Skating, Amish and Elijah

 We took the kids skating this week, since it was James' birthday request from last week. We basically had the place to ourselves and the kids had a really good time. Elijah is so much fun on family outings these days; he is always super excited and loves every minute of whatever we are doing. When we hit the counter to get our skates, he looked and me and yelled, "Ok, Mom, I need skates, how long do my feet weigh?"

Within minutes, he was ready to hit the floor - 

It wasn't quite easy as he had envisioned!

It was only the second time that Tori and Julia skated, but they both did very well. It was sweet how they helped each other (and occasionally knocked each other over.)

Elijah skated between several pairs of people and also ran laps around in his socks, which they amazingly allowed.

Today Elijah and I hit Amish country with a friend to get 100 pounds of apples for applesause, (because I obviously don't have enough to do before I board the plane for Ethiopia!)  We also found out about an Amish general store that I had never been to before. Elijah's current trend is to talk to anyone and everyone that he comes in contact with. He made friends with a little Amish boy in line at the grocery store, so felt free to watch them load their buggy while I loaded our car. Next thing I heard was Elijah tell the man that someday he was going to have a horse..."his mom said so". Then he paused and told the Amish gentleman, "except, when I get a horse, it isn't going to be an Amish horse...just a regular horse." The man just smiled.