Last day of vacation - Sat 7/10

We're back from vacation!! I'll start with the last day first, so that it is in the right order on the blog. Yesterday (Sat) we were in Sault Ste. Marie, MI.


Here are Katie and Jessi jumping on me to wake me up!



Here are the girls outside our hotel, playing with mayflies (fishflies). There were lots and lots of them all over the place in the Soo and in Mackinac. As soon as I told the girls that mayflies can't bite because they don't have mouthparts, they decided to play with mayflies nonstop! They wanted to bring them home as pets!

Sat. morning we drove down to see the locks again for a few minutes (no pics, but lots from Friday). Then we started on our drive home. First we stopped in St. Ignace (north side of the Mackinac Bridge) at the Straits State Park.

Such a beautiful view!

We let the girls play in the water for a while. Here's Katie wading around in Lake Huron.

Here's Megan on top of a little kid-made rock island.

Here are the girls with the Mac behind them.

Here's our whole family. Isn't this a great pic?!?

Then we drove over the bridge. It was such a spectacular view...the blues of the water and sky, the greens of the UP and LP...

The Big Mac.

Once we reached the lower peninsula, we stopped at a yummy fish-n-chips restaurant in Mackinaw City and got lunch to go. We found a hidden beach near a lighthouse, and enjoyed our lunch on the beach! Then the girls donned their crocs and started playing in the water of Lake Michigan. Here are the girls trying to re-create the little rock island.

Megan found a heart-shaped rock.

Megan on their little island.

Three girls with the Big Mac behind them. We had fun there for at least an hour. They got soaked playing in the water (no surprise), so we re-dressed them before started home. They all had a nice long nap on the drive home!

It was a wonderful vacation - lots of amazing sights, great weather, and tons of fun together!

4th of July

We just got back from a fun weekend camping adventure with our best friends! We stayed in our friends' back yard, and there were three tents for the three families, and eight kids (ages 2-9) between us!


Kiddy table


We went out on a boat ride to watch the fireworks over Sylvan Lake. Here is our friend Steve with Katie, Jessica, Megan, and Maddy.



We got a little downpour about 10 min before the fireworks started, but we toughed it out. Here's Shari, Rylen, Chris, Jessi, Michael, and Katie.



Here's windblown Jessi enjoying one of many boat rides. We spent much of the day Sat/Sun/Mon on the boat - tubing, swimming, waterskiing, etc! Jessi tried tubing (on Chris' lap) for the very first time this weekend!

Here's a cute shot of Megan on the boat. She loved sitting at the very front.

Maddy and Katie took turns attempting to water ski. Yes, Katie! Here she is in the water, being held by Tom, ready to go!

Here she is starting to get up.

Almost standing! This is the best shot I got. She made it a little ways a few times (and tipped over right away a few times, too). She was so brave to try it in the first place!

Here's proud little Katie!

It was a fun, but exhausting weekend. Lots of hours in the sun, in the water, chasing kids, and making s'mores. We all stayed up late and got up early - darn kids. The weather was great, but waaay too hot. It was 90+ and high humidity every day, and it never really cooled down at night, so we were all sweating in our tents! The a/c at home feels sooooooo good!

Sarah's shower

I almost forgot to post these pics...they happened right after "the poop," (see below) but out of courtesy and respect to Sarah, I didn't include these in that post!! :)

My cousin Sarah is getting married in September, and she had her bridal shower last weekend. It was a super cute Hawaiian/summer theme. The girls scored leis from all of the guests, and had a lot of fun playing with them:

Here are the clowns with Sarah and her fiancee Brandon:

We can't wait for your wedding, Sarah!

Music at the Park

Last Thursday we went to the first session of "Music in the Park" in downtown Rochester. We ran into tons of friends, and so did the girls. A great Irish/folk band played, and the girls went crazy with their dancing!






Jessi started doing an AMAZING Irish jig as soon as they played a fast Irish song. Seriously, the kid put her hands on her hips and started doing a really high skipping dance. She looked like a real live Irish dancer!


