Home again, Home again

Well our whirlwind trip back east is now over...

We loved seeing all the family and friends as we crammed a summers worth of travel into 12 days. There is the recap, with photos to follow...
Day 1: BWI to Alexandria, VA
A nice time to refamiliarize Ella with Adam and Sarah and an introduction to beautiful Sable.
Day 2: Alexandria, VA to Savannah, GA
A long drive that was a nice time for Mike and I to catch up since we had been missing each other with schedules the past couple weeks. We ended with a nice dinner with Adam and Sarah at Paula Deen's restaurant.
Day 3: Savannah/Tybee Island, GA
BEACH DAY, and Grandma and Grandpa's party. We loved seeing them and all the cousins! SO much fun!
Day 4: Savannah, GA
Time to explore Savannah with family...
Day 5: Savannah, GA to Alexandria, VA
Breakfast with Linda and Mike then on the road. A wonderfully relaxing evening with Adam and Sarah.
Day 6: Alexandria, Va to York, PA (Mike flew home)
After a tough daddy dropoff, we were on our way to York to see my mom. After she got home from work we got to see her. Well worth the wait!
Day 7: York, PA
A lazy day at home, we did go in and have lunch with Grandma at school. After school, Renate and Kathy got haircuts!
Day 8: York, PA
The kids were not feeling so hot after all the exhaustive travel, so we had a quiet day at home. Gladys, a family friend, came to see the kids. When my mom got home from work, we had Sally and Didi over for dinner. It was wonderful!
Day 9: York, PA to Alexandria, VA
After work, my mom drove with us to Adam and Sarah's to spend the night. We had a nice dinner with them and Sarah's brother, Mike.
Day 10: Alexandria, VA to Raleigh, NC
Off to the wedding, we got there just in time to change and get on the shuttle. A beautiful ceremony, couple and reception. Ella is a dancing queen!
Day 11: Raleigh, NC to Gaithersburg, MD
A quick visit with my cousin Amy who is expecting a new baby this week! We were so excited to get to see her, Sean and Allison. Ella and Allison play so nicely together.
Day 12: Fly Home
But not before squeezing in more travel!!!! We went to the Baltimore Zoo to see some animals and tire them out before the flight. It was great, the Baltimore Zoo is so kid friendly and has a fantastic children's zoo area with places for them to play and explore.

We were so glad to see daddens (Mike) when we got home. I have 2 very exhausted kids, but they are happy and we saw a LOT of loved ones. It was a great trip.

Last week's weather

We had a long week last week. Mostly because Ella had ear infections in BOTH ears that was making for long days and even longer nights. But she is very good at sharing and passed a cold onto mommy too, so I went down for the count. We were starting to recover by Friday though and here are some photos to show our fun afternoon Thursday. We had to get out of the house after 4 days of solitary confinement! We had a relaxing afternoon at the park watching baseball and playing together.

In this slideshow are some of the photos from Thursday, both in our backyard at home, and from the park. We hope you enjoy them in good health!

Teaser of Photos to come!

Happy Birthday Mike!!!

Your daughter (Ella) has an ear infection! What a great present!!! Who knew that cuddling with your 2 yr old would be how you spent your 30th birthday? I can't think of anything sweeter.

We will post pictures from our celebration hopefully tomorrow.

Exciting professional news for me...I helped a friend buy a house today. Well at least get to the point of mutual acceptance. From here if all goes well they should close in early June. So keep your fingers crossed!!!

off to bed...so tired

Anatomy of a Smile...

Here is what Fin looks like before the smile...

Here is the warmup grin...

Here is the smile height with the tongue clearly visible.
His happiest smiles always have tongue.

The smile threatens to overwhelm him,
so he starts to pull his head back like a turtle.

And he is calm once more.

Pictures of Fin's smile will hopefully help with you form your own as you start your Tuesday mornings!

Best Wishes!

Here it is..

I thought that this photo was on the website already, but it wasn't.

So here it is!!!

REALLY MOMMY? BATHTIME?!!!!

It's like he knows what is coming...lots of fresh clean, undrooled on skin...

My friend, Danielle, watched the kids Tuesday morning and this was a photo she sent me of Fin.
He is so sweet, and smiley!

Workout time with Mike

Mike was doing pushups last night and Ella decided that she could/should do some too. This was the tail end of a couple of minutes of working out with daddy. I had to recover from some giggling and grab the camera, otherwise we would have more, but this is a taste of her silliness!

