new jammies

Right before we visited NY, Grandma took an Alaskan cruise. Here are the twins in the cute Alaska jammies she brought home for them! Thanks, Grandma!!!!

and a couple shots from today's earlier naptime.....

wordless Wednesday

faster than vacation photos

Just 2 snaps from today. Gretchen picked her outfit and Carl ran to grab his matching one! Ah!! I love matching twins!! (note... that is a size 8 shirt on Carl! Although it is a touch bigger than we normally want his clothes to fit. It was a sale item that didn't come in a smaller size. Still, the 8 isn't insanely huge on him.)

They played outside in the crazy heat for about an hour an a half this morning (which meant I was out there that long, too... neat) and he called her "Minnie" the whole time!

We are really gearing up for the fall vacation!! Both kids are super excited! Gretchen is all talk of eating lunch in Cinderella's castle and Carl just keeps saying, "I can't wait to go to Disney and see Mickey Mouse all day long!" We watched the Disney free planning DVD the other day so the kids could see some attractions and after seeing the Splash Mountain ride, Gretchen came into the kitchen to get me gasping, "Mom! I saw this thing and it wasn't a boat but it went down a waterfall and I HAVE TO GO ON THAT!" I hope I can stomach it! She might be riding things with Lew alone while Carl hangs with me. If he doesn't abandon me to run off looking for Mickey Mouse all day long.

Of course, I have my spreadsheet in place already. I'm only halfway through the unofficial guide so far, though, Angela! That's what I read during my forced 90 minutes outside this morning. In between all the "Mom! Look at this!"-es and "Watch me!"-s, of course!

Smo-Down 2010

I have to admit, I am not exactly sure how the name came to be. I believe it has something to do with the band Moe and the weekend originally revolving around them. (the drummer of Moe is a friend from college). I do know that it's an annual long weekend picnic/camping event held at dear friends' of ours in NY. Lew, Chris & Bob were best friends in high school. I was 2 years behind them; Bob's wife was 1 year ahead of them. They also went to college together - for the most part. Bob was elsewhere and then did get to Buffalo. That's where they picked up Glenn & Woody. Craig & Jackie and Harold & Cathy are friends from Chris' job in Rome after college. Dyana is, of course, Chris' better half! I think that covers everyone in my very primitive timeline fashion.

Anyway, this event has been going on for quite a few years. I remember attending before we had kids. (film days... I would have to dig quite a bit to find a photo from then. Sorry.) The twins attended in August 2006 when they were ~9 months old. I have a mix of film and digital from that weekend because some pictures are scanned in from negatives, but others are digital. I don't have a group shot scanned in on the computer. I'll try to look one up later.

Ah, the days of travelling with 2 bouncy seats, 2 exersaucers, bags of toys, diaper bags, etc are over for us. I miss it somewhat. I don't miss the gear lugging, I miss the tiny people who needed the gear and could sleep easily outside under a shady tree.

We haven't been back since 2006, but that didn't matter. We showed up about 2pm on Saturday (shortly after, Dyana confessed, they had written us off as "no-shows") and got to golf and visit and swim and eat and visit and drink and golf and eat as if we had seen everyone only last weekend. Other familiar faces were absent this year, but it seems everyone understands that life gets busy in the summer and the calendar isn't always cooperative.
The guys hold a golf tournament each year. Gretchen tried to tag along, but at one point she came running up to me sobbing, "The game is over! It's over because one man got the ball in the hole!" She mistook Glenn's hole-in-one (on a par 4 no less) for an automatic win! Glenn probably would have liked that concept. He did go on to win anyway!

This child seems to have her mother's fashion sense. Poor girl! Plastic white pearls go with everything, don't they?
Collette and Gretchen are singing a duet of "Do, Re, Mi" from The Sound of Music!

Dinner was delicious - even without Bob at the grill. Craig stepped right up and cooked the steak to perfection! With so many kids and adults... we had two sittings.

Children's Table:

We had a little playtime after dinner.

I tried to get a cute shot of Madison, but every time I got down on her level to snap one, she got up and came towards me for a little TLC.

Jackie brought glow necklaces for the kiddos and they were very excited and proud!

Then, we headed down to the campfire. Gretchen tried roasting a marshmallow with me, but didn't like the closeness to the fire. Then, she didn't like the idea of a hot marshmallow. Carl bypassed the whole trying-new-things idea and simply ate 5 or 6 "raw" marshmallows before we cut him off. Pure sugar 10 minutes before bed... yippee! Turns out, it didn't matter, he was asleep within 1 minute of hitting the pillow in the tent! Both kids were so excited to be "camping"! You know, sleeping on air mattresses in a tent with a house only steps away for a potty and shower! Gretchen took maybe 3 minutes to drift into dreamland. That meant I could return to the campfire!