Everywhere we go, Jessi dances, and people stop us and ask us if she takes dancing lessons. Nope, she's only two! Here's the Oreo-covered kid taking a snack break:

Katie took this nice pic of us:

Here's a video of some of the dancing...this is a very mediocre part...most of the time she was dancing much more amazing than this, but I couldn't catch it on video, of course. It was so hilarious!

VBS and Poop!

Last Friday was an exciting day of VBS (vacation bible school) and poop! Read on to find out more...

VBS ended on Friday, and all the parents were invited to come for the last half hour to listen to the kids sing lots of songs. It's amazing what they memorized in just a week!


Here's Megan singing:


Here's Katie singing:


Here's Jessi hanging out with her friend Maya (who was in mom-and-tot preschool class with Jessi). They are both excited to be old enough to go to VBS together next year!

Here are Megan and Katie under the baobab tree. The theme this year was Baobab Blast. They loved going all week long, singing songs, making crafts, and doing fun science experiments.

Then Friday night we had even more excitement - Jessi pooped on the potty for the first time ever!! I didn't take any pics of the actual, um, poop, but you can see how proud she is of herself!

We immediately walked to DQ so she could get her VERY OWN Blizzard (as promised).

But after a few bites, she decided that my plain chocolate cone looked better, so she swiped it from me. Thankfully, I like strawberry golden Oreo Blizzards so I didn't mind the swap!

We also went to a store to buy her some Silly Bandz (also as promised). She picked out tie-dye patriotic ones.

Then at home the girls started trading like crazy! They love counting and playing with their Silly Bandz!

What an exciting day!

(PS, Jessi's been a great little pooper-on-the-potty ever since last week. There have been a few accidents, of course, but for the most part she is fully potty trained! She even stays dry through naps and through the night most of the time! If only we could say the same of Katie...)

Fireworks!

Last night we went to our city's fireworks! The weather was perfect (but a little chilly for me), and the crowd was HUGE! Every single inch of Borden Park was jammed with people! I think a lot of cities have stopped their fireworks due to budget cuts, so everyone came to ours this year.

We set out a tarp early in the day to get a good spot, and we walked over right after dinner so we could have time to walk around and score lots of free stuff. The girls got face painting, balloons, balloon animals, stickers, candy, and silly bandz! There was a great live band playing patriotic and big band tunes.


Megan and Katie staked out a good spot under the blankets right before the show started.


Jess hopped up on Chris' lap to watch the fireworks. She was soooo adorable...she didn't remember the fireworks from last year, so this whole event was a whole new experience for her! It was so cute to watch her get excited over every little thing!


Megan snuggled with me...as soon as the fireworks started she declared, "I'm tired." She's exactly like Chris in the sense that when either one of them gets tired, that's it. They go to sleep. No matter when, where, what's happening, etc. So she crawled up on my lap and closed her eyes. I don't think she fell asleep, but she tried to!


Grand finale:


Thanks to our sneaky parking, we were home in just a few minutes after getting to the van. Another fun year at the fireworks!

It's July!

Hard to believe it's July already! I have a few days' worth of pics to catch up on, but I'll start with today's adventures. We went to the library and of course the girls had to walk along the river path:


It's hard to believe this is right in the heart of downtown Rochester, by the library. Here are the cuties posing by the river:


Katie participated in a big kids' event at the library today - making garden art out of recycled products. Here are the two flowers she made out of plastic containers.


After the class we walked to the park and had a picnic lunch...

...which was soon abandoned so they could play in the waterfall and pond!

The tadpoles were big enough to catch this time!

The girls could have spent all day playing in the water, catching tadpoles. We stayed at least half an hour, which wasn't nearly enough, according to them.

Katie found one with tiny legs already!

Megan also found a penny in the waterfall. Did you know she is the BEST coin finder EVER??!! She is! Every single place we go to, she finds at least one coin. Grocery store, sidewalk, doctor's office, parking lot, playground, waterfall...it doesn't matter...she finds money. She has the sharpest set of eyes in the family, that's for sure!