. That meant we had like a mini-row of 3 seats all to ourselves with nobody in front or behind of us. When people (like the cotton candy guy) would come out the corridor our view would be somewhat obstructed, but otherwise it was probably the perfect spot for our first game.

Surprise visit from the Anheuser-Busch clydesdales!

Fredbird! Yay, Jadzia is happy.

Hot dogs! Yay, Jadzia is happy.

Woo hoo, Fredbird is back again! Hey, why can't you shoot some of those t-shirts up here to the upper deck?

Cleaning up the infield.

There were no home runs, but thankfully the Cards pulled out the victory and we got to see fireworks anyway.

Jadzia saw Lumiere Place's bright ribbon display thingy on the way home and wanted to know what it was. So I took a picture for her to remember it.

Jadzia's 4th birthday

As always, Jadzia was excited about her birthday long before it was anywhere near time for it. One day Yoli brought home a book of different cake designs. Jadzia found a monster cake, and announced that that was what she wanted for her birthday. Her resolve never wavered, and weeks and months later, Yoli made her a monster cake.

Yoli didn't believe me when I tried to explain how hard it was to inflate the long balloons.

Jadzia wears her new sunglasses and wields her new baby bottle.

Our friend Farika was in town from California. We hadn't seen her since in around 5 or 6 years, so we invited her to come to Jadzia's birthday party. It was so nice to visit again.

Fun in the front yard

Here are some photos of Jadzia, Ludi, and Josie with their friend Claire in their favorite domain: the front yard.

(by which I also mean the neighbor's porch and the neighbor's driveway)