Mercer & Shaina, Grand Central Terminal, NYC

Easter 2011

In anticipation of the Easter Bunny's arrival, Mom helped Mercer dye a bunch of eggs last night. They drew some good designs on them, too: skull and crossbones, monkey faces, a bunny, a cat, etc. In sharp contrast with last year, not too many eggs were damaged.





Mercer woke up bright and early to find a trail of eggs leading to his very own treat-filled Easter basket. It has since been determined that Mercer does not enjoy Peeps or Cadbury Creme Eggs. Jelly beans are a hit, though.

Down the "fire slide."

Earlier this week, a 5-year old girl from the neighborhood taught Mercer how to go down the fireman's pole on the playground. Once Mercer got a little taste, he couldn't stop riding the "fire slide," as he called it.

Mercer's birthday party

Mercer had a little birthday party this weekend to celebrate turning 4. We originally scheduled it for Saturday, but the wind and rain knocked us back a day. No matter; Sunday turned out to be a great day and the party made Mercer really happy. He was so patient and was rewarded with some cool birthday toys.




Starting off the morning with a birthday donut.

Getting a call from Aunt Becky. She sung him "Happy Birthday."

Opening up some of Grandpa's presents. Mercer has a cool new beach bag for the summer.


Oh, we got a bounce house. Everyone loved it. Ryan here was in it all afternoon with the big kids.

Cousin Hanna

Mercer showing off his birthday pin.

All the kids getting some action. From left: Ryan, Hanna, Mercer, Sydney, Rayla.

Sydney!

Pileup

A Batman cake. The strawberry mousse inside was great.




The cake was good because it made everybody's mouth blue.


Finishing up with some gifts.

Happy birthday, Mercer. We love you and hope you get all your wishes.

Happy Birthday, Mercer

Mercer is 4 today.

In and around Peekskill

By the time we finished up a bit of Spring cleaning this morning, the day became too beautiful to ignore. We dropped off some junk at Goodwill and headed north to Peekskill. We originally wanted to hit Annsville Preserve Park, a neat, out of the way waterfront park we discovered last weekend with Grandpa, but our stomachs were grumbling. We had a bite to eat at the Peekskill Brewery (sliders, BBQ chicken, lemon-Parmesan fries) and discovered a great playground along the Hudson River nearby. That's all Mercer needed to see.



The position of the park along the river is really beautiful. Looking north, you can see the Hudson curve toward Bear Mountain. Looking south, you see the Indian Point Nuclear Reactor. If anything bad happened here, lots of people are going to pay the price.






I have no idea what this thing is below. Probably a mine of some sort. I do know that this kid nailed his head on this thing a millisecond after this picture was taken.



After a quick bathroom break, it's back to the action:



A mosaic of the Hudson River Valley near the bathrooms:




If you were wondering, the official color of his shirt is "celery."


We finally made it to Annsville Preserve, which was only just up the road. Not much fun for kids, but a nice little walk.







Here, Mercer and his new dragon are talking to a ladybug, who was apparently very shy:




Mercer was exhausted after all this. We got Mercer home and showed him he had a splinter in his hand. That didn't go over well. Many tears, a thrown remote control, and a pair of tweezers later, the splinter is out and Mercer is calming down in an early bath.