At The Car Wash

Don't know if we told you guys or not but Mabel started her own little business, washing cars. This is her third small business venture. She started out with your everyday lemonade stand, but her business partners didn't grasp the concept that they were supposed to SELL the lemonade.

So it was on to her hot dog stand; had a couple high school girls working for her, but it turns out there was no future in frankfurters.

So she started a car washing business and got her first client on Sunday afternoon, who happened to be Mom. Mae has her you-know-what together, though, charged Mom three strawberries, half a bowl of guacamole, and even a couple bites of ice cream. I never thought I would say this, but I actually might learn something from MJ.

Washes the ground around your car too, and doesn't even charge for it.

Boogie Down

Watch out, just when you think you're settling in this one jumps up and bites you.

Story Time Squared

So Mae is like, "Whoa, Fin, if you know how to read, hook me up. Let's do this, I love stories." So we hopped up into Mom and Dad's bed and I was reading her some books and then - Mae? Mabel? Mae, we're over here, dude.

Okay, better, but now she's posing for pictures.

The next day we found ourselves in the midst of her books again and this time she paid a little more attention. I mean, how many times do I have to tell her that "correspondence" starts with a "c" and not a "k"? That's why her intensity in this session was so important.

And then a couple days later I was reading in the chair and she wanted to join. Following along pretty well until...

it was either the story itself or my delivery, but either way, I lost her.

Ah, you give them wings and they just fly, don't they.

Festival Season

So it's that time of year in Chicago. Even though the weather clearly has not been informed yet, it's Summer time in Chicago, which means lots of good things, one of which is that it's Festival Season. Every weekend there's an awesome festival in some neighborhood or another.

This one happened to be right outside our house so we headed down and though I really needed a nap, I was hot to trot on getting my face painted.

So I sat down and got prepared...

Took on a little makeup...

And then a little more...

When all of a sudden the woman said to Dad, "I think she's asleep," to which Dad apparently said "Finley!" about 4-5 times before I slowly opened my eyes. What can I say, getting your face painted is relaxing. Just about done...

And voila - a butterfly.

And I kept that puppy on for 2.5 days straight. I refused showers, washing my face, going in the pool, brushing my teeth, anything that remotely would mess up my blue butterfly.

Story Time

So I've been getting a little impatient with this reading thing. I REALLY have been wanting to read my books by myself, and like, for real. So Dad and I took it up a notch tonight, and I'm pretty sure I'll have a couple Thomas Friedman books under my belt by Tuesday... buckle up.

Sorry, got a little distracted by the hockey game on TV for a second there. Focus, Finley, FOCUS. Okay, I'm back, here's another one, pay attention.

Oh, one more thing. Now that you're done watching them, go back and watch the first one again, and this time listen to the guy recording the video at the end when he says, "Perfect." One might think that's my dad, but it's actually Kermit the Frog.

Where's Mabel?

So Mae found herself in the laundry basket (thanks, Dad) and when he put her down in my room she played her first real game of peek-a-boo.

And if you thought the pics were fun, check out the video.

And then like a wild bear she reached over and tried to pull me into the basket by my hair.

Scrabble This!

So we hadn't done word and reading stuff for maybe a week and a half so Dad is like, "Hey Fin, I'm going to clear the table and when I come into the living room in two minutes I wanna see if you can make three words out of the tiles - Bug, Bed and Sad." Deep down, he's not sure I can do it, right? Well, Dad... BLAM!

And then he's like, "Nicely done, Fin. Now let me give you three more words and one of them will be four letters. Let's see how you handle this one." Um, nailed it!

Oh, and tonight we went on a bike ride to the sledding hill over by old McCormick Place. It was awesome, I ran up the hill...

Only to find when I got to the top that Mae was already there?? How the heck did that happen?

Anyway, she figured one good turn deserved another, so tonight it was her turn to bite the dust on the ride home.