A Busy Day...

Today was the kindergarten field trip to the Pumpkin Patch as well as the Fire Station.  What a beautiful day it was - a little humid, but sunny and warm.  The kids had so much fun today.  I was grateful I was able to go on the trip with them.  

Sissy and her classmates

On Noah's Ark with her BFF

 Taking a wagon ride around the property

 These two are inseparable 

Racing on the mice who were pulling the pumpkin carriage

Daddy's little princess - waiting for her prince

Pumpkin faces

Making a scarecrow face craft

 Having fun with her classmates on the bales of hay

Love her...

Having a few laughs at the firehouse with her girlfriends

All 3 kdg classes listening to the firemen talk about safety

Fireman Billy showing the kids their equipment

They were finished at the firehouse after noon, so I decided to take Kendall home with me from school.  I had hopes of her taking a nap before trick or treating tonight, but that girl is too wound up to close her eyes.  She's gonna be exhausted tonight, but at least I've tried.  I can hear her in her bed reading her Barbie book.  At least she's practicing her reading while her little body rests.

Our New Wake Up Song

This is my new favorite tune in the mornings to help me to get moving...I'm taking Little Man to see Toby Mac live in concert in 18 more days!  Can't wait!  We have floor seats - Row 7 behind the pit, plus we are taking his buddy Connor and his mom (who is Riley's current teacher)!  We are going to have SOOO much fun!

Weekly Beach House Update

We are about 4+ months into this build.  Here's your weekly update:

You can see the siding still isn't completed.  It's been at least 4 weeks since they began.  They have to nail each individual shingle up and they maybe have 5 guys working on it a day...

This is the back of the house & porch looking north towards the street.  The driveway will be between the house and our neighbor's fence.  

This is looking from front to back along the north side of the house.  This side is close to the property line but will have a nice fence between us and the people who build next to us - they are knocking down the house and building something new over the next year or so.

Tile work has also begun in the bathrooms.  We have five full baths in this house.  One downstairs and one in each of the 4 upstairs bedrooms.  

This is the downstairs bath/shower.  

 This is Riley's bathroom.  His floor tile is also on the walls in his bath.  Without lights, it's hard to see the exact colors, but it's going to look so awesome!

This is Kendall's bathroom.  The section missing in the shower will have the same patterned tile but in smaller strips.  The floor is the same pattern but different size tile.  Both kids will be getting pebbles in their shower floors.  They are both excited about this!

This is the quest bath.  The floor is the same as Kendall's but different color - gray.  The subway tile goes on the wall above the tub.

The master bath....Our floor tile and shower wall tile is the same.  We will be getting the same pebbles on our shower floor.  We are putting two shower heads in this bath as well as 3 sprayers.  I think that's so Andy doesn't have to give me a back massage anymore!  ;)

It's hard to be patient when we see so much work getting done.  We have really enjoyed all the neighbors we've been able to meet since this project started.  They've even invited us to participate in the block party on Halloween.  They are going to close down the street so the kids can trick or treat safely and everyone is supposed to come out to their driveways to hand out candy...Is it April yet?

A Busy Weekend

The kids had 2 half days Thurs and Fri last week.  We spent Thursday going out to lunch at our favorite sub shop before heading back to school to meet with Sissy's teacher. 

Turkey sub with Peruvian sauce on the side = YUMMO!

Afterwards we headed over to Riverside to check out a new GF bakery.  This place was SOOOO cute!  It's called Sweet Theory Baking Co.  It's adorable and the baked goods were just as delicious!

Little Man enjoying a GF cupcake named - Double Chocolate Stretch Pants!




















We had to bring some home for the weekend!  The box was empty before dinner on Sunday!

I hit up the bead store while in 5 Points and then let the kids run around at the Riverside Park.  They had a great time.  On the way home we stopped to visit Daddy at work.  It was the first time the kids have ever been inside his office.  Sissy had a tree creation from school that she wanted Daddy to keep in his office.   

We rushed home to get to gymnastics.  Lucky Sis was the only girl in her class Thurs so she got a private lesson!  She loved it and she loves her teacher. 

Friday was just as busy.  Another half day but this time I brought them home to do their cleaning.  They had to dust, vacuum, mop, scrub their bathroom, etc.  The place looked awesome Friday, but come Saturday morning, it was a disaster again!  Ugh.  

Friday night Andy and I went out on a date.  We were long overdue.  We haven't had a date night since Oregon!  We've had a number of busy weekends here lately so we were finally able to squeeze in a date.  I had gotten a restaurant.com certificate for my favorite restaurant/martini & wine bar in AB.  We ate at Ocean 60.  It was as good as I remembered!  After that we did a little bar crawl.  We stopped in at the Ragtime, then hit up a dive bar called Fly's Tie Irish Pub.  The best thing there was the outdoor fire pit.  Reminded me of a few places we use to visit back home!  Then we headed back to Jax Beach.  We stopped in The Pier and then Lynch's Irish Pub.  There was a great band playing at Lynch's.  They played classic rock like Journey, Night Ranger, Boston, Styx.  Andy didn't want to leave but momma was tired.

Here we are at Lynch's enjoying the music.

Saturday was just as busy for us.  I had a hair appt back over in Riverside at 9 and the kids had their school Fall Festival and a birthday party to go to.  Andy took them to the festival and the birthday party and I met them at the party.  We headed back to the festival to catch the last of the fun.  After that we headed over to the house to check on the weekly progress since we missed out on our Friday visit.  

