Photo Dump

Here's a brief recap of the past 3 weeks. Natalie took swim lessons at Bon Air (a local country club) a few weeks ago. She is slowly but surely becoming more comfortable with the water.

Here she is just before lessons with her friend, Lucy.
Learning the fine art of kicking

And jumping into the deep end

Just living the life at a friend's pool

So cute

We got to spend time with Willow and her kids & Jenn and her baby. Although it was quite busy in the house, it was still great to see everyone and try to catch up.

We met up with Ashleigh and Lilly yesterday at the park for a picnic lunch. I think it is safe to say that a good time was had by all.

I snuck up on them as they were cooling off in "headquarters".

This is not exactly what you would expect to see when you head for the shower. For whatever reason, Wrigley likes to spend his time in here.
So that's my photo dump for the past few weeks. Totally random, but we are enjoying our summer.

Not much new

Just because I haven't been blogging recently, doesn't mean that we haven't been having fun these past few weeks. We've been busy spending time with friends, visiting Bonkey's, doing home improvements, etc. I just haven't been that diligent about taking pictures. I promise to do better. In the meantime, here's a few random pics of the kids to hold you over. Natalie received a letter from her favorite pen pal - Uncle Ray:

Danny is loving his Chuck the Talking Truck these days:

Ready for movie night:

3 years later

Well it might have taken us 3 years since we were all together again, but we picked up right where we left off. With Heather visiting VA from Texas, it was the perfect opportunity to reunite. Kristin's mom (who we affectionately refer to as Glo), was kind enough to open up her house to us since it was a central location to all. We spent the day catching up, laughing and playing with our kids. Since our last visit, we've added 3 new members! Here are some pictures from the day.

The girls - Mary, Paula, Kristin, me, Mandy and Heather Ok - the who's who from left to right for the little cuties ... Nina, Jack, Lyla, Avery, Abby, Natalie and Danny. The only two missing were Heather's girls who stayed back in VA to spend quality time with their grandparents. We totally understand, but they were missed.Nina and Natalie instantly hit it off and became inseparable for the day. Since they were the oldest, they took on the "babysitting" duties of the littles.

Heather and Jack Lunch time!

Paula and sweet baby Abby. I swear, this baby would cry and it was the softest cry I've ever heard. Precious.

Danny is a 9 months older than Jack and Abby - who share the same birthday and just turned 1.

Thanks again to Glo for letting us invade her house all day. Here is a link to see the rest of the pictures. It was great to see you girls and I know my kids had a blast. I know this because they totally slept in today! I hope everyone had a safe trip back and let's plan to do this again soon. Maybe in Vegas??

Father's Day cont...

I've had a few complaints that my father's day post was a little scarce. I agree, and I was actually planning to post more when the computer starting acting up and I just had to walk away before it ended badly. So, now I'll post a few more pics and also the answers to the "All About My Dad" questionnaire that Natalie completed her last week in kindergarten. My comments are in italics.

Name: Gregory (correct)
Age: 35 (also correct)
What he does at work: He tells people what to do (this is also technically true, but sounds so mean!)
Favorite sport: football (yep)
Favorite food: pizza (I would have actually guessed steak - but he says Ice Cream Sandwiches which now makes total sense to me - we can't keep those things in the house.)
Favorite tv show: football (He agrees with this answer)
What he hates: When Danny is bad (of course she didn't say when she was bad. I asked Greg about this. He said he hates "stupid people", but I think to keep this kid-friendly, we'll stick with her answer).
What I like to do with my Dad: Help him cook dinner (he likes this too)

After a nice cook-out at Mimi & Papa's, it was time for tractor rides. Both kids got a kick out of riding around the yard on Papa's tractor.

And then just relaxed on the deck.

And last week was the first week of summer camp.

Guess who was selected as "Camper of the Week"? She won 2 tickets to the local minor league baseball game.She also started cheerleading and last night was the first practice. Parents weren't supposed to be in the room .... something about them being a distraction .... (whatever!) ... so I snuck this picture from the sidelines with my phone. I was pretending to text so this is the best I could get. She's in the pink shirt/khaki shorts.

And Danny might not be in camp or cheerleading, but he's doing great. He's really growing and learning and changing every day. His little sense of humor cracks us up and his favorite person is still his big sister. He follows her around like a puppy dog and it's really cute to watch. The best part is that she really doesn't mind it. Aside from the occasional hair pulling or Barbie stealing, she really enjoys his company too.

Happy Father's Day!

Boston, Mass

Greg and I spent the last few days in Boston. I had to go for a work conference so Greg tagged along and then we spent the weekend there taking in the sights and sounds. Here are a few of the highlights.

The city is absolutely beautiful and we spent most of the time near the Harbor. Even though we aren't Red Sox fans, we still had to take in a game. The stadium was pretty neat, along with all the street vendors, food, and definitely the people that attend the games. Party atmosphere!

And of course, we had to tour the Sam Adams brewery which just happened to include tastings of the beer. Who can turn that down?

The temps were a little cooler due to a cold front, but aside from that, the weather was great.

After being away for 4 days, we were both anxious to get back home to see the kids. They stayed at home having a fabulous time with Gam and Pop.

Thanks again Mom & Dad. We appreciate it!

Looooong Weekend

We started out our long holiday weekend by attending Natalie's graduation from Kindergarten. Each student was presented with a certificate and Miss Fearon told a cute story about each one. It was very sweet. Then we were all invited to review the work from the past year. It's amazing to see the difference in her writing, spelling, coloring, etc from September til now.

On Saturday we spent the afternoon with some friends for swimming and cool treats.

Then Monday we invited Alex, Amanda, Elizabeth and all the kids over for a cook-out. The big kids beat the heat by testing out a new slip-and-slide. They had a blast.Then they cooled off inside by coloring some pictures.

Danny's little t-shirt is giving a shout out to Uncle Ray! Hi Ray - we miss you!