July 2019

July was another busy month, but if you know us then that is how every month is with us. Here is everything that we got into.

For the 3rd year in a row I ran the Bluegrass 10,000. I hadn't been able to train like I wanted to because of an injury to my leg, but I ran the entire time and finished in 58 minutes. This was the third race in the Bluegrass Trifecta series. Only one more left until I get my medal!

We also headed back downtown during the heat of the day for the 4th of July parade. The parade wasn't the greatest because it was just a ton of political people handing out stuff to try and get you to vote for them. I just love this picture of the kids. Landon trying to get the picture over with and Brinley being a goof and refusing to smile.

One highlight was the big Pikachu balloon. They also had a craft station where the kids made bracelets and foam American flags. They were also extremely excited to see the Ale-8 truck handing out free baby cherry Ale-8's.

After the parade we headed home and got out of the heat and made our first batch of pickles for the year. We only like bread and butter pickles in this house and these turned out awesome. 

One of my co-workers gave me the game of Life for the kids to play. We played it the first day I brought it home and they were hooked! I was just happy because it was shorter than a game of monolopy!

We made our monthly trip to the Home Depot for the kid's workshop. They built tow trucks. They are getting so good at doing these by themselves. I only have to help them occasionally. So proud of their developing handyman skills.

I also signed us up for a night hike at Raven's Run. It was a guided trail hike which also included some night vision experiments. We all had a lot of fun and we all got to see a shooting star as well while we were also doing a little bit of star gazing. Unfortunately, this was the best picture that I could get because we weren't even able to use regular flashlights on the walk. 

Now that both kids finally figured out how to ride a bike we met up with our friends Scott and Sydney to ride bikes. The kids rode around the parking lot of the school and had a blast.

Brinley lost her 5th tooth. She was excited to show off her new smile. Landon thinks he will never loose his first tooth.

I had the privilege of "working" camp again for my older pediatric oncology patients. I use the word work loosely because I just got to hang out and participate in all the stuff with all the kids. It was awesome seeing these kids run around and just be kids. They are warriors and are such fighters. I got to be there on talent show night and when they said their goodbyes to the graduating seniors. It was so awesome to see how much these kids have bonded together over the years. I also got to be at camp for the paper lantern release. I can't wait until next summer when I get to go back again!

Ever since the kids have been able to eat real food we have been participating in Chick-Fil-A dress like a cow day. Who could pass up free food!

The past couple of years right before Landon's birthday it has been burger week here in Lexington. Chris, McKinley, and I went out and had back to back to back burgers. We started at Harry's with a PB&J brie burger. Next we headed over to Ted's Montana Grill and had a spicy jalepeno, pepper jack burger. Lastly we headed to Bar Louie with a fried cheese, cheesesteak, and queso burger. We decided to call it after three burgers. We unanimously said we like the Ted's burger best of the three.

For the second year in a row I got up early to get in line for for some fresh Georgia peaches from the Peach Truck. We split them up because 49 peaches is too many for just one family.

We even canned some of them after they got ripe. These peaches were delicious! 

Aunt Andrea, Uncle Chris, and Olivia came to visit for Landon's birthday. We took them to the Y for Olivia to experience her first swim. The kids enjoyed playing with Olivia. Olivia wasn't too sure about the pool, but she liked playing with the kids!

Since the whole family was together we decided to celebrate Andrea's birthday early. We had dinner at Malone's and then we had some ice cream cake.

Uncle McKinley gave Landon an early birthday present, Pokemon Monopoly. Landon was completely obsessed with this game when we played it with Uncle McKinley. He kept saying for a few days after that it was the only thing he wanted for his birthday. Well, this game was about 20 years old because it was McKinley's when he was a little kid. Landon was shocked when McKinley told him that he could take it home with him.

Last night as a 5 year old!