Kendall and her friend Annah at the birthday party.  We are so lucky to have such good friends where all the kids are friends! 

Riley climbing the rock wall at the Fall Festival.  

Momma needed a nap after all that fun - instead, everyone else took one but me!    

By Sunday, we headed to church then Andy took the kids to the park so I could rest in quiet.  I'm grateful for the fun and friends no matter how tired that makes me.

A Benefit of Early Mornings

One blessing about being up so early to take the kids to school is that we see some incredible early morning skies.  From our apt it's difficult to see the entire thing, but the colors off the clouds today were phenomenal!  Here's a pic of this beautiful day the Lord has made.  I'd really like to wake early and take the kids down to the beach to see the entire sunrise...Gotta put it on the bucket list!

Home Sweet Home

During our PSU weekend we also got to spend some time in Lancaster.  Sissy was a little nervous to go to Lancaster because she was afraid she'd feel left out since she's the only one who wasn't born there - usually she's proud of the fact that she was born in Jax, until we are in Lancaster where the rest of us consider it to be our "hometown."  After our trip, she wanted to stay in Pennsylvania.  She had such a great time.

After parting ways with my parents, we stopped by my BFF Beth's house for a visit.  Beth and I have been friends since Toddler Gym (preschool age).  We haven't lived in the same town since high school, but we have managed to stay close and know we can always count on each other no matter what.  There is a lot of security in having a friend like that.  Beth and I were both pregnant with our first borns (both boys) at the same time.  Our boys have been friends since birth and even though they don't see each other often, they are able to pick up right where they left off each time, just like Beth and I do.  It's so heartwarming for us moms to see our boys enjoying each other as much as we do.  

Here are 4 out of 5 of our kids.  They get along so well.

After we left Beth's house, we decided to make a quick stop in Hershey to take a quick ride through Chocolate World.  I wish we could have stayed longer, but we had plans for dinner.  The kids loved the ride and picking out a piece of chocolate from the shop.  You can find Hershey's everywhere, but some of the bigger sized stuff - things we always took for granted - were hits with our kids. Riley picked out a HUGE Hershey bar and Kendall picked out one of those GIANT sized Hershey's kiss.  

After we left Hershey, we drove to Lancaster.  Along the way, we took the kids on a walk down memory lane with us.  We explained things to them that they didn't know or understand - things like silos, bank barns, tobacco barns, chicken farms, pig farms, windmills, etc.  I forget our kids don't see these things every day like I did as a kid.  We headed over to Lancaster Brewing Company where we met up with some of Andy's family.  His mom, dad, dad's girlfriend, aunt, and one cousin with his daughter were able to join us.  It was wonderful to be able to visit with a lot of people at one time.  The kids were able to visit with their grandparents as well.  

After dinner I drove the family down to our hotel.  We stayed at Willow Valley (or what use to be Willow Valley).  It's owned by Hilton now and the old restaurant and inn have been torn down.  The kids LOVED the pool at the hotel.  While the kids went to bed, Andy watched the Dallas game and I drove back downtown and met up with some of my CV friends.  It was so awesome to see some of them and catch up over a few drinks.  I have missed them so much!

Easy to see why the kids loved our hotel, huh?  This is a big reason why we stayed at Willow Valley.

The next morning we woke up and headed to Columbia to the Turkey Hill Experience.  Along the way, we took the kids on a tour of our old stomping ground.  We showed them downtown, where my grandpa use to work at Hamilton Watch, the significance of Wheatland, the local TV station where Uncle Matt worked in college, where the old Mc Donald's use to be on Columbia Ave before it moved down the road and how it was a big deal to go to McD's as a kid.  We also showed them Hambright school where my dad and Uncle Kevin went to school.  We also told them that Pappy Hershock's grandfather built Hambright.  We showed them where Pappy Hershock grew up and how he lived in a house with his grandma, aunt and uncle.  We showed them where Uncle Kevin bowled as a kid and the road his parents still live on - Kendall wanted to visit his parents!  We also showed them where my parents got married, where my mom grew up and the road where we lived while waiting for our Millersville house to be built and the church where we got married.  Riley was impressed at how much of our family history was in such a small radius.  Both kids want to  go back and see the rest of the area where mom and dad grew up.

We finally arrived at the Turkey Hill Experience.  If they thought we had family history in Lancaster, we sealed it up here.

This is Chubb Frey.  His family started and continue to run Turkey Hill Dairy.  He and my grandfather were best friends.  My grandpa worked for Chubb for many years.  Chubb actually spoke at my pappy's funeral and his wife spoke at my nanny's funeral.  

This is my pappy - first row, second from the left.  

Andy and I love the Indian head on the old Turkey Hill signs.  It is significant in terms of the location of the dairy.

After the tour through the THE, the kids got to sample tea and ice cream.  Might have been their favorite part!

My two favorite NUTS!

We use to have a milk man drive a truck like this to our house every week.  Our milk man was awesome!  He use to love my cat and would let me play in his truck.  It helped that he was also friends with my pappy!

After our time at the THE, we headed to Baltimore to fly back to Jax.  The kids were both sad to leave.  They had a fantastic time.  We'd like to make a trip back up in the summer so the kids can see where we grew up, where we spent our childhood.  It was bittersweet for everyone.