grandparents, cousins and singing

 Last weekend the girls and I headed to my parents.  We spent some time with cousin Trey.  Maria has been asking, "when am I going to see Trey?"  I got to hang out with one of my bestest girlfriends and help her do prep for her son's birthday.  We spent time with GG, at her house, per request from Maria, who said "we never go to GG's house."  Mainly because when we go home, she comes to mom and dad's house.  SO we spent several hours at her house, most of the time which she spent reading to Maria, she was in heaven! 

 Anna seriously contemplated checking out the depth of the landscape pond...the girl keeps us on our toes!

 Checking out a bird nest.

 enjoying some time on the swing.

 

Sunday we attended the baptism of this beautiful niece, Everly.  And we had a lovely lunch afterward, yum.

Aunt Michele knew how to keep her happy!

 Cousins having fun and making LOTS of noise.

 After lunch, we had to jet down to the Follinger theater in to hear my dad sing in the Summit City Barbershop Chorus.  We had yet to be able to make it to one of his concerts and he has been in the group about a year now, I believe.  He is there in the back row, third from the right.  How appropriate that they had a naval theme, since he served in the Navy himself.

Maria enjoyed listening to grandpa, even though it was quite toasty in the outdoor theater, at least it had a roof!

We have plenty to praise God for; grandparents, cousins and singing.

fun at the beach

Some friends came today with their kids and we beat the 100+ heat by hanging out at the beach.  I do believe I got a bit of sunburn despite putting sunscreen on multiple times, hopefully I am the only one!  The kids played well together, had fun, and were dog tired by the end of the day!

We have plenty to praise God for; friends to help us enjoy the beach as we escape from the hot weather.

random days

 We had a pajama day and I pulled out some motor skill activities that had been floating around in my head for a while.  It kept them occupied for quite a while, and left me able to complete my kitchen tasks of baking bread, making bagels, zuchinni bread and doing some laundry!  Pajama days rock!

Maria was using a stick to pick up some beads, they also used measuring cups to scoop and pour the beads, the metal bowl gave great sound effects.

 Using clothespins to clip/slip on the edge.  Maria did the clip kind, Anna worked on the old fashioned slip on kind.

 Using a pair of craft tweezers, she transferred the craft puffs to the opposite bowl.
There was also a tray of craft sticks to sort by color.

Don't even ask, we don't know why she was doing this, but it really reminded me of the character, Mushmouth, on Fat Albert.
That's our randomness for today!

beaching it

 Eager to hit the beach perhaps?

 One can never be too careful in the lake!

Sharing the troubles of the day.

 Maria has loved her swim lessons.  Here she is jumping to the instructor.  She did it without any help!

Fun on the 4th

We started our patriotic attire on Sunday so that we could fit it all in!

 silly sisters

 We headed to a friend's house for a cookout and some small fireworks.  The kids were thrilled!

 Check out Peter leaping next to Maria. 

 They did get a bit scared and all scooted back.

Anna trying out sparklers for the first time.

 Maria too.

We have plenty to praise God for; our freedoms.

bonding with cousins

We had visitors, which the girls were very excited about spending time with.  Their cousins are very close in age, so it was fun to have them spend the night, oh and Aunt Emily and Uncle Justin too!  I now know what it would be like to have two sets of twins since their ages match up so closely.  We spent alot of time playing in the yard, and later after dinner we had to head out again as they thought running in circles through the house was great fun!

They all played so well out in the yard, that I actually was able to water and tend to the garden.  The sandbox was a bigger hit than the pool, which surprised me on such a toasty day.

All 4 Monkeys!