Muffins for our little bed head six year old. I started asking him months before his birthday to tell me what he wanted to do for his special day. He never told me anything. I finally told him about a month before his actual birthday that we needed to know right then or else he wouldn't have a party. He said that he just wanted to spend the day playing games with his family. So, I decided we would do everything the little man wanted, especially playing all the games he wanted.

We started the day off by going to church at Southland. Next we headed to Landon's favorite restaurant, Goodfellas. 

He especially loves the bread sticks and "red sauce", which is just marinara sauce.

Landon picked out the entire design of his cookie cake too! He said that he loves soccer the best out of all the sports. He also specifically wanted the number to be red. No idea why, but the kid was happy. We also had an issue when I went to pick it up because they spelled his name wrong. They spelled it Landen, but were able to fix it. 

Landon loved his farming lego set that MiMi and Pap got him for his birthday.

Landon and his cousin Miss Olivia. Landon enjoyed reading her a book. He also passed on his rocking giraffe that Grandma and Grandpa gave him when he turned 1. Landon hadn't rode on it in a long time and even said that it was creepy. We decided to pass it on because Olivia is going to collect giraffes so we just wanted to add to her starter collection.

Landon with his gifts and then what it all turned out to be. The little man got way more than what he needed. He got a ton of legos that kept him busy for well over a month putting them together. 

I still can't believe how lucky we are to be this little guy's parents. He and his sister are two of the biggest blessings in our life and we are extremely proud of them.

Let the board games begin! We started off with one of Landon's favorites, Five Minute Marvels. Look at that little man's smile.

The rest of the day's games. As soon as one finished he was already picking out the next game to play.

We got an original Heflin family picture with all the grandkids. Every body also had to take some time to play with Olivia because she just isn't quite ready for board games yet. Olivia is such a good little girl. 

Our little family. These two kids really are growing up so fast. Excited to be on the journey and help them along the way. 

The collection of games that we ended up playing for Landon's board game birthday extravaganza. 

First tomatoes finally turned red out in the garden. We are also over flowing with zucchini and cucumbers.

The only other thing that Landon had said he wanted to do for his birthday was to go jump on the trampolines at Adrenaline. Well, I took a day off so that we could go hang out and jump. This was about the only picture I was able to take because I was jumping the whole time with them.

The month of July was also a time for us to have work done to Brinley's teeth. According to her dentist she was just born with poorly spaced teeth causing her to be at increased risk for developing cavities. She does everything that is asked of her with her teeth, but she still develops small cavities. During the month she had to have 3 of her baby teeth filled.

Landon got a 2x2 Rubix cube for his birthday. I learned the pattern of how to solve it and have been trying to teach Landon how to do it too. He was able to solve it with me telling him all the steps and was so excited. Now to just learn it on his own.

On the way home one night the kids and I spotted this double rainbow after a little storm. 

I had another week of vacation and we were having trouble figuring out what to do. We finally decided that the best thing would be to just go and visit all of our family. So we started our journey off with a little trip up to Columbus to visit Aunt Andrea, Uncle Chris, and Olivia.

We made a visit to the Columbus Zoo. Olivia even met us there to see some of her favorite animals. Brinley loves animals more than just about anything in this world. She had a lot of fun seeing all the animals. This is such a nice zoo and we would highly recommend if you are ever in Columbus.

More of the animals that we spotted on the hike around the zoo. 

A trip to Columbus wouldn't be the same without a trip to Jeni's Ice Cream. They have such unique and delicious flavors.

Olivia and Aunt Andrea took us to see their local library. The kids had a blast playing in the children's area. We also stopped by a local bar that has all kinds of arcade games and ski ball. They allow kids in on the weekend and Landon would have stayed there the whole day if we would have let him.

We quickly completed the Irish Fairy Door Trail in downtown Dublin. We have done it before, but we wanted to take Olivia around to see them all. They expanded to 12 businesses who placed a fairy door for little kids to find. The kids had a lot of fun trying to be the first one to find the door.

