Pizza Picnic At The Park

I have been missing Liz & Liberty lately, so I sent Liz a text today and told her we need to hang out before I leave next week. She said they were free tonight, so I stopped at Little Caesar's to get some pizzas before stopping to get Autumn and we headed to the park. She LOVED being outside and getting to run around and be wild and crazy and release a bunch of energy.

She couldn’t wait for L&L, so I let her have some crazy bread. She laid down in between my legs and just used me like a pillow and propped her legs up. She was just chillin’ and enjoying her bread (as you can tell by her messy mouth).

L&L finally got there and brought Lady along w/ them. Autumn was SO HAPPY and enjoyed running around and having Lady follow her.

While I was helping Autumn w/ something, L&L must have grabbed my camera and taken this self portrait. I am so lucky to have them as friends. They are wonderful people, not to mention so much fun to be around.

There was a little hill over by where we were sitting and I had a crazy idea to try rolling down it b/c I haven’t done that in years and thought it would be fun. I was right! It was complete blast. I showed Autumn how to do it and she tried, but instead of rolling down the hill, she somehow managed to roll from left to right across the hill. In this picture, I went first and then Liz came after me and we almost crashed into each other and were in fits of laughter when we finally stopped at the bottom. I need to throw inhibitions to the wind more often and do crazy stuff like this b/c it was just too much fun.

After our crazy hill rolling, Autumn wanted to go play on the playground. We took Lady over to the water part of the park to see if she would run around in the water, but she didn’t want to. I love how the spray from the water looks behind them in this picture.

Autumn wanted to ride these rocking animal things and Liz climbed on the duck and started to “race” Autumn to see who could go the fastest. Right as I clicked this picture, Liz held her hand up to her tummy b/c she was laughing so hard…classic!

After all that fun, she convinced Liberty to get on the see-saw with her. He was bouncing her all over the place and they both had their hands up in the air like they were riding a bull at the rodeo.

You would have thought w/ all of that fun we would be done at the park, but that was only the first half of the fun. We went over to some big fields and started having races b/c Autumn loves to run. I love how the setting sun makes the lighting in this picture look. Liberty was trying to see if he could out run Lady and Autumn was chasing after them both.

After running around for a little bit, it was time to have an “official” race w/ a starting line and the phrase, “on your marks, get set, gooooooo.” I felt like I was back in elementary school, and it was a great feeling.

Liz is so free and uninhibited. This picture describes perfectly how we all were feeling from being able to be outside, run around, enjoy the gorgeous weather, etc. This picture makes me think of the title of my blog, “Happiness is never stopping to think if you are.” And by golly, we were deliriously happy.

This was such a cute and tender moment. Autumn was worn out from running around so much (she’s a fast little runner) and so was Lady. So, Autumn laid down on the grass and Lady came right over to her and laid down by her. I love how there are bits of grass all over in Autumn’s hair b/c it’s evidence of the crazy and reckless abandon we enjoyed. She was leaning in to give Lady a kiss and it was just too cute.

B/c I was the one behind the camera taking all the pictures, Liberty told me to give him the camera and go have a race w/ Liz & Autumn. It was a pretty close race between Liz & I until right at the end she turned on her fast burners and beat me. I love the look of determination on her face along w/ her tongue hanging out.

After all the fun and excitement, it was starting to get dark so we headed back to the cars and did one more roll down the hill. We went over to Mom & Dad’s house b/c Dave & Pam & the 3 chihuahuas were coming up to watch conference. We spent the rest of the evening just sitting and talking and enjoying each other’s company. Autumn had worn herself out w/ all the fun at the park and wanted Pam to play w/ her hair. I am so blessed to be surrounded by such loving and caring people. What a fun day!