Tulip Festival Video

The first part of this video is Ella and Chester running right for the mud puddles. How do they always know just the areas to get the messy? Unfortunately for Ella, she got caught before she saw much mudtime.
The second clip (all part of the same video, just different colored flowers), is showing how well Ella listens. She is really amazing when I need her to be. I love my kids!! Enjoy!

Tulip Festival

We had a great time at the Tulip festival in Skagit County on Friday. It was beautiful to see the huge fields of flowers. We were waiting for a good weather day that would make the trip worth it, and it was definitely worth the wait!!!! Danielle and Nathaniel and Alicia and Chester came with us, which made the trip even more fun. I absolutely loved watching Chester splashing around in the mud puddles, especially when I realized he didn't have to go home in our car! Haha! Sorry Alicia! True though...

Ella was really funny, she kept posing with weird faces that she thought were cute and smelling the flowers. She really thought the tulips smelled, "mmmmm". Haha! Fin and I were photographers for the day, until Danielle got a couple of shots for me of the family! Enjoy, and we will look forward to next year as well!

Here are some pictures from Ella's Birthday weekend Celebration. Her party was complete with both cupcakes and a cookie cake. Toby, Anthony, and Kesi were the only guests under 3 feet tall, but that was the perfect breakdown of adults to kids. Ella opened presents from family that night and got to test out her new soccer set and trike Monday afternoon when we had beautiful sun again!

Ella's Birthday Party Prep

Aunt Sarah got to play the fun game of chase the toddler in the cold on Friday night. Ella may be small, but she can MOVE!!!

Luckily, Sarah's long legs came in handy and she caught up to her quickly...






The giggles are the best part of this game!
Thanks for being a good sport Sarah and playing in the snow, IN APRIL. Who would have thought? Oh wait, that's right, my curse continues. Don't worry WA residents, it generally only messes up weather patterns for 1 calendar year, so you are 5 months from normalcy again.


While Sarah played with the birthday girl, the guys set to work to put the grill together. LOTS of cardboard and boxes within boxes!!! They did a great job, or at least I will say they did since the grill worked great for the party.




















The Finished Product!!!!
Complete with melted hail on it.

Some pictures to tide you over..

Sorry the blog has been light on content lately. In the midst of training, keeping up with housework and the rest life offers can be tough. Saturday, while Mike was in his exam, the kids and I had a fun day at the park in the sunshine. Mike's exam went better than he expected and we should hear results in a couple of months. Will write more soon! But all is well here, JUST BUSY!!!

Cure for the blahs...

The next time you are feeling down or like you can't accomplish anything, get on youtube and look up graduation speeches by your favorite celebrities. Some of my favorites include Conan O'Brian, Stephen Colbert...

After you feel all warm and fuzzy, pumped up, ready to tackle the world just don't get cynical and think, "Man, I graduated 10 years ago?!!! What have I done since then?". Like Stephen has said in a past speech, "cynicism is a self imposed blindness, a rejection of the world because we are afraid it will hurt or disappoint us". Instead, open your eyes, keep moving forward and laugh...

I almost forgot again, Happy Belated Birthday Sally!

Updates on the week

Unfortunately no pictures yet, I am still waiting to hear the ok from some other mommies before I post pictures from a playdate. I like to check and make sure they are comfortable with their children being on the internet. I am also waiting for some photos from the zoo playdate to be uploaded too since I was silly and didn't check the camera for batteries before leaving...needless to say, it didn't have any. So sad, but all the more reason to go back to the zoo. Next time with help!

Over all the zoo trip was fun, but exhausting. It is amazing how sometimes 2 kids is a breeze and others it is a tornado of activity. We had a great time, but Ella was tired, and Fin kept pooping (always when we are out!), and wrangling 2 kids in a public place with thousands of other kids is not easy! I was so worn out after an hour of wearing Fin, pushing Ella in the stroller, and lifting her to see all the displays. Oh yes, while a baby is strapped to my front I had to lift my daughter over the heads of middle and high school aged kids who were there on a field trip. Did they offer to move for the tiny little girl, oh no... Were we as self absorbed and unaware as these kids were? I just don't remember that stage. Maybe I am blocking it out because I know I will be on the other end this time and don't want to consider it yet!!! Oh geez, so many fun times to look forward to.

This week will be light on the blogging to warn fans...Mike has an 8 hour exam on Saturday that he is studying for as much as possible, and I will be in training from 8-5 everyday this week. Oh joy of all joys!! Hopefully it will offer some divine inspiration as to how to be successful in Real Estate (maybe without even trying, hehe, I had to say it CYHS theater geeks!). A busy week here, but come next Saturday night, we will all be celebrating a productive week!

Thanks for reading! We'll talk again soon!