PA '09

Words can not express what a fabulous time we had on our 1st family vacation with 4! We were warmly welcomed by Kristen's family with open doors, beds and hearts, plus tons and tons of food! It was so wonderful to stay at a house fully equip with ALL the necessary baby supplies. We didn't have to bring a single thing for Leah. Seth and Jacob had the run of the house and Nana Mary took such great care of them. I took 134 pictures in 4 days so I will share a few of the best...

We started out the vacation trying to find a letterbox near Kristen's parents house. After a very long and buggy walk we were unsuccessful and totally bummed, but we tried!

So then we went for ice cream to a place called Blue Ribbon. It was the most amazing ice cream I have ever had and I don't even usually like ice cream. We liked it so much that we went back on Saturday night too!
On Friday we headed to Sesame Place and it was the best park I have ever been to for kids. It was the perfect size and the kids had the BEST time. (the parents had an amazing time too!) It's fun to be a kid again.
Seth and Jacob are finally old enough for water rides so they took full advantage. They even went on a smaller roller coaster and loved it too!
Thank goodness it was one of the only 80 degree days of the summer so they could enjoy the water to the fullest.
Seth and Roland lounged in the lazy river while Leah and I people watched. I found a prime location for people watching while Leah had her lunch. I saw some very interesting characters.
Seth has absolutely no fear of characters in full on costume and he flocked to any and all of his friends from Sesame Street.
A sweet treat to finish off lunch. Seth took one bite of the frosting and said he was full. I was totally fine with that and finished it myself. It was delicious!
Leah loved the water and the people watching too! She looks too cute in that bathing suit. (Thanks Maya for letting her use it this summer!)
Next summer she will be running around in the water and having all sorts of fun! Watch out boys she will be coming after you soon.
With no nap and a full day of water this is what Seth looked like at the hotel at 8pm on Friday night. He was out like a light!
On Saturday we went to the Please Touch Museum in Philly and we told Seth specifically that he would not hear us say "You can't touch that!" at all that day. He was told to explore any and everything he could. He was in heaven!
Yes, that is me in a giant human size hamster wheel. I held my own pretty well! See, even the adults could play!
Roland and Seth had a tea party in the Alice in Wonderland exhibit at the Please Touch.
Grocery shopping with Daddy while Seth cashed him out.
I have soooooo many more wonderful pictures that I'd like to share with you. The trip was just so much fun and we have so many wonderful memories to take away from it. We are so lucky to have met The Castana's and to have been able to go on this trip with them. We were able to see where they come from and have a window into their world. We plan to take many more family trips together over the years and to come and visit them wherever the army may take them. Although I'd like the army to permanently station them right here for ever and ever.

I will post a few more of the best pics from the trip tomorrow. There are some that are extremely funny of Roland playing dress up at the museum so stay tuned!

Signing Off

We will be Internet free for a few days so we are signing off. We will have all sorts of adventures to report when we return from PA. Have a great remainder of the week and weekend to all!

Checking In

** I went for my second golf lesson last night with Kristen and if you can believe it...I am definitely improving! I feel much much better about my stance and my swing and I think I only missed about 10 shots out of two huge buckets of balls. It all started to click. Now I need to work on my distance. I'm hitting only about 75 yards, but it is up and straight so I am happy. We go back next week for our third lesson and we are working on distance and putting.

**We want to wish a special belated Happy Birthday to our niece Elise. We sent her wishes yesterday, but I didn't have time to post on the blog. She is now 5 and will head off to kindergarten this fall. Where does the time go??

** The packing for our trip is complete and we will be ready to head out tomorrow morning. Pray that Leah sleeps in the car or else it might be a long 3 hours. We are headed to Kristen's parents on Thursday, Sesame Place on Friday, the Please Touch Museum on Saturday and then back to Kristen's parents for a second overnighter and home on Sunday at some point. We are very excited to be going somewhere new so I am sure that I will have tons and tons of pics to share.

** In case I don't get a chance to post tomorrow morning we would also like to wish Sarah a Happy Birthday. We won't even discuss that she isn't even 30 yet and she still has a couple of years in her 20s. Have a great day and we will celebrate at dinner next weekend. I'll make reservations when I return from our trip.

** If it stops raining we are headed to the Farmer's Market. YES, it is raining here again!

For time sake we bathed the kiddos together last night and it was just too precious! To many more years of bath time fun!

4 Month Checkup

This morning Jen watched Seth for me while Leah and I went to the docs for her 4 month check and shots. She smiled during everything, even after the first shot she was still smiling, but the second one must have made her extremely mad because I have never seen her face so red. She was not a happy camper any longer. The magic of the truck motor calmed her though because about one minute into the drive home and she was out and fast asleep.

Leah's 4 month stats are as follows...

Weight: 15lbs.

Length: 25 1/2 inches long

She is thriving in all areas and we go back in two months!

