Goin' Bananas & Goin' to Grad School

I have had the great pleasure of spending more time with my adorable 3-year-old niece McKayla in the last two weeks. Last week we had a flier on our door (one of MANY annoying ones) and I was surprised to find it actually useful. It was for a place down the road called "Goin' Bananas Playnasium". I had never heard of it or noticed it so I looked it up online. Turns out it is this GREAT indoor play place with tons of little tike play things and tons of huge blow up fun bouncy/slide things. I thought that McKayla would enjoy this, so Andrea and I started prepping her for it and I took her there yesterday. We had a BLAST! At first she was scared of the big blow up things, because they were so high, but eventually I talked her into trying them out and she loved them! Unfortunately, after about 30 minutes three field trip groups showed up and there were tons of wild kids running around like crazy. This scared McKayla, and frankly me too, since none of the kids were paying attention and would have run right over her. So, she decided (and I agreed) to go back to the little tot area to play with the little tike stuff. That was much calmer and she still had a lot of fun. I have a feeling Aunt Michelle will be taking her there again in a few weeks! Here are some pictures of the fun:




In other news, I leave in just four days for my second summer of grad school--YIKES! I am excited, but at the same time I'm just not quite ready to leave home again for three weeks. At least this is the last summer! Next summer I'll have my degree--woohoo! This summer we have three classes: neuroscience, matter & energy transformations, and molecular basis of heredity. I'm really looking forward to neuroscience (I LOVE brain stuff) and the heredity class. Not so sure about matter and energy transformations...but 2 out of 3 isn't bad =). Hopefully they are as interesting as I am expecting them to be. The best part is the first class is taught by a guy that is HUGE in cochlear implant research...wow will it be fun to talk to him =). I hope to have some good conversations with him about sign language vs cochlear implants, etc, etc. I'm such a nerd! Anyhow, the other exciting thing about traveling to St. Louis for three weeks is seeing old friends! My roommate from ISU, Sara, lives near Chicago so we are meeting up for a weekend in Bloomington, our old stomping grounds. I will also get to see my old waitress buddy, Erin, while I'm there. It should be a fun time, and will be a nice break from the grad school madness. I'm sure, just like last year, the three weeks will fly by and before I know it I'll be posting about how I'm back home already =). Then, the countdown to school starting will have to being...but we won't think about that now!

That's about all from here right now. No exciting plans for us for the 4th, since I fly out at 8am on the 5th and since Sierra is completely terrified of fireworks! It is my mom's birthday though, so a big HAPPY BIRTHDAY to the best mom ever!!!!