Snailed it!

Part one of the day was yet another visit to Lowe's.  Yes, we do a lot of construction projects together, Madison and Daddy.  There she is with her apron, and the finished product, the snail from the movie "Turbo."  Also in the picture is a dragonfly that decided to photobomb us.  Dragonflies tend to do that a lot - they love photobombing people.  You probably didn't know that about dragonflies - they don't even make reference to their photobombing prowess in any online reference materials.  Until now.  So take it under our authority here:  dragonflies are good at photobombing.

Anyway, this snail is a neat one:  it's a pull-back toy.  Meaning, as soon as Madison got back home to our hardwood floor at home, she pulled it back, and it went rolling across the floor down the hall towards the front door.  It was a completely unexpected distance, which was a big thrill for Madison.

Here's a nice moment for Madison as well.  She's up in a nice treehouse, just part of the afternoon she spent at a birthday party for Matthew.  He's four this year, and lots of people came from all around to celebrate... and blow bubbles too.

The reason they are on stumps is so that the bubbles will hang in the air longer.  See how that works?  Anyway, we had a lot of fun at the party - it's all the little things.  Including an indestructible piñata.

All the children spent a long time just pummeling this rainbow piñata over and over again, but it just refused to yield any of it's sacred candy to anyone.  It did finally come open after a great deal of beating - but for a while there we didn't think it was going to do anything.  The adults were rolling up their sleeves, about to step in for an attempt.

After the birthday party, Madison and Daddy went over to Borders Books where they were giving out free books to children who followed a reading program over the summer.  Madison wrote her books down, along with the authors, and sure enough:  they gave her a free book.  All you had to do was read ten books, which Madison did quite some time ago, actually.  Madison chose from a list of books one about "The Never Girls," some ordinary girls that I think wind up on Neverland.  We'll find out soon enough as we read it together!

Afterwards, we walked through the Disney Store for a bit, and then outside at the Mall of Georgia Fountain.  Yes, Daddy and Madison walked through it, and yes, we got wet.  But it was over 90 degrees outside today, and it felt great!

We also drove by the Gwinnett Church for a bit today - Madison hadn't been there before, so we dropped by.  Nobody was home.  But we still had some fun at the playground at least, not wasting that opportunity.  Speaking of not wasting opportunities, we're still doing the "Sodapalooza" this summer, and we got ourselves another wild cherry slushie on the way home.  Yes, that's our favorite!

So tonight we continued our aqua-movie fest by watching "The Incredible Mr. Limpet."  Yes, another Don Knotts movie to add to Madison's collection.  This is a highly unusual movie, but with popcorn it was just fine for Madison.  There's a very interesting video on the DVD that shows the grand premiere of the movie, which took place at Weeki Wachee, believe it or not!  They actually played the movie under water with the audience in the seats that face out, looking into the springs where the mermaids usually perform.

Tonight was the first of three super moons.  It didn't seem that super to us, although we weren't looking at it until it had risen somewhat.  It was just a big ol' full moon.  Perhaps tomorrow night we can catch it on the horizon if we go somewhere to peek.  The moon is busy this year, with blood moons and super moons.  With all the stuff that's going on in the world with Israel and Ukraine and Iraq, you have to wonder sometimes...