The men geared up for a round of night golf where they take smaller bracelet sized glow thingies and stuff them into whiffle golf balls so they can golf at night! For some reason, Lew decided not to go. He mumbled something about not wanting to make his score worse with a bad round of dark night golf. That left him to visit with Dyana, Jackie, Cathy and me. Between us, there are 8 kids ranging in ages from 2 years to 19 years. The conversation was a mom one and Lew confessed later that he should have gone with the guys! Ha ha!

After the golf round, Cathy managed to convince Chris to play chef and make "Pudgy Pies" on the campfire in one of those cast iron pie irons. She had all the ingredients for Pudgy Pie Pizza and Chris did a great job cooking one after another. Harold and Lew were a riot with their goofy yet negative comments about productivity issues occurring from having only one pie iron. By the end of the snack round, H had the design for the sign to hang outside the restaurant franchise in place. Glenn attempted to let others man the music, but in the end, he vetoed many of the requests and kept playing DJ himself. Two couples (us included) did not make it to the end of the campfire, but I hear it lasted until 3 am.

Sunday morning, the twins seemed to wake first. Lew felt he couldn't keep them quiet enough - he's so polite, isn't he? - that he loaded them into the car and took them out for breakfast. He changed them out of their jammies and into their regular clothes right in the parking lot of Friendly's. I'm sure everyone thought he was a Weekend Dad and he probably drew more attention doing that than he knows. Oh well. The worst part is, within minutes of him pulling out of the driveway, all the adults were awake. Well, except Glenn. Coffee was brewing, showers were running, and breakfast hit the table. There was delicious blueberry cake made by Jackie and then she whipped up some yummy French toast as well. For that, we got to use Chris' tasty 2010 homemade maple syrup! Sorry, Lew.

Glenn sneaked out before the group photo. Is that a tradition? Here are the family photos as well as one of the group shots.

Packing up. Right now, Carl is really into car makes and models. (understatement.) Craig and Jackie left first and about a half hour later, Carl came up to me worried. "Where did the Hyundai go?"

Thank you, Chris and Dyana for once again opening your home to us and making us feel just like family! We've got 2011 on the calendar already! I'll be sure to get Lew to make the cookies next year, too!!

still editting photos.....

I'm still pluggin' away at the photos from our vacation. I'll have some to put up later tonight if I have enough energy. I'm also still catching up physically after 2 weeks not in my own bed and a few long days in the car.

Here's a tease... we ate this dinner outside one night at my Mom's. You know, they don't have salt potatoes in NC. They look at you as if you have 3 heads if you ask for them - and the looks of dismay and almost horror grow if you then describe them.

(lettuce from Annie's garden! Local cukes and sweet corn, too)

Still drooling? Well, grab a napkin - because Mom made 2 pies... one rhubarb and one raspberry! Both with fruit from their garden.

I know you are wondering. I wasn't sure if I should come out and say it or keep it to myself. As if, to pick one over the other should be private and personal. Or maybe, I feared if I chose one, then Mom wouldn't make the other one for me again. It was close, but, side-by-side, right here and now, if I were given the choice of only one piece... I'd go for the rhubarb!

we miss NY

When you miss Uncle Kenny a lot.... you should wear his old clothes, of course!Gretchen has on a pair of his old shorts and Carl is wearing his old Mickey Mouse tee shirt!

We actually (oo - I sound like Gretchen. Her favorite word is 'actually') just got back from a great two week visit to NY. I decided not to tip off anyone that our home would be empty until after the vacation. Now, I am wading through tons of photos. I will be posting some stories very soon. I'll try not to bombard you with too many photos... oh cripes... who am I kidding? Stay tuned!!

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By the way - clothing disclaimer: Carl picked his own outfit out... shoes, hat, shorts, shirt... all of it. I do not make my kid go out in dress shoes in the middle of summer. But, when he insists, I also don't fight him on it. It's the classic example of "pick your battles".

they don't make 'em like they used to

We had Cootie as a kid. I can remember the cooties themselves were all the same and much more simple than the ones in the game Carl & Gretchen have.
Now, let me say - the game concept and actual play is fun. The chance element keeps it easy to play fairly with the kids, too. (quick refresher: you roll dice to determine which body part you can add to your plastic bug's body. You must collect head, body, hat, eyes, mouth and 6 legs - each side of the die correlates to a specific body part. The first person to complete their cootie wins.)

Now, the disappointing part.....

The physical game is frustrating! The kids cannot place many of the earned items on the cootie themselves.

The heads do not stay on the body.

The legs are tricky to put on. This might sound whiny - but when you have an independent 4 year old (or 2) and they cannot achieve success it gets, well... buggy! (yeah well, I never claimed to be above bad puns. Deal with it.)

But, winning is always fun! (you really better hope she wins.. she does NOT look like this if someone else wins!)