Brinley and Landon really do love their little cousin Olivia. They tried to help her take her 9 month picture. Landon even fed her a bottle one morning. We also stopped in and had some Duck Donuts too. The bottom right picture is of us with our fairy door shirts on.

We also went to probably one of the coolest children's museums that we have ever been too. COSI is an awesome place. The kids had a lot of fun running around and playing with everything that it had to offer. Olivia got to play at the water table and she even took a nap right before it was time to leave. We will most definitely be back because we decided to become members while we were there.

Tuesday morning we got up really early and headed back towards home. We made a stop at Kings Island for the kids first trip to the park. They had a blast! Although they weren't able to ride any of the big roller coasters they had a lot of fun in the Snoopy kids area. 

More exploring around Kings Island. The only thing that I wanted while at the park was to try the blue ice cream for the first time ever. It was delicious.

We had a good finish at the park by watching the fireworks show with the Eiffel Tower light show.

We made a quick pit stop home to clean our clothes and to take care of the garden. We canned some more pickles and salsa. I even made the kids go out and take a picture with our huge sunflowers. This year they grew to about 12 foot tall. 

Next half of our vacation week we headed to western Kentucky. We headed back to McLean County to visit Grandma and Grandpa. We had a picnic over at the Island Dairy Freeze. Then we took the kids to see the old Island Wooden Bridge. We even stopped into an old friend's sweet shop for a cupcake treat.

Next we headed to Owensboro where we explored Grandma's old work place, the library. Then we had dinner with my Aunt Mary Ruth and some of her kids, grand kids, and a great grandchild. It was good to catch up with them and to finally get to play with Preston. It has been some difficult times for Aunt Mary Ruth with some medical issues, but she looked a whole lot better than the last time we had seen her. Lastly, we stopped by Dairy Queen for a blizzard because it was Miracle Treat Day and for every blizzard bought they donated money to the local children's hospital.

Next we headed down to Scottsville to visit Jennifer's sister and her family. Since it was Friday and they had to go to work we headed out to the local amusement park to have a little fun. The kids could almost ride everything in the park. It seemed like the majority of the rides involved spinning around in circles. Jennifer doesn't do well with spinning rides so I took one for the team and rode with Landon because he required an adult since he is a little shorter. The kids favorite ride was the Starship 4000. They rode it 5 times straight before we left. Brinley was the only one that was tall enough to ride the Kentucky Rumbler. This was her first wooden roller coaster and boy did it jerk you around. 

The kids love playing with Elam. Elam sometimes can be a little rough because he is a little power ranger. The next minute he can be the most loving little guy. Landon and Elam are like best buddies, maybe it has something to do with the fact that they are born on the same day. While we were in Scottsville we explored some of the Amish farms and country stores. The kids even taught Elam how to play Cinco Linko. It was so good to spend some time with the Prock's. Pretty soon they will be welcoming home another little boy and we can't wait to meet him.

The kids and I decided that we wanted to celebrate National Cheesecake Day. We weren't able to get into the Cheesecake Factory before Jennifer had to go to work, so the kids and I celebrated together. I did get a slice to bring back home for Jennifer.

I turned the last of the zucchini from the garden into some loaves of bread. I placed these in the deep freezer so that we could enjoy them later in the year when the garden has long since died.

Landon told me that he wanted to sign up for baseball again. I told him that if he wanted to then we were going to have to start practicing more. So, we set up the tee he got for his birthday and we hit baseballs into the trampoline so that we wouldn't break the neighbor's windows. Come to find out Brinley can still play tee ball with Landon for another season. Thrilled to have them start fall ball soon.

July was in fact a very busy month. We had a lot of fun seeing friends and family while celebrating birthdays. The kids are growing up so much and I am so excited to see what they grow up to be like. I am going to help them explore and see as much of this world so that they can hopefully grow up to be well rounded, educated human beings with many life experiences. I so truly happy to be their father. Thanks for reading and God bless you!