Visit with Gramma and Grampa Ray

This weekend, Evan went to North Carolina to go deep sea fishing with his friends and family. If you're wondering why I didn't go, then you must not have been on the sail boat we took on the day after our wedding. Or on the cruise we took in 2007. Or ever in any form of transportation with me that may induce motion sickness. My belly is not made for fishing boats. or planes. or trains. or the back seats of cars.

Evan had a great time and caught lots of adorable fish, who's cute little faces made me sad. Next weekend we will have a fish fry and (other people) will eat them. Poor fishies. Perhaps I have watched "Finding Nemo" one too many times this weekend.
Luckily, my mom and step father came to visit this weekend, so I had a hand with Marino so I could finish up my school work for the semester. He was sort of crabby this weekend so I was glad to have some help!

Saturday morning, we all went to Brookside Gardens in Wheaton. I'd only been there one time before and it was cold, so it was a treat to go in the Spring!

10 seconds after this picture was taken, Marino took off down the hill and fell on his face in the dirt (luckily not on the cement).

Brookside Gardens has a butterfly exhibit in the conservatory right now and it's really pretty. There are tons of beautiful butterflies and flowers in there (it's much nicer than the butterfly exhibit at the National Zoo). Marino was really into it at first.

Then I showed him a very large butterfly (let's just refer to it as Mothara). Once Marino saw Mothara, his joy in the butterflies waned. Suddenly, he was all "I'm scared." Then a poor butterfly had the misfortune of landing on him. He screamed "no no no no no" and started flailing around and trembling.

I mean, they are pretty terrifying, right?

I tell you, this boy is scared of the most random things. Clowns and butterflies. Anyway, we left after that, and as we were walking out, he shouted cheerfully, "bye bye butterfly"
Can you guess what happened 20 seconds after I snapped this picture?

Yep, Marino threw his snack trap in the water. With the frogs. And then whined because we wouldn't let him eat the rest of the goldfish in the snack trap.

Here he is in a calm moment with Gramma and Grandpa Ray. He LOVES to say "grampa ray" over and over again.

Luckily, Gramma and Grampa Ray love him so much they seem not to mind the bad behavior. He was very into hanging out with them this weekend and was very sad when they left. When Marino woke up from his nap today, the first person he called for was "Gramma". Next month we'll be going to New York to visit them!