Blythe the mermaid

For Blythe's birthday, my parents and got Blythe a Belle dress-up outfit and a Tinkerbell outfit. The Belle dress was a big hit, but the Tinkerbell...not so much. Leave it up to a 4 year old to tell you exactly what she thinks of your gift. Basically, it was unacceptable and she preferred to have an Ariel dress instead of Tinkerbell. Maybe because the Tinkerbell one was so short and made or feel uncomfortable....or not. So anyway, when we saw my mom at Ada's birthday last weekend, she gave Blythe the Ariel dress. This one she loves.

She can barely walk in the thing, but that doesn't appear to phase her. And as usual in this pic, Ethan appears to be absolutely miserable. One of these days I will teach him to smile for pictures.

Still cold as ever here (duh), so a good indoor activity is bowling! The town of Christiansburg has a big bowling alley, but we've always preferred to go to the 8 lane bowling alley on VT's campus. Mostly because it's cheaper and because it's smoke-free (though now that restaurants are smoke-free, I wonder if the other bowling alley is too?). Of course, I guess I shouldn't be surprised that the rates at VT's bowling went up. Not surprising because it's a state university and like every public institution in the country, it's struggling on funds right now. So shoe rentals used to be $1 and now they are $2. Games used to be $2 and now are $2.50. Oh well. It takes the 4 of us so long to play, that 1 game is all we need. I usually beat Braden, but today he killed me. I'm blaming it on the pregnancy which has thrown my equilibrium off. Even Blythe beat me (though she used one of those ramps). We had a good time though and as usual, I was glad to get out of the house and go do something with Braden and the kids!