Old School Summer Play

Do you remember the good old days of slippin and slidin? I have fond memories of flopping down on that piece of wet plastic, and off I went, barrelling down the path of a wild, watery adventure. Thanks for taking a little walk down memory lane with me :) Well, we broke out the slip n' slide the other day. My neice Katie was visiting. They all had a good time. M loved drinking the water that squirted out the sides. Whatever floats your boat, I guess! I was tempted to set it up on our big hill in the back and let them slide down even super fast, but the instructions said to only do it on level ground. I then thought of what G might try to do if it were on a our hill, and images of a visit to the ER flashed back at me. Needless to say, that thought was quickly killed. We opted for the flat ground and ended up with some safe and fun memories.

Chocolate Lovers

In line for the big coaster...
The coaster
T on the swing


I have a weakness for sweets...especially chocolate. A few years ago, we took a trip to Hershey Park in Hershey, PA. It is a beautiful drive there and only 2 hours away. Our family has been hooked since. Because this past weekend was stake conference at church (which means a get out of teaching day for us teachers), we were feeling a little sponataneous and decided to pick up and go on Friday afternoon. It was the first weekend of summer, so I thought there was no way we'd find a hotel room, but we lucked out. The place wasn't the Ritz, but it wasn't a dump either. We got into the park after 5pm, when people were basically leaving. If any of you go there, I highly recommend this because it is less crowded, less hot, and half the price!

G rode on a good sized coaster. I was pretty surprised that he actually initiated going on it and enjoyed it as well! I, on the other hand, cower at coasters. I think it's something that has come upon me as I have gotten older. I used to love riding coasters...or maybe I really didn't love them, but rode them to avoid looking like a chicken in front of my friends!

The day after Hershey Park, we went to the train museum and also took a buggy ride through the Amish country. Everything is so close and there's so much to do there. Anyone who lives in this area who wants a quick family friendly trip, this is the place!

I am posting one picture above with my one complaint...sharing a bed with some crazy sleepers. I had a bed with the girls and Cedric shared one with G. I did not get a wink of sleep. I saved each kid from falling off the bed probably a gazillion times. The pic. above was taken at 3am. Love how T's head is right up against M's bum!

Ode to the Man

Okay, so I don't want to get all sappy on the blog. I just want to say that I have an important guy in my life who is an awesome father and husband. Happy Father's Day! We love you! Here's a little something we put together for ya!

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Awards and Field Trip

It's starting to bring a tear to my eye thinking that the school year is almost over. These past few weeks it has hit me that my babies are growing up! T had her last day of preschool. She has come a long way this year. I remember how my heart broke as I had to leave her in an unfamiliar place with strange faces. The teachers had to pry her off of me as she cried tears of terror. Despite a rough start, she really came to enjoy it. T will go again for another year this fall before starting Kindergarten. She learned how to write and sound out words. We are so glad we stuck with it!

Her last day was a fun one...moonbounces, snowcones...what girl could ask for more? Then they had a cute slide show and she got her certificate.

I also had an opportunity to tag along on G's field trip. He went to a farm nearby. He was able to go on a hayride, jump on a huge moon bounce, ride tractor bikes, do mazes, and feed animals. It was a blast!

G had his awards ceremony today for Kindergarten. He got an excellence award for spelling.

Here's a proud mom saying, I am so proud of my kids for giving their all this year. Summer, here we come!!!

Here's a little montage of our events...

Photo and video editing at www.OneTrueMedia.com

Biking

I don't know how we mustered up the energy for a bike ride after having field day, camping, and grilling, but if you are on a roll, why stop now? We all went on this cool bike path that we have in Northern VA called the WO & D trail. It used to be railroad tracks that they converted to a bike path. You could even bike all the way to DC (45 mins.-1 hr. car ride) from our house, if you were ambitious enough! We went a couple of miles with the kids to this stone quary. They loved it. Then you'd think we would have called it a day, but Memorial Day is not a holiday without swimming! We headed to the pool (I'll spare you the bathing suit pictures) and then to grandma and grandpa's. We were beat by the end of the day (and long weekend)!