Golf Outting

Sunday morning I had the brilliant idea to find a sitter for Leah and have Roland, Seth and I go golfing. I really needed to practice a bit before my next lesson on Tuesday and I thought it would be a great outing for Roland and Seth. Seth has this new LOVE of golfing and since Tom bought him his own clubs he has been dying to try them out. It was a win win for us all.

Roland was extremely helpful in a couple of the areas I was struggling with. I am definitely not a natural born golfer, but I am willing to keep trying and hopefully improve.

This score card is incorrect in so many ways, but the 2 holes that I actually tried are circled. I know you are totally laughing, but I tried and it was my first attempt with only one lesson under my belt. As you can see I attempted the 9th hole and ended up in a pond so that was the end of the night and we were off to dinner!

4th of July Festivities

The weather was so up in the air that we had many different plan options for the 4th, but we just had to make a decision. We had planned to spend the 4th with our friends The Voss', but we were holding off until the day arrived to decide what to actually do. In the end a mutual friend offered up his vacant cottage on the lake for us to hang out at and we all had a great day. The weather was iffy and even a little rain fell, but we made the most of all of the good weather that came our way.

The mom's were trying to play ladder golf, but this interrupted us! At least they are smiling.
Leah was entertained well.
Texas Horseshoes
The Voss' braved the water with the kids while I took pictures.
Don't ask Rod what is underneath the towel!
Seth's 1st sparklers!
He was instantly addicted!
We had a great great day, but paid for it last night with lack of naps for both kids. Seth woke up at 11pm screaming and couldn't catch his breath from crying so hard. He was more than overtired! Roland finally calmed him down and got him back to sleep and he was up at 6am. Nap time will come early for Mr. Seth today. Leah was also out of sorts because she only took short naps yesterday so she went to bed early and was also up at 11pm crying and then up for a bottle at 3am. Hopefully she will get some catch up rest today as well.

It was a great 4th of July though, oh so memorable!

Happy 4 Month Birthday Leah Bean!

The past 4 months have been so wonderful. You are a very calm and content little girl who loves to smile and now who lives to laugh! You are rolling all over the place from belly to back and back to belly. We can't leave you alone in a room for too long because we don't know what position you will be in when we return. You love to take in all the sights of the world and not miss a thing. I sometimes wonder how you don't get whip lash from moving your head back and forth so quickly so that you don't miss a thing! You have started cereal and LOVE it so we can't wait to move on to bigger and better foods to see your likes and dislikes. We love you very much Miss Leah!

Milestone Moment

When Seth was 4 months old I was super excited to try cereal for the first time. We had the camera ready, the bib on and we were ready to introduce solids into his diet. Well, he basically HATED it and spit every last bit of it out and onto me. Last night we had the same high hopes for Miss Leah's first time with cereal and she LOVED it! They are such different kids it is scary.

Now I am oh so excited to try other fruits and veggies when the time comes! Our little girl is growing so quickly, she will be officially 4 months old on Sunday!

Mommy/Seth Day

Today was the first time since Leah was born that I actually took a whole day to spend with Seth and only Seth. While I was on maternity leave I couldn't bare to leave Leah so now that she is used to going to Pat's we are going to try and do a bi-weekly special Seth day. Seth took full advantage of his day starting from the moment that Roland took Leah out the door. We watched Happy Feet, colored, worked in our Pre-school workbooks and since it was a rainy day we had to revert to plan B which was to go to the mall to the new pottery store and paint pottery. Seth looked over all the options and in the end he picked a dinosaur to paint.

Seth was able to pick out the colors, the brushes and paint it any way that he wanted to. We will pick up the finished product in a couple of weeks. After our painting we grabbed a pretzel, ran into his teacher for the fall and then went to the arcade where he thought that spending 8 quarters was like a million dollars. In the end he got a tootsie roll pop and three tootsie rolls with his winning tickets. He was happier than I have seen him in a while! Right now he is currently napping and I was able to sit on the couch in total quiet for over an hour before I started working on my master list of things to accomplish! How come that list never gets any shorter??

It was a great day with my little man, I hope that he enjoyed his mommy time!

Happy Belated 21st Birthday!

Last night we celebrated my sister Dayna's 21st Birthday a little late, but nonetheless fun! She picked the menu and then Seth and I made cookies for dessert.
Seth must have asked at least 10 times after dinner when it was time for cookies. Finally we gave in even though we were all stuffed from dinner. We did have to cut him off after 3 cookies though!

Farmer's Market

We took our first stroll of the summer down to the farmer's market today and I thought that Leah was going to miss it all together as she fell fast asleep on the way there, but she awoke in time to take in all the sights.

We ran into tons of friendly faces, had some lunch and bought some wine! What more could you ask for? Tonight we are having Dayna over for her birthday dinner as well as Dad and Sue. It should be a fun filled evening!

Tomorrow Leah is going to spend the day with Miss Pat while I take time to have a special day with Seth. Our first special day alone since Leah has been born. I have a sunny day plan and a rainy day plan so stay tuned...