A Visit from Friends

The Sunday after we got home from camping, our friends Dave and Kerry came to visit us from Annapolis with their cute daughter Lacey. We had a wonderful time chatting and playing in the backyard. Of course, we had to fire up the grill and cook some good old burgers and hotdogs. What's Memorial Day without grilling? I think M made a new good friend! Here's a pic of the blonde and the brunette cuties sharing a hug. Thanks for visiting us!

Camping

This year, we decided to get in touch with our adventurous side. Every year, a big group of friends from our ward head out for a fun weekend of camping at Shenandoah National Park. The group grows larger by the year(88 people attended this year). We have never been camping before as a family (the last time was when we were kidless at BYU). We were nervous that the kids would get scared of the bugs and sleeping outside in the dark. However, we declared this year as the year to start the tradition, or at least see if it will ever become a tradition!

So with that said, I stayed up till 3am packing and finishing up on work (G had a field day the next day at school that I had to help at and we left right after). Who ever knew camping would require so much packing? Thankfully, it paid off. To much of our surprise (and delight), camping was a huge hit! The kids loved gathering the firewood and helping dad build the fire. The hike was a little rough; Cedric had to carry T the whole way up and I was stuck with M in a baby carrier (we were too lazy to pack the hiking backpack). G cried half of the way down because his ankle hurt. However, the view at the top was spectacular. It was worth it! G said he'd never do the hike again, however, if you ask him what his favorite part of camping was, he said it was climbing the rocks at the top of the hike. I think he really gained a sense of accomplishment from it! Final verdict: A tradition is born!

Field Day!!!

We had a busy busy Memorial Day weekend. G had his field day at school on Friday. He was lucky enough to have both of us go and help out. We love being involved in his school. It's the best to know all of the kids and the teachers. Plus, you can pick out the good kids from the bad for play dates, ha ha. Anyway, Cedric and I were in charge of the parachute. This was the only activity that wasn't a race and just plain fun. However, we had all of the kids (25) in each class at our station at each time. It was tough getting them all to pay attention and follow instructions. We had to get creative with the stuff they had to do with it. After being sleep deprived from packing (see above posting), it was a little hard to do, but we managed. I think by the last group, we got a groove down, but it took a few trials and errors! We still all had a lot of fun.

Wind=Good Times

We have had a bout of strange weather. The past week it went from downpour to almost 80 degree weather, to this windy, cloudy day. The kids (including Cedric, the big kid) were running around the culdesac trying to fly the kite. G even tied it to his bike. They did pretty well. The girls just watched and laughed at the boys from their luxury jeep for most of it. Our neighbors probably thought we were cooky. I think Cedric ran about a mile by circling around so many times!

Hanging out with the Grandparents

My parents live about 15 minutes away. We are lucky to have them so close. The other day, we went to their house and discovered this nature preserve nearby. It was pretty neat because it was basically a long deck that wrapped around this pond. The kids loved feeding the ducks...or shall I say geese (they kept correcting me if I got it wrong). Here are some pictures of us on our walk.

Farm Fun

Last weekend, all the farms in our county had free tours and wine tasting (which we, of course, did not take advantage of). We are so fortunate to live so close to the country and also close to the city. We can see a mix of different scenes and it's wonderful! We went to an alpaca farm. I thought the kids liked it while we were there, but as we were leaving, I had the following conversation. G: "Mom, I don't ever want to come to this farm again." Me: "Why?" G: "All they had were those Alcapocos and some goats. They just stood there. Like, come on, where are the real animals?" Gotta love the enthusiasm.

The Nation's Capital

We had some family friends visiting from Iowa last week. We had an opportunity to take in all the sites of our nation's capital. It was nice to do the tourist thing for a while. Sometimes we take for granted how close we live to all these neat things. We haven't really taken the kids much because it's usually too crowded and a lot of walking. The kids loved it. We were able to go to the Air & Space Museum, the Museum of Natural History, the White House, Washington Monument, and some other places. Since there were so many pictures, I decided to do a slide show. Hopefully, this will entice all of you that are far away to come visit us!!!!

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